Melissa Bailey Photo
As a popular East Rock deli relaunches plans to expand its operation, it’s looking beyond its property boundaries for new parking spots.
After withdrawing a previous proposal amid neighborhood skepticism, the Italian market, Nica’s, at 601 Orange St. has launched a second attempt to “decongest” its cramped aisles and deli area.
The Sabino family, which owns the market, filed an application before the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) on March 19, in time to get on the agenda for next Tuesday’s BZA meeting. On Tuesday afternoon, Calvin Weingart (pictured) of Godfrey Hoffman and Associates, a land surveying firm, was carefully measuring the property lines around Nica’s to make way for the new development.
The proposal calls for a bigger kitchen and retail area, a new second floor with 12 seats for customers — and a new parking lot in an off-site location on Humphrey Street.
The new plan met with some initial concern by the neighborhood’s alderman.
Relief Sought
Except for a new parking component, much of the proposal is similar to the last one, which was presented to East Rock neighbors last June, then withdrawn a month later due to neighborhood concern about too many cars and delivery traffic in a residential zone. To get approval to waive zoning laws, an applicant has to show hardship.
The plan would expand the first floor in order to provide more room in the kitchen, the deli/ retail space, and to put in a new stairwell to a new upstairs space. The current upstairs, which now holds a modest office, would be totally redone. The new plan would expand the upstairs offices to 1,028 square feet, and add room for restrooms and for 12 customers to sit down and eat. The end result would be a new storefront, and more room to shop, cook and eat.
The new seating area would not turn Nica’s into a restaurant, states the application, written by attorney Tony Avallone. There would be no wait service, no new employees and no expanded business hours, he said.
“Customers have asked for some seating during the winter and inclement weather,” Avallone wrote. Unlike the previous plan, this one does not include outdoor seating on the roof.
The purpose of the expansion is “not to draw more customers, but to service the existing customer base,” according to Avallone. For that reason, Nica’s does not expect a significant increase in traffic, he wrote.
Melissa Bailey File Photo
Current conditions at Nica’s are cramped. At noon, at least five deli workers shuffled between counters and the panini press, and a line of over a dozen people wrapped into the frozen food aisle, which is only one person wide. In a pause between making sandwiches, owner Joe Sabino (at center in photo) said he was too busy to talk. He referred comments to Avallone, who could not be reached.
The Sabino’s new plan would increase the building’s footprint by 72 percent, adding 1,754 square feet to the 2,446 square-foot space. The second floor would be expanded from 410 to 1,898 square feet.
The new plan asks for relief from several zoning laws concerning rear and side yard setbacks, building height, lot coverage, and parking.
The plan asks for two 0‑foot side yard setbacks where 8 and 10 feet are required; a 5‑foot rear yard setback where 25 feet are required; a 32-foot building height where only 10 feet are allowed in the rear, and where 0 are allowed on the side yard; 85 percent lot coverage where 30 percent is allowed; and permission to locate nine parking spots off-premises.
Parking Solution
The location of the new parking lot is drawing a few raised eyebrows.
By zoning law, Nica’s has to come up with nine more parking spaces to accommodate the expanded business, according to its application. The market calls for a new parking lot on a separate lot, behind 355 Humphrey St.
To get to the new lot, Nica’s customers would have to drive around to Humphrey Street and enter a driveway next to the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. In a recent visit, the gravel lot (pictured) was marked with numbered spaces. The path to the lot cuts across property lines of three neighbors. In order for either proposal to gain city approval, Nica’s would have to show that three nearby property owners have granted the market an easement to cut across their properties. The application did not address that issue.
The application does not say how customers would get from Nica’s from the new lot. The most direct route would be down this alleyway (pictured) next to people’s homes. To get to the market without cutting through someone else’s side yard, customers would have to walk an estimated 700 feet, back down the driveway to Humphrey, up to Orange, and through the front entrance to Nica’s.
Nica’s is drumming up support for the new plan through a petition at the store. The petition says Nica’s wants to decongest the store and give customers more room to shop comfortably.
East Rock Alderman Roland Lemar said he had not studied the new plans in detail, but he shared an initial concern: “With any expansion in a residential zone,” he said, there’s the danger that “the impervious space might be too much.”
While Nica’s is a “wonderful asset” to the neighborhood, he said, the plan may bring “too much of a good thing.”
“It might upset the character of our streets,” he said.
This is one of those situations where parking zoning makes no sense. If the business states that they wish to more efficiently serve their existing customer base, and not expand staff in any way, why the need for 9 new parking spaces?
While I think that the building proposed is a bit big for the lot, if the business is not seeking to expand actual operations, taking over another lot for parking doesn't make sense. Now you end up with this ridiculous satellite lot that no one is going to use rather than just encouraging people to park on the street.