11/14/08
Business zone overhaul proposal sent to Town Council committee
The Town Council's ordinance subcommittee will review a package of zoning-ordinance amendments designed to revamp some of the town's business districts into more neighborhood-friendly business zones.
At their meeting Nov. 10, the council referred the recommended amendments to committee. The package was recommended to the council by the Planning Board last month.
The overhaul of the Business A District is a recommendation of the town's 2007 Comprehensive Plan, and affects two areas in Cape Elizabeth that are zoned Business A - one along Shore Road at the border with South Portland; and the other along Route 77 between Broad Cove Road to beyond Kettle Cove Road and the Kettle Cove Takout and Dairy Bar.
"The amendments have been drafted to revise the regulations for the Business A District to represent a neighborhood business district, as recommended in the Comprehensive Plan," said Town Planner Maureen O'Meara, in a memo to the Town Council. The board voted to send the amendments to the Town Council after holding a public forum in April, several workshops and a public hearing.
"The changes include definitions, permitted uses, performance standards and new design standards," O'Meara's memo says.
"The amendments package also includes a recommendation to reduce the wetland setback to 100 feet in the BA District for properties served by public water and sewer," it says.
At a public hearing in October, citizens opposing the amendments had several concerns, including the proposed definition of a restaurant as an establishment where less than 50 percent of sales are from alcohol. The board clarified the definition to say the sales were to be calculated annually.
Neighbors of the BA districts also objected to the wetland amendment, which would allow businesses in the Route 77 district to expand by reducing the wetland buffer.
Neighbors of the Shore Road business district also opposed a proposal to add property at 553 Shore Road to the business zone.
At the Nov. 10 Town Council meeting, neighbors organized as the North Shore Neighborhood Association objected to the rezoning and to asked for less business intensity.
While the amendments propose to expand the business district along Shore Road, they also seek to revert part of the business district along Route 77, behind the former Jordan's Agway, to residential zoning.
The ordinance committee will likely wait until after the Town Council caucus Nov. 20, when subcommittee members for the year will be named, to schedule their review of the proposed amendments.
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