Woodstock recently hosted a presentation on what land could be developed if proposed zoning changes are adopted. Judith Kerman, member of the now-disbanded task force and current vice-chair of the planning board, provided the information.
The town’s Housing Oversight Task Force worked on a series of zoning changes designed to promote more affordable housing to address a drastic need. Some opponents fear this will give carte blanche to developers.
Basically, the changes limit development on land which has environmental constraints. Constrained land would be subtracted from the land that could be developed.
“The impacts of zoning codes are complex as they interact with the actual characteristics of land and possible land uses. This is the case in Woodstock as it is elsewhere. There has been a fair amount of confusion and concern about how much density Woodstock might face based on what can be developed now,” said Kerman. “I hope to give viewers a better understanding of the current land-use situation in Woodstock and demonstrate some of the ways the proposed new zoning has the potential to physically limit or constrain development and increased protection of environmental resources,”.
The implementation of net acreage was discussed.
“This approach to land use removes all the areas with environmental constraints — that is, where building and associated disturbance should not occur — from the calculation of acreage proposed for zoning purposes on a parcel of land,” Kerman explained. “The net buildable acreage — that is the maximum number of potentially permissible dwelling units based on zoning — would be calculated from the remaining area of a parcel after the acreage subject to constraints has been subtracted.”
Under the new code, the permissible location of buildings, parking, septic, etc., would be identified as a building envelope on the buildable acres specified during the approval process of the subdivision. All development would have to take place within that building envelope, as well as follow all other zoning and subdivision requirements.
A lot of Woodstock land has steep slopes, defined as those with greater than 25 percent grade. Current zoning allows building on land up to a 35 percent slope, while the proposed revisions restrict it to 15 percent slopes. she explained.
Large swaths of land owned by the New York City Department of Environmental Protection are also protected from development.
Under the current code, multifamily homes — three units or larger — are permitted in every district except R-8.
The current zoning, Kerman said, placed no specific upper limit to the total number of units allowed on a parcel. That was determined by the size of the parcel. “So a very large parcel could have many more units in the current zoning than will be permissible in the proposed zoning.”
The proposed code also limits multi-family building to no more than eight units per building for a two-story structure. This limit does not exist in the current code.
The presentation is available on the town’s YouTube channel at https://youtu.be/1AuOVDSD2Fk. Maps detailing developable lands are available at https://townwoodstock.digitaltowpath.org:10111/content/Generic/View/65.
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