IOP zone, housing densities focus of plan
By: John Tredrea
Hopewell Township’s potential for nonresidential development would be reduced substantially if a rezoning ordinance introduced on first reading by the Township Committee May 18 is adopted.
The proposed ordinance would eliminate the Industrial Office Park (IOP) zone. The largest area of land affected by the proposed ordinance is on the west side of Scotch Road, located north of I-95 and extending nearly as far west as Jacob’s Creek. Included in this area is 440 acres purchased about a year and a half ago by Merrill Lynch, which is building a 3.5 million-square-foot office park on the east side of Scotch Road, also just north of I-95.
The impetus for the proposed ordinance scrapping the IOP zone, Mayor Marylou Ferrara said, is local government’s perception that the township, which she termed “one of the few parts of central New Jersey that still has a sense of rurality … is facing unprecedented pressure for development.”
The ordinance that would eliminate the IOP zone is scheduled for a public hearing at a special Township Committee meeting, at 7 p.m. June 21 in township hall.
The mayor encouraged anyone with questions on the ordinance to put them in writing and give them to the township clerk, thus giving officials an opportunity to research their answers before the public hearing, at which an adoption vote on the ordinance also could be cast.
The mayor added that a copy of the ordinance eliminating the IOP, along with another proposed ordinance that would reduce the permitted density of residential development in much of the township and a map showing how the township would be zoned if all the changes go through, were scheduled to be left with the clerk and at the township branch of the county library system by May 19. That library is on the northern side of Pennington-Titusville Road, about a quarter-mile west of state Route 31.
According to the map of the proposed changes, the area west of Scotch Road would be changed to Valley Agricultural, a new zone that would be created by the residential rezoning ordinance introduced by the committee May 18. Valley Agricultural (VA) would allow one housing unit per four acres. Under the proposed rezoning, VA would replace the R200 zone, which allows two units per acre. Like the R200 it would replace, large areas of VA zone would be in the central, east-central and west-central township.
Another new zone, Mountain Conservation (MC), which would allow six-acre lots and replace the R250 zone, would include almost all of the northern fourth of the township.
At the May 18 meeting, the committee vote on the proposed residential rezoning was unanimous, as was the vote to give official status to the map showing all the proposed rezonings.
John Hart abstained on the proposed elimination of the IOP zone, saying he wanted to study it further. Mr. Hart said he is concerned elimination of the IOP zone could result in the township being sued by owners of affected properties.
Voting in favor of both proposed rezonings, and of the map, were Mayor Ferrara, Deputy Mayor Jon Edwards, Committeewoman and former Mayor Kathy Bird-Maurice and Committeeman Robert Higgins, all Democrats. Mr. Hart is a Republican.
The mayor said the ordinances, if adopted, would have no effect on developments that already have been approved.
Township Engineer Paul Pogorzelski said that, under the current township zoning code, IOP areas in addition to the west side of Scotch Road are located off the eastern side of state Route 31, between Titus Mill Road and county Route 654, and along Reed Road, near Diverty Road. These tracts are much smaller than the one on the west side of Scotch Road, and would be rezoned for “mixed use” — a blend of light industry, office and commercial,” the mayor said.
The proposed rezoning comes on the heels of a recent report by township planner Michael Bolan that current township zoning allows a potential 18 million square feet of nonresidential development, only 6.3 million square feet of which has already been approved and thus would not be affected by a rezoning.
“Enough is enough,” Committeewoman Bird-Maurice said of the township’s current stock of standing and approved nonresidential development. “Our roads are already at capacity.” Ms. Bird-Maurice noted Mr. Bolan’s estimate that, if all nonresidential development allowed under the current township zoning code were enacted, 155,000 more cars would come in and out of the township each working day.
Such a traffic impact would be “totally unmanageable and unacceptable,” said Committeeman Jon Edwards. Addressing residents in township hall that night, Mr. Edwards added: “I know your commuting times have gotten longer … they’re going to get a lot longer still if we don’t act” on the zoning changes.
Responding to Mr. Hart’s comment that the IOP elimination could result in the township being sued by one or more property owners, Ms. Bird-Maurice said the township has the right and the power to “change the zoning to suit the conditions it finds.”
Committeeman Higgins also hailed the proposed rezonings. Mr. Higgins, the committee member assigned to Public Health by Mayor Ferrara, said: “These ordinances are a vital first step in public health protection … it is reasonable to fear that build-out under current zoning could threaten” the quality of water township residents get from their wells, and also could threaten to lower, below minimum requirements of daily living, the amount of water those wells would be able to provide.
George Hawkins, executive director of the Stony Brook-Millstone Watershed Association, was enthusiastically in favor of the rezonings. “The step that’s being taken now is a fundamental step that will unite the township,” he predicted. “Our children will bless us if we do this and damn us if we don’t.”
Based on statements of township planner Michael Bolan, his predecessor William Queale and other local officials, the actual impact of changing R200 to VA and R250 to MC will be negligible. They say that, due to environmental constraints such as soil conditions and steep slopes, most of the area in the proposed VA zone can only sustain 4-acre lots, and most of that in MC can only sustain 6-acre lots, which is what the new zoning code would provide. “This is what we’re practicing already … and have been for 10 years,” was how Mr. Hart described the proposed residential zoning changes during the May 18 meeting.
In the same report to the Planning Board that said 18 million square feet on nonresidential zoning is possible under current zoning, Mr. Bolan said 4,800 new housing units could be added to the current stock of 5,500 units. However, Mr. Bolan noted that the 4,800 figure is based on lot sizes that would be enacted by the proposed rezoning.
The mayor and Ms. Bird-Maurice are the Township Committee members who are also on Planning Board. Under state law, the board must review the proposed zonings, and respond to them in writing to the Township Committee, before the committee may cast an adoption vote on the ordinances that would enact the changes.