Barsky Brothers project opposed by neighbors.
By: Jennifer Potash
The Princeton Regional Planning Board will continue the public hearing for a proposed new housing development along an eastern stretch of Nassau Street on Thursday.
A group of neighbors have objected to the plans, maintaining the proposal will create large-scale houses on small lots that will loom over the existing and more modest homes nearby, compromising privacy for those residents.
Barsky Brothers Holdings Corp. of Witherspoon Street is seeking to subdivide 1.42 acres of land on two existing lots into five new lots, convert an existing three-story frame house previously subdivided for apartments back into a single-family residence, and build four new residences with two-car attached garages.
The development would be located in the R-3 zone, which permits single-family homes on lots with a minimum size of 7,200 square feet.
The proposed lots for the new houses range in size from 8,794 square feet to 10,837 square feet. The new residences are between 3,572 and 4,270 square feet in size. The lot for the existing house will be 22,096 square feet and the developer has agreed to a restriction that the lot will be limited to a single-family residence.
Access to all of the houses would be from an 18-foot driveway named Barsky Court and connect to an existing horseshoe-shaped driveway that will form a courtyard for the new residences.
The development will require variances for a rear-yard setback and for establishing new lots that do not abut an improved public street. The project was designed by the Lambertville architectural firm Minno and Wasko.
The plans have undergone many changes following suggestions from the borough’s Historic Preservation Review Committee and the Site Plan Review Advisory Board of the Planning Board.
Neighbors on Queenston Place, Linden Lane and Nassau Street have formed the East End Zoning Watchdogs. They maintain that a 4,000-square-foot house on an 8,000-square-foot lot will overwhelm the neighborhood. By comparison, the existing houses, mostly built in the early 20th century, range between 3,000 and 3,500 square feet, but the lot sizes are considerably larger ranging between 15,000 and 25,000 square feet, said a spokesman for the group, which has retained a lawyer and a planning consultant.

