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zoning

Public debate of North East's zoning overhaul continuing April 9

Public debate of North East's zoning overhaul continuing April 9
The Town of North East’s Boulevard District — a stretch of Route 44 between Millerton and the New York State border — is the town’s largest commercial zone. The proposed zoning rewrite would allow mixed-use buildings with residential apartments above ground-floor retail.
Photo by Aly Morrisey

MILLERTON — The North East Town Board will continue the public hearing on proposed zoning amendments at its regular meeting on Thursday, April 9.

The April hearing will be the fifth public discussion of the drafted zoning overhaul that seeks to broadly update the town zoning code's language, improve readability and modernize zoning rules in the town's main commercial district along Route 44 between the Village of Millerton and the New York-Connecticut state line.

Town Board members have opted to amend portions of the draft code. The most recent draft of the code is available on the town's website, townofnortheastny.gov, as of Wednesday, April 1.

Since January, board members have opted to allow additional retail uses in the Boulevard West district, which includes parcels from the eastern border of the village along Route 44 to Kelsey Brook, a tributary of Webatuck Creek. The additional retail uses will allow sales of pre-fabricated sheds and playground equipment after a request from property owner Rob Cooper.

Among the more substantive revisions was the decision to impose an overall size cap on accessory dwelling units. The board voted to limit ADUs to a maximum of 1,200 square feet and specified that they must be accessed from an existing driveway on the property. Board members also discussed adding language to clarify how ownership through an LLC or trust would comply with the requirement that the property owner reside in the principal dwelling.

Other adopted changes to the code include breaking up long sentences in some definitions to improve clarity. Board members also opted to require new parking lots to construct at least 10% of spaces with electric vehicle-ready equipment for later installation of EV chargers, and to require marked pedestrian infrastructure and lighting in all parking lots.

One revision — which would have allowed retail businesses and restaurants in the so-called Irondale District, a small commercial area encompassing seven parcels along Route 22 near Winchell Mountain Road and Irondale Road — was repealed at the board's March 20 meeting after sharp criticism from the town’s Zoning Review Committee, residents and the Village of Millerton’s Board of Trustees.

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