Schools

More Houses for Pansy Road

Street Next to Town's Most Overcrowded Elementary School Had Earlier Development Plan That Reached State Supreme Court

Elizabeth Farina's lived on Pansy Road for 58 years and was one of the leading critics of a development proposal that added six houses next to the town's most overcrowded elementary school last year.

But Farina is taking in stride the latest proposed development on her street, which calls for two houses to be built on nearly three acres of vacant land a short distance away.

"They're in the regulated area that they can build. There's a lot of building going on on the street," Farina said Monday evening.

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In addition to the two houses planned just south of 220 Pansy Road, Farina said two houses on Pansy Road have been knocked down and are being replaced with larger homes and another house was built on her street since the six houses were erected next to Osborn Hill School.

"Probably Pansy Road was the hidden piece of undeveloped property in the town of Fairfield, and, now that the dam has been broken, everyone's building," Farina said.

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The two houses proposed just south of 220 Pansy Road would have lot sizes of 1.47 acres and 1.5 acres, which greatly exceed the minimum lot size of 9,375 square feet, or one quarter-acre, required by town zoning regulations.

William Fitzpatrick, the attorney for Marion Sperry and Diane Mongonel, Trumbull residents and the owners of the property and applicants, said the lot sizes were so large because of the property's configuration. "The property is so deep, it goes all the way back to Old Navy," Fitzpatrick said, referring to a business on Black Rock Turnpike. "It's just a very, very deep piece."

The development application is now in the town's Conservation Department, but the time period to file a petition for a public hearing has expired, and the department is recommending that the application be approved. Fitzpatrick said the development plan did not require approval from the Town Plan and Zoning Commission because the lots already exist and the development is not a subdivision, where one large parcel is divided into smaller parcels.

Objections to the earlier development on Pansy Road were mostly based on the potential for more traffic and the developers' plan to build houses on "rear lots" that lacked access to an existing street. The Town Plan and Zoning Commission had rejected that development plan, but Ed Pinto and Dean Kardamis, the developers, sued the TPZ and the case eventually reached the state Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the developers.

Town Attorney Richard Saxl said today that the high court ruled the TPZ could not cite off-site traffic as a reason for denying the application, while the trial had ruled it could.

While traffic and aesthetics were main objections to that development, Farina on Monday evening also brought up the effect of new homes on enrollment at Osborn Hill School, which is the only public elementary school with more than 500 students.

Osborn Hill School had 547 students as of March 1 - 69 students more than Mill Hill School, which was the elementary school with the second-highest number of students as of March 1.

Farina said three of the six houses built in that development were occupied, and she estimated that a total of 10 children lived in those houses. "That's half a classroom. If you get 10 more kids in the other three houses, you have a full classroom," she said.

Farina said she thought the town should have bought the property where the six houses had been built in case Osborn Hill School needed to be expanded. The town late last year attached a modular annex onto the back of Osborn Hill School in lieu of building an addition.

But Farina didn't seem to mind the appearance of the six houses, saying they were better than an enormous home closer to the street that would have blocked out the setting sun. "I guess I'm getting used to it, and c'est la vie," she said.


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