Farmington's Town Plan and Zoning Commission will hold a public hearing Oct. 26 on a request to rezone 598 Plainville Avenue for an 18-unit active-adult community. The commission accepted that application and three others on Sept. 28, at a meeting that also produced the denial of beer sales at the Valero station, the new flood rules and the final 46 lots at Farmington West Estates.
Four hearings on Oct. 26
- 598 Plainville Avenue. JBS Developers LLC asked to rezone the property from its residential zoning, R40, to the town's active-adult housing zone, for an 18-unit active-adult community. The Inland Wetlands Commission approved the project with 19 conditions on June 3, after it was cut from 20 houses to 18 during that commission's hearings.
- Three home food businesses. Three residents applied for special permits to run cottage food businesses, food made in a home kitchen for sale, each with a farm stand so customers can pick up from the porch. Town Planner Shannon Rutherford said staff will add the farm stand to each legal notice, because porch pickup is part of how these businesses work.
How to weigh in. The Sept. 28 hearings were held at 7 p.m. in the Town Council chambers at the Town Hall Annex, 1 Monteith Drive, with the option to join online through a link on the town's website, according to the legal notice read at that meeting. Residents may speak in person or online, and the commission reads written letters into the record. Application documents are posted on the town website or available from the Planning Department at 860-675-2325.
Signs
1599 Southeast Road. The commission approved a single sign plan for the multi-tenant building at the former Barnes & Noble site, which straddles the Newington line and had a monument sign approved earlier this year. Under the formula staff applied, each foot of building frontage allows a square foot of sign, so the building's roughly 325 feet of frontage came with about 325 square feet of signs. Instead of sizing each tenant's sign by its own storefront, the owner pooled that total and divided it: 35 square feet each for Kid Strong, Cold Stone, and a tenant not yet named, and two 74-square-foot signs for a jewelry store, one facing Southeast Road and one facing north. A sign for Goldfish, on the Newington side of the line, makes up the rest of the total; Newington's acting town planner has approved it, the owner's representative said.
The Farmington signs are built to be lit from behind, which the town's current rules do not allow. The commission has a change to its sign rules pending, so it approved the signs on the condition that they stay dark unless and until the regulation changes, the same arrangement it made for a business in Batterson Park. Commissioner Josh Davidson commended the planner's office and the applicant for "the creative way" they worked within the current rules.
170 Scott Swamp Road. Relentless Performance got approval for an unlit sign of 67 square feet, a little more than half the 120 square feet staff calculated for that frontage, Rutherford said. Lights shown in the application drawings were for illustration only, the applicant said.
Both votes passed without opposition.
A kiosk at New Horizons
New Horizons plans a digital information kiosk in its interior courtyard, facing inward. Rutherford said it will show daily and weekly activities and urgent notices, such as bears on the property, and that a screen lets staff change type size and color for residents with impaired vision. No vote was needed: Rutherford treated it as an accessory use and sent it to a building permit, and no commissioner objected.
The commission also approved the minutes of its Sept. 14 meeting.
This coverage is supported by Farmington Storage, 155 Scott Swamp Road, the only storage facility in Connecticut with Museum air. 860.777.4001 📦
Jack Beckett has covered Farmington's Plan and Zoning Commission long enough to know that a three-hour meeting usually starts with sign math. Fourth coffee. ☕
The Farmington Mercury covers the town nobody else is covering: the meeting that ran late, the log nobody typed up, the sign plan that had to fit two towns. We publish slowly and without apology. Always last to breaking news, thorough about everything else. Find us at farmingtonmercury.com and tell your neighbors. #WeAreFarmington 📰