Weston ZBA Sets June 29 as Final 40B Hearing for 200-Unit South Avenue Project

WESTON — June 21, 2022 — Weston ZBA sets June 29 as likely final hearing for contested 200-unit 40B project on South Avenue. The Zoning Board of Appeals — Chair Jane Carlson, Winifred Lee, and Sujit Sitholi — voted 3-0 at its June 21 session to continue the Chapter 40B hearing for 518 South Avenue LLC, which seeks a comprehensive permit for 200 rental units, 50 of them affordable, on roughly 9.54 acres. Peer reviewer Tom Houston declined to rebut the applicant's revised construction management plan on the record, noting that abutter experts estimated earthwork at 46,000 cubic yards against the applicant's 32,500 cubic yards, and that the work would likely consume "the better part of a construction season." Town Counsel John Witten of KP Law told the board that any waiver not formally requested by the applicant would not be granted, and Carlson said she was not inclined to waive the town's Article 27 stormwater bylaw given the unresolved dispute over 100-year mounding analysis. Neighborhood attorney Luke Legere, of McGregor Legere and Stevens, delivered an early closing statement urging denial, arguing the applicant abandoned a conservative 45-mph sight-distance calculation it could not satisfy and that the project's wastewater system will introduce nutrients that increase the risk of eutrophication in adjacent wetlands. Written public comments are due by noon June 29.