Developers propose 731 houses
2 gated communities sought
By Chris McKenna
Times Herald-Record
[email protected]
Woodbury – Two developers have just injected a new variable into the uneasy debate over Woodbury's future by proposing to build 731 upscale houses in two gated communities on opposite sides of town.
Both developers want the town to loosen its zoning for their projects and are offering in return to donate 400 of their 1,100 combined acres to the town for protected open space.
Formal petitions to change the zoning were jointly submitted Friday and Monday, and representatives of the developers addressed the Town Board at a work session Monday and were scheduled to make another presentation last night.
The proposals come amid land-use conflicts with the neighboring Hasidic community of Kiryas Joel, an urbanized village that's expected to try to expand into the green environs of Woodbury to accommodate its rapid growth.
Woodbury residents have petitioned to incorporate a new village that they hope will preserve the town's current, large-lot zoning. But Hasidic land interests – who own hundreds of acres in Woodbury – have filed a lawsuit to block the referendum and their case is pending in state Supreme Court.
The larger of the two new proposed developments would encompass 400 acres in Central Valley, between Dunderberg Road and Route 105.
The Carteret Group Inc., a Pearl River-based developer that's building the tony Brigadoon housing development off Route 32 in Woodbury, proposes 450 single-family homes for this tract. It says 130 of those houses would be restricted to residents 55 years old and older.
The company is asking the Town Board to change the zoning from two-acre to one-acre lots and promises to set aside 100 acres for open space.
The Carteret property includes a 178-acre estate it bought last year from the Nature Conservancy – a deal that rankled Woodbury residents who were disappointed that a land-preservation group would sell property to a developer.
The site abuts undeveloped land owned by the Hasidim, including ACE Farm, a 140-acre property that the real estate arm of Kiryas Joel's main congregation bought in January – an even bigger source of consternation in Woodbury.
Carteret has proposed shielding its new homes behind a tree buffer, including a 200-foot-wide belt along the property edge facing ACE Farm.
The second development – known as Legacy Ridge South – would be built across town near Cornwall, on 707 acres bordered by Trout Brook Road, Smith Clove Road and the Thruway.
That developer, who was not named in the application, hopes to build 281 single-family homes and offers to set aside 300 acres for open space. It wants the zoning reduced from three-acre to two-acre lots.
Both developments would operate on central water and sewer systems, rather than individual wells and septic systems, according to their applications. Details about those aspects of the plans couldn't be obtained yesterday.
