It’s neighbor against neighbor - 70th St. challenges curb-cut permit
By Helen Klein
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| Photo by Helen Klein |
Not satisfied with a decision by the Department of City Planning (DCP) to allow a curb cut and parking pad in front of a Dyker Heights rowhouse on 70th Street, residents of the block have filed an appeal with the Board of Standards & Appeals (BSA) to get DCP’s ruling reversed.
The move is the latest effort by opponents of the curb cut to preserve both the look of the block and the available on-street parking in a neighborhood where every parking spot is coveted. Besides the residents of the block who joined in the appeal, Community Board 10 has expressed support for the effort.
“We still believe the rules do not permit a curb cut and front yard parking pad,” asserted Josephine Beckmann, the board’s district manager, the president of the United Neighbors of Fort Hamilton Parkway and a resident of the block in question, during the board’s May meeting.
The issue is not a new one. The block, between Fort Hamilton Parkway and Eighth Avenue, has been roiled since the owner of 846 70th Street received permits in January from the Department of Buildings (DOB) that enabled him to tear off his front porch, and put in the curb cut and parking pad.
The board had previously appealed the granting of the permit, and had been rebuffed, last month, by DOB Brooklyn Borough Commissioner Magdi Mossad.
The house is in the middle of a row of 19 nearly identical structures, that date to 1905, so the alteration makes a significant change to the streetscape that was as unwanted as it was unexpected.
The block was recently rezoned as part of the larger Dyker Heights rezoning, and, at the time, it was the understanding of residents, as well as of CB 10, that the zoning district chosen for it, R4-1, would preclude exactly the alteration that has occurred.
The issue revolves around a definition in the Zoning Resolution. The question is, what exactly is a side lot ribbon, and if you don’t have a side yard – which none of the interior homes on this row of houses does -- can you have a side lot ribbon?
While it appears to defy logic, it appears that, according to DCP, you can have a side lot ribbon without a side yard, the rationale given for allowing the homeowner in question to create a parking space in his front yard, something that was supposed to have been prevented by the rezoning.
The appeal contends that that interpretation runs counter to the intention of the Zoning Resolution.
“We submit it is illogical to read this section as permitting parking in the side lot ribbon in a dwelling that is fully attached (that is, has no side yard) when the section expressly prohibits parking spaces between the street line and the street wall,” asserts the appeal. It is between the inner edge of the sidewalk and the front of the home that the parking pad is, in fact, sandwiched.
Rather than permitting front yard parking, the appeal suggests that the intention of Zoning Resolution was to prevent it, only allowing curb cuts that would lead to enclosed parking in a garage or parking in a side driveway, such as does not exist in the middle of a group of rowhouses, but which would be typical in a streetscape of freestanding or semi-attached homes.
Followed through to its logical conclusion, the ultimate result of the interpretation, the appeal concludes, would be, “The obliteration of all on street parking in front of attached row houses, as each adjacent homeowner would be allowed to cut the curb to provide parking in the front yard.”
CB 10 had previously voted to ask that officials at DCP and DOB, “Support a finding that front yard, unenclosed parking is not permitted in any part of the front yard (that is, between the building line and lot line) on lots developed with fully attached dwellings in R4-1 zoning districts.”
After that request was denied, recalled Joanne Seminara, chair of the board’s Zoning and Land Use Committee, the committee had discussed the issue at its most recent meeting and, given the existence of the appeal, had decided to continue to press the matter.
Seminara told the group gathered at the Norwegian Christian Home, 1250 67th Street, “We unanimously felt we would continue our advocacy on that issue, and authorize someone from the board to go to the BSA and speak to our opposition.”
The move is the latest effort by opponents of the curb cut to preserve both the look of the block and the available on-street parking in a neighborhood where every parking spot is coveted. Besides the residents of the block who joined in the appeal, Community Board 10 has expressed support for the effort.
“We still believe the rules do not permit a curb cut and front yard parking pad,” asserted Josephine Beckmann, the board’s district manager, the president of the United Neighbors of Fort Hamilton Parkway and a resident of the block in question, during the board’s May meeting.
The issue is not a new one. The block, between Fort Hamilton Parkway and Eighth Avenue, has been roiled since the owner of 846 70th Street received permits in January from the Department of Buildings (DOB) that enabled him to tear off his front porch, and put in the curb cut and parking pad.
The board had previously appealed the granting of the permit, and had been rebuffed, last month, by DOB Brooklyn Borough Commissioner Magdi Mossad.
The house is in the middle of a row of 19 nearly identical structures, that date to 1905, so the alteration makes a significant change to the streetscape that was as unwanted as it was unexpected.
The block was recently rezoned as part of the larger Dyker Heights rezoning, and, at the time, it was the understanding of residents, as well as of CB 10, that the zoning district chosen for it, R4-1, would preclude exactly the alteration that has occurred.
The issue revolves around a definition in the Zoning Resolution. The question is, what exactly is a side lot ribbon, and if you don’t have a side yard – which none of the interior homes on this row of houses does -- can you have a side lot ribbon?
While it appears to defy logic, it appears that, according to DCP, you can have a side lot ribbon without a side yard, the rationale given for allowing the homeowner in question to create a parking space in his front yard, something that was supposed to have been prevented by the rezoning.
The appeal contends that that interpretation runs counter to the intention of the Zoning Resolution.
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Rather than permitting front yard parking, the appeal suggests that the intention of Zoning Resolution was to prevent it, only allowing curb cuts that would lead to enclosed parking in a garage or parking in a side driveway, such as does not exist in the middle of a group of rowhouses, but which would be typical in a streetscape of freestanding or semi-attached homes.
Followed through to its logical conclusion, the ultimate result of the interpretation, the appeal concludes, would be, “The obliteration of all on street parking in front of attached row houses, as each adjacent homeowner would be allowed to cut the curb to provide parking in the front yard.”
CB 10 had previously voted to ask that officials at DCP and DOB, “Support a finding that front yard, unenclosed parking is not permitted in any part of the front yard (that is, between the building line and lot line) on lots developed with fully attached dwellings in R4-1 zoning districts.”
After that request was denied, recalled Joanne Seminara, chair of the board’s Zoning and Land Use Committee, the committee had discussed the issue at its most recent meeting and, given the existence of the appeal, had decided to continue to press the matter.
Seminara told the group gathered at the Norwegian Christian Home, 1250 67th Street, “We unanimously felt we would continue our advocacy on that issue, and authorize someone from the board to go to the BSA and speak to our opposition.”
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