An architect’s rendering of main Elms building after it’s renovated and modified for multifamily use.
Re-engineered around a “floating zone” concept, plans to redevelop The Elms Inn property as a 16-unit housing complex will be up for public comment next week.
Like earlier versions of the proposal, the revised Elms plan is designed to preserve the property’s streetscape and reuse older buildings on the three-acre site, including the old restaurant and hotel.
The new plan will be the subject of a simultaneous public hearings of the Planning and Zoning Commission and Inland Wetlands board Tuesday, July 9, starting at 7:30 in the town hall annex of Prospect Street near Yanity gym.
The Scala family has owned the Elms property on Main Street, across from Gilbert Street, for decades. They operated a restaurant and hotel there many years. Their plans to redevelop the property have been through two previous public hearing sessions in recent months.
The original application had called for several amendments to the towns multifamily Development district or “MFDD zone” and in earlier hearings the commission expressed concern about how the changed zone would affect other properties in town have been or will be developed under it.
The decision to rework the plan as a floating zone grew from a suggestion consultant hired to give the commission an independent review of the plans by the developer’s professional team.
The “floating zone” now proposed would be a regulation that exists on the town’s books but isn’t attached to any specific spot on the zoning map.
Applicants could ask to have the floating zone applied to their property, based on criteria spelled out in the new regulation. The commission would make the decision whether it’s an appropriate place to use the rule.
The new zone is designed so the three-acre Elms site would qualify, and allow the applicants to proceed with their 16-unit plan.
Other qualifying properties could seek the zoning designation, as well.
The wetlands application concerns the rear of the property, where the stream behind the library and Prospector Theater sites flows behind the Elms down toward Casagmo. The volume of storm runoff reaching the condominium complex has been a concern raised by resident in previous public hearings.