Montclair Attempts To Curb McMansions
From the Star Ledger:
Montclair says enough is enough
"A 5,600-square-foot estate has plenty of room."
"That's the rationale as Mont clair advances a new list of land- use amendments intended to shrink the kind of mammoth residences popping up within its borders."
""From our point of view, that's a good size house," Jonathan Mel lon, Montclair's assistant planner, said of new lot-coverage limits that would effectively halve the size of houses now allowed in residential neighborhoods."
""There were some builders who expressed concern that they would not be able to build appropriate sized homes," Mellon said. "Six thousand square feet is not exactly small.""
"On a 60-foot-by-150 foot lot, for example, simple setback require ments now allow 49 percent coverage, meaning a two-story house could have some 8,800 square feet, not counting any finished attic or basement. A 25 percent coverage would allow for a two-story house with 4,466 square feet; add a half- story -- Montclair's maximum allowable-- and the house would approach 5,600 square feet of living space."
""The net result would be reducing the size of houses," Mayor Ed Remsen said as the council scheduled a June 13 public hearing."
Montclair says enough is enough
"A 5,600-square-foot estate has plenty of room."
"That's the rationale as Mont clair advances a new list of land- use amendments intended to shrink the kind of mammoth residences popping up within its borders."
""From our point of view, that's a good size house," Jonathan Mel lon, Montclair's assistant planner, said of new lot-coverage limits that would effectively halve the size of houses now allowed in residential neighborhoods."
""There were some builders who expressed concern that they would not be able to build appropriate sized homes," Mellon said. "Six thousand square feet is not exactly small.""
"On a 60-foot-by-150 foot lot, for example, simple setback require ments now allow 49 percent coverage, meaning a two-story house could have some 8,800 square feet, not counting any finished attic or basement. A 25 percent coverage would allow for a two-story house with 4,466 square feet; add a half- story -- Montclair's maximum allowable-- and the house would approach 5,600 square feet of living space."
""The net result would be reducing the size of houses," Mayor Ed Remsen said as the council scheduled a June 13 public hearing."
1 Comments:
In addition to any rules on the books, all tear-downs and additions should be subject to approval by a township committee for both size and design.
That way nothing falls through the cracks.
Probably wouldn't be a perfect system, but it would cut down on the number of gigantic, gaudy houses being built on small lots.
An extra plus would be if the house has a roofline at a certain pitch, any new addition should either match that pitch, or integrate with that existing roofline in an architecturally consistent manner.
I drove past a Cape Cod in Union the other day, and the owner made an addition to the front and back by simply rasing the front wall and rear wall up to the level of the existing ridge, which essentially turned the house into a perfect cube. What an eyesore.
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