A group of seven residents from Raymond and Frye Island have appealed the Raymond Planning Board’s approval of a park-and-ride facility on Raymond Cape.

Nearly three years after Frye Island initially proposed the park-and-ride facility, the Planning Board voted 5-1 to approve the project in February, with Bruce Sanford opposed.

The appellants, many of whom are abutters to the proposed facility, have called on Raymond’s Zoning Board of Appeals to reconsider and reject the application for the 50-car parking lot sited across Cape Road from the Frye Island ferry landing, according to their attorney, David Kallin of the Portland-based Drummond Woodsum law firm.

“The Planning Board’s decision was made on unlawful procedure and in excess of the authority granted to the Planning Board and affected by error of law in the Planning Board’s unlawful waiver of certain provisions of the land use ordinance and the shoreland zoning provisions, and because the Planning Board’s decision was an abuse of discretion and clearly contrary to specific provisions of these ordinances,” Kallin wrote, in the May 6 appeal.

On July 27, the zoning board will hold a meeting on the matter to determine the standard of review it will use to rule on the appeal, according to Chairman Lawrence Murch.

Although the appeal contests a number of elements of the application, it particularly focuses on the Planning Board’s decision to waive a 300-foot dimensional requirement in the town’s shoreland zoning provisions. According to the provisions, “off-site parking lots shall be allowed if they are within 300 feet of the lot containing the associated permitted use,” a measure intended to ensure pedestrian safety.

“The centerline of the driveway entrance of the park-and-ride is more than 830 feet from the centerline of the driveway for the existing ferry: almost three times the maximum allowable distance under the ordinance,” Kallin wrote.

Furthermore, Kallin argued, the town’s land use ordinance forbids the Planning Board from waiving any provisions of the shoreland zoning provisions relating to independent parking facilities.

Earlier this year, the Planning Board debated whether to grant the waiver. In January, the board delivered a split decision on the application, as members expressed concern that the proposal violated the town’s shoreland zoning provisions relating to off-site parking lots.

In a Jan. 9 memo to the board, the town of Raymond’s attorney, Mary Costigan, of Bernstein Shur, suggested that although the proposal did not meet the 300-feet standard, the board could waive the requirement, as the proposal provides a safe pedestrian route to the ferry.

“Because the 300-foot requirement is based upon pedestrian safety and not upon concerns related directly to its location in the shoreland zone, it appears that a waiver of the requirement could be consistent with the spirit and intent of the regulatory scheme, reading both the land use ordinance and shoreland zoning provisions as a whole,” Costigan wrote.

The board subsequently waived the requirement in February and approved the application. Costigan declined to comment on the appeal for this article.

The appellants include Jacob and Lacey Rollins, Paul and Gloria Coffin, James Shaw, Charles Flahive, Kevin and Susan Gleason, Debra LeBel, Reba Orszag and Betsy Gleysteen.

According to Gleysteen, the group believes the waiver should not have been granted and is opposed to the parking lot for environmental and safety reasons.

“Environmentally, we are not in support of the parking lot,” she said. “We just think that the environment the way it is now, it’s pristine. If the parking lot is not needed, which is our position, why would you change it?”

The appeal also argues that the project will create unsafe conditions for pedestrians crossing Cape Road.

“The area as proposed will have more cars passing the ferry road to access the parking lot from Quarry Cove Road, will have vehicles entering and exiting the Ferry Road, will include a passenger drop-off area, and have pedestrians crossing the road from the parking lot side with a poor line of site around the curve of the road,” Gleysteen said. “The speed limit in the area is 35 miles per hour. During the day in low-use times, the risk of a problem is low, but the ferry is used in all types of weather, both day and night. All of these different factors make the area less safe when conditions are less than ideal.”

In mid-2012, Frye Island submitted the original application to the Planning Board to build a 43-car parking lot and ring road on a 25-acre lot of undeveloped land across from Ferry Landing Road. According to Town Manager Gary Donohue, the overflow lot is needed “to relieve pressure on the ferries and for safety issues” as the island community grows in the future. Now, ferry users park their cars alongside the roadway.

Opposition quickly emerged from a citizens’ group called the Friends of Raymond Cape. In March 2013, the group filed a lawsuit demanding that the Raymond Board of Selectmen call for a moratorium on all applications for major site plan review within the town’s shoreland rural and recreational zones for at least 180 days.

After the Maine Superior Court dismissed the request for a moratorium, the group appealed the decision. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court, the state’s final court of appeal, dismissed the case, but also rejected a joint motion from the towns of Raymond and Frye Island that the advocacy group, having filed a “frivolous” appeal, provide the towns with funds for legal fees and other costs.

Then, in March 2014, the board denied the application on the grounds that the proposed four-way intersection with Cape Road and Ferry Landing Road was unsafe and that the proposed parking lot was too small.

On July 18, Frye Island submitted a substantially modified application for a 50-car parking lot on the same property, this time based on feedback from the Friends of Raymond Cape. The proposal, supported by the advocacy group, eliminated the proposed ring road in favor of walking paths, and replaces the 25-foot light poles with 12-foot light poles. The revised application also set the parking lot farther back from Cape Road, in an effort to maintain the area’s rural character.

Barb Lovell, a key member of the Friends of Raymond Cape who has supported the second application, said that some of the appellants had participated in the Friends of Raymond Cape campaign.

“One way or the other they were supportive and helpful,” she said.

Lovell declined to say whether she supports the appeal, saying she and Tom Ewig had signed a contract with Frye Island that barred her from opposing the project.

“Until some change occurs, we have signed that we will not participate in any way in opposition,” she said.