BOWDOINHAM
The planning board wants to hear the public’s thoughts Thursday night on the possible creation of a village district in the town’s designated growth area.
A public hearing on a village district will start at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Coombs Municipal Building. The meeting had been scheduled for Tuesday but was postponed due to weather conditions.
Since adoption of the comprehensive plan in June 2014, the planning board has received requests to create a village district to alleviate some requirements for the many legally non-conforming lots and buildings in the village area.
According to an announcement about the public hearing, “There are many lots and buildings within the downtown area that were created before the town had dimensional requirements. Now these lots don’t have the minimum lot size or frontage and/or their buildings do not meet the required setbacks.”
The comprehensive plan calls for the area in and around the village to be the town’s growth area. However, many of the lots within this area don’t or barely meet the dimensional requirements of the ordinance. Dimensional requirements within this area must change to allow for growth.
As a starting point, the planning board has created two draft district maps to illustrate options in creating a village district.
Currently, with the exception of shoreland zones, the town is made up of one district and must allow all uses everywhere in town that meet the standards within the ordinance.
For example, districting would allow the town to prohibit or restrict junkyards in the village district.
The town also could create a variety of districts within the growth area so standards could vary within the growth area. One concept map shows how the growth area could be split into three districts: Village I, Village II, and Historic Village districts.
The proposed Village II District is located further away from the village area in town. The existing lots there are larger and the majority of existing buildings meet current dimensional requirements.
Creating a Historic Village District for the downtown area would allow the town to reduce dimensional requirements to more closely match existing lots. While many lots in this area would still be considered non-conforming, a reduction in building setbacks would allow many non-conforming buildings to be conforming.
The draft village district maps and other information can be found at bowdoinham.com.
dmoore@timesrecord.com
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