Super-sized house gets Wellesley board's OK
After much heated debate, the Wellesley Planning Board has approved plans for a house that planning officials said would be one of the largest homes built in town.
The vote Monday night was 3 to 1, with member Neal Glick voting against the plan at 33 Wachusett Rd.
UPDATE: Under a formula the Planning Board uses to trigger its large house review process, the project would total 16,029 feet. That includes attic space, vaulted ceilings that could potentially be turned into another floor, accessory structures, and other factors.
Using a traditional calculation, the interior livable space would be 11,592 square feet, including the solarium and four-car garage, according to architect Patrick Ahern of Ahearn Schopfer Associates. That does not count a 334-square-foot unheated cabana and 1,799-square-foot athletic court. END UPDATE.
The board said that the approval was conditional upon the owner adding 30-foot evergreen trees to maintain the privacy of abutting homes, as well as a rainwater collection system capable of holding at least 3,000 gallons.
"If we allow this house to be built, we abdicate to a large extent our ability to judge future houses in terms of mass and scale," Glick said before the vote. The home, which will sit on approximately 1.5 acres of property, is in a neighborhood where homes over 5,900 square feet must be subjected to a large house review.
Ahearn, who designed the home, said that the footprint was originally 10,254 square feet. It had been reduced 9.2 percent to 9,313 square feet to address the board's concerns about scale, he said.
The reduction was largely accomplished by removing an indoor swimming pool from the design, replacing it with an outdoor pool and a cabana Glick contended could be considered a second dwelling.
"I've never heard of a cabana with a fireplace before," Glick said. "This is nearly 400 square feet. There are studios in Beacon Hill and the Back Bay smaller than that. "
Ahearn, who lives in Wellesley and is a former vice chairman of the Planning Board, said he had designed similar structures for other homes in town.
"We've been good listeners and taken this board's comments to heart, and tried to address every concern as it has come up," Ahearn said.
One of those concerns was the problem of stormwater runoff, which the board said had been a longstanding problem in the neighborhood. Wachusett Road lies in a watershed protection district, meaning it is near a stream or brook, and the board members were concerned about runoff from roofs and other impermeable surfaces causing flooding.
"We've built a system that discharges 100 percent of the runoff from impermeable surfaces on-site," Ahearn said. "We can handle the discharge of a 25-year storm."
In the end, board members acknowledged the changes Ahearn had made, though they said they still had misgivings over the size of the home.
"I walk my dogs past that property every day," said vice chairman Stephanie Wasser. "I'm going to miss the parklands."
The property is owned by 6628 S. Trust, Shennol Smith Trustee.
"If it's not the biggest house in town, it's certainly one of the biggest," Michael Zehner, Wellesley’s assistant planning director, said in an interview last week. "Whenever we have these large house requests, we have to look at the impact construction will have on a neighborhood, both in terms of the difference in scale and logistical concerns like stormwater drainage."
Other business before the board Monday night included an amendment to the plans for 978 Worcester Street, site of the former Wellesley Motor Inn on Route 9. Developer Dean Behrend received permission to amend his designs to include a sit-down restaurant at the mixed-use site.
The board is also recommending renewal of the site plan for the old Wellesley Inn. Development of the site, which is being done by Jones Lang LaSalle, has stalled because of economic recession. The company is still hoping to build apartments at the location. Final approval of the renewed site will be determined by the Zoning Board of Appeals at its Thursday meeting.
Sarah Thomas can be reached at sarah.m.thomas@gmail.com.
Waiting for Twitter to feed in the latest...