This Monday the Planning Board will hold a public hearing on amending Montclair’s Master Plan for the Montclair Center (MC) & Bay Street areas. This is an important public input part of the process to better align land uses and to streamline zoning.
There is a clear and unquestioned need for this and Montclair Center is an appropriate priority. The rest of Montclair will be addressed sequentially at future, undetermined points. The planned result of applying these newly created zones and land uses (e.g. the new C3 zones) to Montclair Center is that the same scheme will be applied to other zones throughout town that are principally residential and office zones. I think this approach is flawed because it reflects a planning bias based on a downtown-centric focus and an over application of our standardization objective.
A better approach would embrace a two-part land use & zoning scheme that separates the needs of and solutions for the Montclair Center (MC) & Bay Street from t...
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This Monday the Planning Board will hold a public hearing on amending Montclair’s Master Plan for the Montclair Center (MC) & Bay Street areas. This is an important public input part of the process to better align land uses and to streamline zoning.
There is a clear and unquestioned need for this and Montclair Center is an appropriate priority. The rest of Montclair will be addressed sequentially at future, undetermined points. The planned result of applying these newly created zones and land uses (e.g. the new C3 zones) to Montclair Center is that the same scheme will be applied to other zones throughout town that are principally residential and office zones. I think this approach is flawed because it reflects a planning bias based on a downtown-centric focus and an over application of our standardization objective.
A better approach would embrace a two-part land use & zoning scheme that separates the needs of and solutions for the Montclair Center (MC) & Bay Street from those of our neighborhood commercial and residential zones. The approach for the former would essential establish a clear boundary reflecting the totality of the intensive commercial nature we want and where, then apply the C1, C2, C3 zone concepts within, as appropriate. For the rest of Montclair, a separate nomenclature should be created to reflect their principally residential orientation and related commercial needs. For example, the Neighborhood Commercial zone (e.g. Watchung Plaza) becomes Residential Commercial, RC1, and subsequent RC2, RC3 zones for the appropriate mix of land uses and zoning adjacencies. I do not think this is just a symbolic distinction, but one when future, specific development is reviewed, leaves no doubt about our priorities in changes to our streetscapes through reductions in building setbacks and densities.
This would not change or impede the execution and timelines of further amendments to the Master Plan. It would recognize evolving the current working strategy of one zoning scheme to one that works better for the overall Master Plan principle of placing our residential uses first and the emphasis on protecting their importance.
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