The Princeton Environmental Commission has endorsed preserving a 3-acre lot on Ridgeview Road that is being threatened by development, citing the potential decline in water quality if the wetlands on the property are disturbed.
The property at 394 Ridgeview Road – the last undeveloped lot on Ridgeview Road, which runs between The Great Road and Cherry Hill Road – is the subject of a hardship variance that is front of the Princeton Zoning Board of Adjustment. The applicant needs a variance to build a single-family house on the undersized lot. The minimum lot size is 4 acres.
The zoning board heard testimony on the application at its November and December meetings. The public hearing is scheduled to resume at the board’s Jan. 23 meeting at Witherspoon Hall at 400 Witherspoon St.
Meanwhile, the Friends of Princeton Ridge made a case for preserving the parcel at a Jan. 9 special meeting of the Princeton Environmental Commission.
“This lot is really a treasure,” said Christopher Barr of the Friends of Princeton Ridge.
The neighbors never thought the lots at 394 Ridgeview Road and 500 Ridgeview Road would be developed because of the extensive wetlands on the contiguous properties, Barr said.
That’s why they were shocked when they learned a year ago that a developer had purchased the lots and was planning to build houses on them, Barr said. The developer built a house at 500 Ridgeview Road and now wants to build a house at 394 Ridgeview Road.
The developer received permission from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and from the Town of Princeton to build on the lot, Barr said. Approval from the state agency was needed because of the wetlands on the lot.
Barr said that 60 percent of the two lots – combined – is covered by a combination of wetlands, wetland transition areas or riparian zones. The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection had designated the Princeton Ridge wetlands as “critical forest wetlands,” he said.
The headwaters of Mountain Brook start in the area of the two lots. It runs into Stony Brook, which empties into the Millstone River which, in turn, is a source of public drinking water. Protecting the headwaters helps to keep sediment out of the river, while also providing a habitat for animals.
Barr said residents have observed deer, foxes, wild turkeys, migratory birds and even a bobcat in the neighborhood. But building a house on the lot at 394 Ridgeview Road will be disruptive and could even force deer out to the street, potentially causing car-deer collisions, he said.
Michael Pisauro, the policy director of the Watershed Institute – formerly known as the Stony Brook Millstone Watershed Association – said the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection rarely denies requests for permits.
The state agency’s rules do not acknowledge headwaters of a stream, Pisauro said, but filling in the headwaters will have an impact on water quality downstream. If a house is built at 394 Ridgeview Road, the water quality will decline, he said.
“Just because the DEP issues a permit does not make it right,” Pisauro said, adding that the DEP obeys the letter of the law. Protecting the headwaters of Mountain Brook is “extremely important” for everything else that is downstream, he said.
Wendy Mager, president of the Friends of Princeton Open Space, told the Princeton Environmental Commission that Mountain Lake, which is downstream from Mountain Brook, underwent an extensive and expensive dredging operation a few years ago.
“We don’t want to see it disturbed upstream” because it would cause sediment to collect in Mountain Lake again, Mager said.
More sediment would undo the good that was achieved when the lake was dredged, she said. Disturbing the wetlands would negatively impact Mountain Lake.
When Princeton Environmental Commission chairman Sophie Glovier said that she feels the parcel is “more than worthy of preserving,” commission member Heide Fichtenbaum agreed and offered a motion – which was unanimously approved by commission members – to endorse preserving the lot at 394 Ridgeview Road.
There are many types of maps, but none that show an overlay for watersheds and geology, “and that leads us to build in places that are (environmentally) sensitive,” Fichtenbaum said.
“I personally endorse without any reservation the preservation of the property,” Fichtenbaum said.
