GUILDERLAND — Colonial Car Wash on Western Avenue received another use variance last week from the zoning board of appeals here.

The zoning board approved the area variance and site plan review for Colonial Car Wash with a vote of 6 to 1, with board member James Sumner voting against the proposal.

Sumner said that the review did not include a satisfactory traffic design. The project allows only a right turn out onto Camp Terrace, which intersects Western Avenue. Sumner questioned how customers would drive east out of the site.

Chairman Peter Barber said that the project gave drivers reasonable ways to get to Western Avenue. A right-turn-only on Camp Terrace would give people the safest way out, he said, but the project did not eliminate all traffic problems.

Neighbors were concerned about sediment that accumulated at the car wash, and the lack of a privacy fence. Last week, one family told the board that the proposal took care of their concerns.

The board approved the proposal on condition that grit and debris be removed from the site immediately, and not stored or dumped for storage and drainage on the property. The board also required the erection of a six-foot stockade fence along the automatic car-wash bay, the addition of streetscape trees and landscaping along the berm, and snow removal from the site.

Victor Caponera, Jr, the attorney representing Colonial Car Wash, said that the project has included raising the berm, removing pavement, eliminating vacuums from the rear, reducing the number of car-wash sites from six to five, and reducing off-site light spillage.
"We feel that, based on the changes we have made, "it would certainly be a benefit to the town," Caponera said. "This is a better project than what’s there now."

Other business

In other business, the zoning board:

— Approved a request by Allan Sholtes of Foundry Road for a storage shed and a carport. Sholtes needed an area variance because the two sites fell within the required setbacks due to his steep, wooded backyard;

— Approved a request by Henno and Susan Karmo of Terry Avenue for a one-foot area variance to expand their kitchen;

— Approved a request by Aldo Vignolesi for a special-use permit to open a pizzeria in Cosimo’s Plaza on Route 20; and

— Approved signs for Marini Builders for the Saddlebrook neighborhood, the Walgreens on Western Avenue, Adirondack Tire Center on Western Avenue, and Prescribed Realty on Carman Road.

The board continued applications by Nicholas St. Louis for Nextel Place on Western Avenue, and Fifi Gifford for Fifi’s Frocks and Frills on Western Avenue. Both applicants asked for signs with changeable text.
"We don’t allow changeable copy," Barber said. "We approve a fixed sign."