GUILDERLAND CENTER — Over the objections of about 10 residents who called the density too great for a rural-agricultural zone, the town’s planning board granted concept approval last month to Black Creek Estates, a conservation subdivision that will build a maximum of 20 houses between Hurst Road and Route 146.

Twenty lots is two more than the 18 that were proposed the last time the project came before the board. More than half of the 46-acre parcel is to remain open space.

The two extra lots were a bonus granted to the applicant, B&D Properties, in exchange for a plan to fund and build a 1,500-foot-long asphalt multi-use pathway for people biking, walking, or jogging along Route 146.

The pathway would run from the development’s entry to Hurst Road. The town may help with paving the path and will be responsible for its maintenance. The town may also continue the pathway as far as Route 158.

The plan calls for B&D Properties to extend the sidewalks from the point where they currently end on Route 146, to Hurst Road. Since sidewalks exist now only on the opposite side of Route 146, a connecting crosswalk will need to be added, the board heard.

Rural character

Donald Csaposs, who boards a llama at Teri Conroy’s Wunsapana Farm on Hurst Road, said that the 2010 Neighborhood Master Plan for the Guilderland Center Hamlet had called for appropriate separation between the hamlet and the surrounding countryside.

He asked rhetorically whether Hurst Road should be viewed as part of the hamlet or the surrounding countryside. He said he believed all residents of the road would probably agree that the road is in the countryside, rather than in the suburban hamlet.

Csaposs, who works for the town as a grant writer but stressed he spoke to the planning board as a private citizen, asked the board to make the interior road through the subdivision a cul-de-sac, to avoid compromising Hurst Road’s rural nature.

Things got testy for a minute when Csaposs said he wanted to discuss a couple of projects from the eastern parts of town, and board member Mickey Cleary told him not to “just go off on tangents.”

Csaposs said that he was not going off on a tangent, and told Cleary, “I know you just want to get the meeting over and done with.” Csaposs also said that the microphone was still his.

Csaposs said that, when the city of Albany had wanted to build Sandidge Way Apartments at the border of the town, the town took a strong position, insisting that there should be a reasonable division between the urban development of the complex and the suburban nature of McKownville.

Likewise, Csaposs said, when the town recently approved a transit-oriented district around Crossgates Mall, it took care not to change the quality of the residential neighborhoods west of Gipp Road.

Referring to the Black Creek Estates, Csaposs said, “It’s my position that allowing this subdivision to exit into Hurst Road is an inappropriate penetration into a country lane.”

Board member Tom Robert challenged Csaposs, arguing that Sandidge Way is a project involving over 200 apartments. Csaposs said it was a matter of relative scale and that “McKownville isn’t Hurst Road.”

There are only 22 houses on all of the 1.7-mile length of Hurst Road, the board heard. The plan calls for adding nearly as many on the 1,300-foot-long interior road.

“The relative impact of this subdivision on Hurst Road is,” Csaposs said, “in my view, likely to be equivalent,” referring to the effect on McKownville of the Sandidge Way apartment complex.

The current application has moved the intersection of Hurst Road and the interior road further away from Teri Conroy’s llama farm, the board heard.

David Ingalls of B&D Properties told The Enterprise that the road had been moved 150 west, away from Conroy’s farm, at the firm’s own expense. He said that the cul-de-sac option would have been cheaper, but that the town was not interested in it.

Density and open space

The plan will keep 60 percent of the 46-acre parcel as open space.

The conservation plan allows for lots smaller than usual in this zoning district, of a minimum 20,000 square feet, with 80 feet of frontage. All driveways would open onto the S-shaped interior road.

Feeney said that 20 lots is the maximum to be allowed, but that the number could go down if the developer finds that, for instance, the stormwater management system will not allow for that many, or if residents make it clear to town officials that they would give up the pathway in order to see fewer homes built.

Several residents at the July 10 meeting suggested that greater density was too high a price to pay for a pathway.

Feeney said that the multi-use pathway “is something that came up, that we feel is a good amenity for that area.” He said that the town would be amenable to continuing the path, from Hurst Road to Route 158.

Feeney also said several times during the meeting that, driving through the development, no one would be able to tell the difference between 20 and 18 houses, or 20 and 16.

Some residents at the meeting expressed concern about possible issues with stormwater.

Robert Freisatz, who lives on Route 146, said he has had some dampness in his basement for years, and that sometimes, in the spring, water runs straight through his garage, in the garage’s back door and out the front toward the creek across Route 146. Freisatz said he expects that, with the new development, there will be more runoff as well as more chemicals from lawn treatment, to head for the creek. Stormwater ponds, he said, may also generate more insects.

Feeney said the developer would be obligated to ensure that the amount of runoff does not increase at all from the current amount.

Also, the developer will need to connect the existing sidewalks in Guilderland Center to Hurst Road, according to the approved concept.

The project has been before the board several times, with various iterations revised in keeping with public concerns. First was a design that placed driveways along both Hurst Road and Route 146. Next was a plan with fewer lots but with driveways that still opened onto Hurst Road. Third was a conservation plan with 18 homes with all their driveways opening onto a town road that would wind between the two existing roads.