Title: In re Dooley

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

In re Dooley (98-093); 170 Vt. 108; 742 A.2d 761

[Filed 05-Nov-1999]

       NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under
  V.R.A.P. 40 as well as  formal revision before publication in the Vermont
  Reports.  Readers are requested to notify the  Reporter of Decisions,
  Vermont Supreme Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of
  any errors in order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes
  to press.

	
                                 No. 98-093

In re Appeal of Sandra Dooley, et al.	              Supreme Court
In re Appeal of SCANNEL, et al.
In re Appeal of Timberlake Associates	              On Appeal from
     		                                      Environmental Court

	                                              May Term, 1999

Merideth Wright, J.

       John L. Franco, Jr., Burlington, for Appellants.

       Marc B. Heath and William W. Schroeder of Downs Rachlin & Martin,
  PLLC, Burlington,  for Appellee.

PRESENT: Barney, C.J. (Ret.), Underwood, J. (Ret.), Meaker and Maloney,  
         Supr. JJ. (Ret.), and Fisher, D.J. (Ret.), Specially Assigned

       PER CURIAM.   The appellants are challenging the decision of the
  Environmental  Court allowing construction of a gas station-convenience
  store of the "mini-mart" type on what  formerly was the site of a branch
  bank facility.  That operation had been carried on from a  modified
  residence and, at the time of sale to Timberlake, had reduced to being
  merely an ATM  site, operating twenty-four hours.

       The property is located on the south side of Williston Road just east
  of the East  Terrace/Spear Street entrance to Williston Road at the point
  where that South Burlington road  crosses the city line and becomes the
  City of Burlington's Main Street.  Easterly of the property  are commercial
  locations, including a Staples shopping plaza and a gasoline station, and
  then the 

 

  I-89 interchange with Williston Road (U.S. Route 2).  There are also
  residences adjacent to the  south.  Across Williston Road, opposite the
  northwesterly edge of the property and the Spear  Street intersection is
  the entrance of the so-called "jug-handle" for north-turning Route 2
  traffic.

       The property lies entirely within the City of South Burlington.  It is
  zoned "Commercial  1" and is within Zone One of the City's "Traffic Overlay
  Zone."  The proposed gas station-convenience store is a conditional use in
  that zone, requiring review and approval by the city  zoning board of
  adjustment for compliance with the zoning conditional use standards.  Since
  it is  a nonresidential project, the site plan proposal requires approval
  by the planning commission as  well.

       Generally, the installation proposed involves the demolition of the
  existing residential  bank building and the construction of a 900 square
  foot convenience store facility to the rear of  the lot, fronted by a
  gasoline island of three fueling positions under a canopy.  The plan
  includes  access drives, pedestrian walkways, paved parking, lighting and
  landscaping.  Building heights,  design and conformity to environmental
  requirements, side-yard and front set-back distances, as  well as the
  impact on adjoining property, are all part of the design requirements.

       A proposal was duly submitted to the zoning board of adjustment.  With
  some revisions  in details the proposal was approved and taken to the
  planning commission.  That body generally  approved the site plan with the
  exception of the location and number of curb cuts for vehicular  access. 
  The zoning board had required as a condition of approval a two-way driveway
  onto  Williston Road and an incoming-only entrance from Spear Street.  The
  planning commission  approval was conditioned on the Williston Road
  entrance being a right-turn, east-bound entrance  only access, with in and
  out access on Spear Street.

 

       The applicants then returned to the zoning board with the alterations
  made by the  planning commission.  The zoning board did not accept the
  planning commission's version and  required the Spear Street access to be
  entrance only, with "controlled dual access" from Williston  Road.  This
  was unacceptable to the planning commission, and when the applicants
  presented it,  the planning commission denied site plan approval.

       Faced with that impasse, the applicants took their case, by de novo
  appeal, to the  Environmental Court, a tribunal authorized to review the
  issues before both bodies and resolve  them.  After hearings and findings,
  that court approved the proposal before us, modifying the  basic proposal
  in some particulars, and authorized the project.  We affirm.

       The opponents' appeal to this Court specifically challenges two of the
  dimensional issues  and the provisions intended for traffic control, both
  foot and vehicular, in the conditional use  proposal developed from the
  evidence by the trial court.  The scope of the appeal was the subject  of
  several motions by all parties, seeking to define the validly contested
  issues and perhaps to  bring them into closer focus.  With challenges to
  some issues as not properly raised or  preserved, and a motion from the
  applicants for partial summary judgment all presented below,  the trial
  court annotated its decision and order as follows: "The court will review
  in the present  appeal any aspects of the conditional use approval which
  differ from the project approved in the  1995 application.  Any aspects
  which are unchanged, such as the 24-hour operation, are not  within the
  scope of this appeal as the 1995 approval was not appealed."

       The first issue raised is a challenge to the fifty-foot set-back
  proposed for the canopy over  the fueling stations.  The fifty-foot
  set-back was approved in the 1995 application.  Although  subsequent
  proposals decreased the size of the canopy, nothing in the evidence 

 

  suggests it was ever moved toward the street line.  It might well be
  assumed that the size  reduction, if anything, increased the set-back
  dimension.  Nowhere in these proceedings is there  any indication that
  either the zoning board or the planning commission found any shortcoming in 
  this particular dimension, and the lower court was fully justified in
  sustaining compliance.

       The second dimensional issue, raised by the appellants for the first
  time here, seems to be  that the proposal does not take into account
  Article 25.101 of the South Burlington zoning  regulations.  That article
  calls for a fifty-foot front yard set-back from the edge of the "planned" 
  right-of-way of Williston Road.  Nothing in the evidence places the
  southerly on-the-ground  location anywhere but where it was shown on the
  plot plan and accepted by the planning and  zoning bodies.  No
  representation by any authority speaking for the City of South Burlington
  has  suggested any defect in the placing of the right-of-way as the
  proposal does.  We are left without  evidentiary guidance as to a different
  place for its claimed true location.  Perhaps the width has  already been
  incorporated into Williston Road, possibly all on the north side, or
  perhaps divided  by some unknown measure between the north and south sides. 
  This late-in-the-day challenge  may raise intriguing speculation, but it
  must be said that there has been no challenge of substance  questioning the
  determination that the Williston Road southerly right-of-way boundary is
  exactly  where the plot plan put it and the commission, board and trial
  court accepted it.  No reversible  error appears here.  See Abbiati v.
  Buttura & Sons, Inc., 161 Vt. 314, 318,