Opinion ID: 2772168
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: 5(b)1ii.

Text: The Waretown CAFRA Town Center designation encourages the incorporation of smart growth designs into development and redevelopment projects, and in more compact forms due to the higher impervious cover limits and development potential possible in a CAFRA Town Center. [39 N.J.R. 768(b).] In April 2007, plaintiffs filed their complaint in lieu of prerogative writs against the Township, DEP, and the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA). See R. 4:69-1. The complaint challenged the validity of the ordinances affecting their property (hereinafter collectively referred to as the Ordinances).2 Plaintiffs alleged that the Ordinances were 2Plaintiffs specifically challenged Ordinance 2006-34; however, the Township acknowledges that plaintiffs intended to challenge 11 “arbitrary, unreasonable, capricious and illegal.” Among other claims, plaintiffs contended that the rezoning constituted “inverse condemnation.” Plaintiffs own approximately thirty-four acres of land in the Township. Their landholdings consist of Lots 1.01, 1.04, 2, 3, and 6.01 in Block fifty-six of the Ocean County Tax Map. The property extends south from its frontage along County Road 532 (CR-532, also known as Wells Mills Road) and is directly east of the Parkway. CR-532 connects the Parkway with Route 9. The property is bordered by intermittent residential development to the south and east, the Waretown Cemetery and various vacant lots to the north, and mostly undeveloped land to the west. Plaintiffs live on a two-acre, single-family residence on the eastern portion of Lot 2 of their property. The residence has existed on the property since the early 1970s and was purchased by plaintiffs in 1985. The remainder of the property consists of undeveloped woodlands. When plaintiffs acquired the property, it was subject to “mixed zoning” and included portions that were zoned as R-2 residential and C-3 commercial. The C-3 commercial zone permitted various kinds of commercial development -- including use for hotel, retail, medical, and office facilities -- on a minimum of one-acre lots, while the R- Ordinance 2006-06 and Ordinance 2006-37, as well. We consider this action a challenge to all three. 12 2 residential zone permitted single-family dwellings, public parks, and nature preserves on a minimum of two-acre lots. As a result of the Planning Commission’s endorsement of the Township’s Petition, all but Lot 6.01 of plaintiffs’ property was converted from a PA-2 Suburban Planning Area to a PA-5 Environmentally Sensitive Planning Area for the purposes of the State Plan; Lot 6.01 remained a PA-2 Suburban Planning Area. Ordinance 2006-06 rezoned a portion of plaintiffs’ property from C-3 commercial to R-2 residential. Ordinance 2006-37 rezoned as an EC district all property within a PA-5 Environmentally Sensitive Planning Area; thus, it converted all of the plaintiffs’ property, save Lot 6.01, to an EC district. Lot 6.01, which is 2.68 acres, remains zoned for R-2 residential development and could be developed with a single-family residence in accordance with R-2 density restrictions of one unit per two acres. Although plaintiffs’ single-family residence conforms to the EC district’s density requirement of one unit per twenty acres, no further development of their property within the EC district is permitted under the new zoning.