The Zoning Board of Appeals Monday approved two variances, which, along with the pending sale of an access road by the city is the last step in Wal-Mart’s plans to open in North Tonawanda.
Planners last week were satisfied with the site plan they’ve tweaked for months and their final nod now awaits only a period for input by equivalent offices at the county level, where the schematics have been forwarded.
Variances granted for the industrial lot near the corner of Erie Avenue and Niagara Falls Boulevard Monday skirt a minimum of 30 percent shade coverage - now the site is approved for roughly 15 percent — and a minimum of 1,825 parking spaces - now reduced to 915, half the original proposal.
“I think I’m in an unusual standpoint because I think that it’s a better project because of (the variances),” Marc A. Romanowski, attorney for Wal-Mart, said.
Anthony Bellomo, with FRA Engineering, explained to the board exactly what he and members of the planning commission had hashed out July 21 — that fewer trees in a staggered pattern are intended to please the eye, but any more than the current number would require a bigger parking lot and the destruction of existing foliage along the outer perimeter.
“After several meetings with the planning commission, we’ve developed the plan you see here,” Romanowski said. “We’ve looked at this issue every way but sideways and we can’t (meet the 30 percent minimum) without expanding the parking area.”
“Your code is probably one of the most stringent I’ve seen anywhere,” he said of the city’s parking space minimums, originally 1,825 for the project.
Commercial codes call for one space for every 100 square feet of “floor space.” The dramatic reduction has been characterized as the lowest number Wal-Mart is likely to entertain for the 185,000 square foot project.
Immediately prior to approving the variances, members of the board were required to also approve the environmental impact findings OK’d by the Planning Commission June 2.
“At this stage it’s really just finalizing the plans for both the county and the city planning commission,” Romanowski said. “It’s mostly just mechanical.”
The board also discussed several homeowner variances. Its next regular meeting will be held Sept. 8, at 7 p.m., in City Hall council chambers.
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