White Plains adopts new comprehensive plan

The White Plains Common Council has adopted the city’s new Comprehensive Plan, known as One White Plains, which was prepared in a three-year effort. There were several significant edits made to the draft version of the document after it had been presented to the public and drew loud criticism for not protecting existing single-family neighborhoods and encouraging dense development outside of the city’s downtown core.

Planning Commissioner Christopher Gomez submitted a communication to Mayor Tom Roach and the Common Council in which he gave details of the last-minute changes that were made in response to the harsh criticism.

Gomez explained the changes that were made to the section of the document known as liveWP, which discussed neighborhoods, housing and development:

• General text insertions to more strongly reflect the strength and value of the city’s single-family neighborhoods and importance of the public realm (publicly owned roads, sidewalks, open spaces, etc.).
• Additional detail regarding the city’s existing Affordable Rental Housing Program (ARHP) and highlighting the success of the oft-misunderstood Affordable Housing Assistance Fund (AHAF).
• Removal of the following two initiatives from the document in their entirety: Ø 1. Conduct a feasibility study to identify reasonable standards for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) on single-family properties. Ø liveWP 13. Amend the subdivision regulations to permit appropriate clustering techniques for large properties in single-family and multifamily zoning districts.
• Revision of the former liveWP 6 to limit future study to permit assisted living uses to only multifamily zoning districts (not in single-family districts unless a large institutional campus over 10-acres).
• Revision of the former liveWP 14 clarifying and highlighting the potential benefit of permitting single-family houses within Conservation Developments to be attached (on lots between 5 and 10 acres) to increase private contiguous open space and increase setbacks and vegetative buffers to neighboring properties.
• Removal of the reference to study potential for medium density housing along portions of the North Street corridor in the former liveWP 16.

“I trust that the significant edits incorporated will serve to allay the majority of the remaining community fears regarding the liveWP element in particular while giving equal credence to the thousands of public comments received city-wide throughout the extensive three-year planning process,” Gomez said.

Many White Plains residents had become alarmed when they discovered that a developer of high-rise apartment buildings had started assembling a parcel in a single-family neighborhood apparently in reaction to contents of the draft document that opened the door for dense development in parts of the city where it currently is not permitted by zoning.