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<br />Appeal Against the Setback Permit for 2940 Old Highway 8 <br /> <br />The reduction in the setback is intrusive in major and minor ways and does <br />not seem to be necessary: <br /> <br />Our most serious objection is the 6' 2" encroachment of the planned garage <br />into the standard 10' setback limit: <br /> <br />Traffic around the end of this garage will be constrained to a 3' 10" <br />corridor, less if gutters or landscaping are involved. This could increase the <br />incidence of unintentional or casual trespass on our property by the owner's <br />mowers, children, relatives, friends, pets, contractors, etc., due to house or <br />home related activities. This will be especially true since there are no <br />clearly defmed boundaries between the properties: our house is 25' back <br />from the property line and many people will falsely assume that the <br />dividing line is half-way between the two buildings. To preserve our <br />privacy we will be forced to find a way to minimize this likely increase in <br />casual trespassing, which will probably require building a privacy fence at <br />the property line, a fmancial burden placed upon us by this expansion. A <br />fence will also further close the current open views of the two properties. In <br />any case, a temporary fence should be constructed to prevent trespasses <br />during the construction phase of their garage, since accidental trespassing is <br />likely to occur during any construction project, but more so when the <br />construction contains a 3' 10" bottleneck. <br /> <br />The property along Old Highway 8 have large yards and, in general, the <br />houses are well setback from each other, most often in excess of the 10' <br />minimum. The 1 0' minimum should be sufficient for the expansion of <br />houses in this area. <br /> <br />The application calls for reducing the current garage's setback of30' to a <br />setback of 3' 10" for the proposed garage. This is 1 /8 the current distance. <br />If the R-l setback of 10' were maintained, the distance would be a less <br />radical change of 1/3 of the current distance. <br /> <br />The comer of the proposed garage within the setback is at an angle to the <br />property line and, therefore, appears more intrusive than a garage wall <br />parallel to the property line. Although it must be admitted that a parallel <br />wall at 3' 10" from the property line would be even more intrusive and lead <br />to more unintentional and casual trespassing; a parallel wall at 10' would <br />be acceptable. <br /> <br />September 12, 1999 <br /> <br />Page 4 of5 <br />