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NORWALK, Conn. – The traffic study in support of a proposed Norwalk mosque was the first thing to come under fire Thursday night in a debate among those deciding its fate.
"The traffic study only gives us counts for the prayer hall," said Joe Santo, chairman of the Zoning Commission. "It doesn't give us counts for the gym and the other part. They claim that they're not going to use them together, but I don't see how we can control that."
The commission's plan Review Committee plowed through many other issues before getting to Al Madany Islamic Center's mosque planned for 127 Fillow St. at about 9 p.m. More than 30 people packed into the small conference room, most of them from the Fillow Street area. Their attorney, Marc Grenier, also watched.
Commissioner Nathan Sumpter argued for the mosque, while Santo, James Wilson and others steadfastly expressed skepticism about the parking planned for the facility and the impact on the area. Adam Blank said he might vote to approve the prayer hall but not the large building planned as a community center, if that was possible. Mike Mushak said he wanted to vote for the mosque but couldn't get past the parking and traffic issues.
Members said the zoning regulations need to be rewritten but agreed they couldn't do that while this application is pending.
"I don't see that the mosque and the rec center as being not allowed because of the regulation that we have on the books," Sumpter said. "Even with leaving the house there it does fit in our zoning regulations, even with the parking."
The mosque would become a destination "because it's beautiful," Blank said. Others agreed.
"We don't leave our church to go to another church simply because it's a new church," Sumpter said. "The reason that we go is because that's our church. That's where we attend our services."
The model for the mosque presented a false impression, Mushak said. It made it looked bigger than it is, he said, and compared the size of the dome to a trampoline. The red house would fit on the stage of Concert Hall and the rest of the facility would fit in the seating area of the hall. "People are reacting to the scale which inherently is scary, because of the red house," he said, pointing out that the red house is small.
The traffic study presented by Michale Galante in support of the mosque was misleading, Blank said, because it didn't allow for people entering the parking lot and then leaving if there were no spaces. That it was based on the people praying in the space rented by the center made it invalid, he said, because the mosque would be built in part to allow space for women and children at the prayer services.
Blank said the description of the recreation area as accessory use was misleading, as the prayer hall accounts for 3,000 square feet and the rest of the space is 40,000 square feet. But he agreed that the zoning regulations do not require an allowance for parking for the accessory use.
"They basically are following all of the rules based on our code with this application," Mushak said. "We have the extra – you can call it a 'smell test' or whatever you want to call it – but it's the special permit that allows us to look at the context, etc. Which is what we're doing. I think everybody is making good points, but I just want to highlight that this whole process wouldn't have happened if the zoning code had provisions in it for this type of application. In the future, I think we do need to address that."
"The plan meets the regulations," Sumpter said. "We need to go with what we have realizing that it's OK because it's in the regulations."
The panel will meet again June 14 and consider which resolution to send to the entire commission for a vote. Staff member Michael Greene said he would write three, based on the comments. One would approve the mosque, one would deny it and the third would approve it with modifications.
The "drop dead" date for a decision is June 29, Santo said. The commission expects to make a decision at its June 20 meeting in Concert Hall.
Comments (7)
During the recent board meeting it was clear that the members were confused as to the mosque specifics. The key question is why wasn't the architect of the mosque allowed to speak and answer the questions after all he has designed the building. He was present at the hearing and asked permission to speak after it became clear that there were questions but he was denied to chance to clarify his project. Common sense tells you to go to the source, instead of spending one hour wondering about something, it would've been easier to get the direct answer from the source within seconds or minutes.
In regards to muslim prayers, the once a week congregational prayer known as Jummah is in early afternoon around 1 pmish. This is outside the busy traffic hours.
There are two prayers in the entire year during Eid festivities which will have more people and during those two instances there will be two prayer sessions.
The other significant thing of note is that the traffic survey by the condominium complex hired surveyor studied the Windsor, CT mosque and fulltime school complex. This is misleading because by using traffic studies including a fulltime school, this obviously will have increased traffic. What would be ideal is studying the traffic of nearby mosques only. Its like comparing apples and oranges.
Additionally in order for a plan to go in front of the board and the public, the planning and zoning committee needs to give the go ahead. The mosque people were told what changes had to be made to fix the traffic concerns otherwise the project would not move forward and they had done that otherwise the project would not have been able to be presented to the public. If the planning and zoning committee personnel were not satisfied they likely would've further addressed this.
There is nothing wrong to being opposed to something, but I think the appropriate thing to do is understand the facts and then form an opinion.
Commissioner Sumpter assumes a Muslim will only attend the mosque in his local area. When in fact, it's quite common for Muslims to visit other mosques and to stop by the closest mosque for daily prayers when out on business or traveling. I'm concerned that we will get a lot of out of town traffic on a street that normally only handles residential traffic. As others have stated, the church up for sale on West Avenue would be more suited for this purpose since it's right off the highway.
The big issue seems to be parking. They could easily get 2700 more square feet of parking under the proposed building, more, if they removed the little red house. That would be a lot more parking on site and would meet most of the valid safety objections. Requiring more on site parking is not unreasonable.
In the neighbor's little experiment, a lot of the parked cars were not entirely on the roadway, giving an incorrect impression of what the street would look like. Parking them the way they did would be impossible for days after a heavy snow.
It is not legal, that's why they have to file for a special permit and bend the truth about their intended usage to get it approved! Their entire argument is laughable, let me build this huge, expensive complex so I won't use it... promise I won't....
This should be a huge wake up call for the residents of Norwalk that we have some major zoning law problems. Regardless of the outcome, residents should remain mobilized so the laws are changed as soon as possible.
Without trying to quote the exact text of the section, the zoning rules in Norwalk allow "houses of worship", and schools, in every zone but require a special permit. This proposal is not "illegal", it may be non-conforming. All that means is, because it is not a single family residence in a single family residence zone, the Zoning board has to review the proposal before a building permit is issued and decide if a particular set of plans will fit on a particular site. They look at issues such as enough on-site parking for the proposed use. If the plans for the mosque clearly limited use of the building to no more than the number we could reasonably expect to arrive in less than 89 cars, the neighbors would not have much of an argument about enough on site parking. If the site was adjacent to a large municipal parking area, on site parking would be less of an issue. There may be some who just don't like the idea of a mosque anywhere in Norwalk, but Zoning only rules on how the proposal, on that site, complies with the law. Some of their review will involve resolving conflicting opinions of various expert consultants who disagree on how much on-site parking is needed and how entry to and exit from, the site can be safely managed, or not. Not every site is suitable for a house of worship. Some lots are just too small.
I'm curious as to what the zoning regulations actually say? Also, I thought that if neighbors don't approve of a building (or addition) then zoning will not allow it to be built?
This is shamefull. Its legal so let them build it. We have the city itself ignoring the impact some of the events it allows to go on have in neighborhoods and people are worried about a place of worship?