Ordinance Counting Pools in Lot Coverage Likely to Pass

CAPE MAY — City Council will vote on an ordinance Dec. 15 at 7 p.m. that would include swimming pools in calculations for lot coverage of properties.
That ordinance is likely to pass but discussion continues on increasing lot coverage in the R-1 zone from 30 to 40 percent.
At a Dec. 1 council meeting, City Manager Bruce MacLeod presented information to council from the city’s Construction Office showing samples of site plans that included pools. He said Councilman Niels Favre had asked about the effects of increasing the lot coverage allowance from 30 to 40 percent in the R-1 zone.
MacLeod showed a plan with a property of 9,375 feet, the minimum size lot in the R-1 zone that would allow a pool, with 30 percent lot coverage including 25-foot front yard setback, a 30-foot rear yard setback and two side yards with 10-foot setbacks. That amounted to 2,812 square feet, he said.
MacLeod also provided council with a picture of the same size property with 40 percent lot coverage.
“On a pure mathematical basis, it would make it appear that it fits,” he said.
MacLeod said not every lot is an exact rectangle.
Mayor Edward J. Mahaney Jr. said while it is possible to have 40 percent lot coverage on a 9,375 square-foot property “it barely fit into the minimum set backs in all bulk areas.”
MacLeod said Cape May has about 68 swimming pools predominantly located in the R1 and R2 zones. He said they had not addressed space for equipment for pools such as pumps or heaters.
MacLeod said there should be a 10-foot buffer for safety reasons and pool equipment should not occupy that space. He said while a pool would count 100 percent toward lot coverage items such as decks or a stone area surrounding a pool would fall into a 50 percent calculation of lot coverage.
Favre said 38 percent of the city’s swimming pools were located in the R-1 zone.
“My recommendation is if we do anything with lot coverage, we do it in a separate ordinance not part of the pool ordinance,” said Favre.
He said he discussed the matter with Councilman David Kurkowski, who was absent from the meeting. Favre said Kurkowski told him going from 30 percent to 40 percent lot coverage in the R-1 zone was “too much,” and he would be more comfortable with 35 percent.
Favre said a property owner has to make a decision of how much of the lot is going to be for structure and how much for amenities such as a pool. He said he supported passing the pool ordinance and perhaps in the future, as a separate issue, increase the R-1 zone from 30 percent to 35 percent lot coverage.
On the minimum lot size of 9,375 feet in the R-1 zone, an extra 5 percent of lot coverage would amount to 900 feet, said Favre.
Mahaney said he did not favor increasing lot coverage from 30 to 35 percent at this time. He called it a “quality of life” issue. If R-1 zone lot coverage were increased, the added space most likely would be used for additions to homes rather than for pools, said Mahaney.
“The reason that people come to this town is for the sense of openness and airiness and friendliness, not congested massively high or laterally wide usage of the land,” he said. “We should not be pursuing temporary fads that are to the benefit of speculators or real estate investors who don’t intend to have a long term commitment to our city.”