College Point Rezoning PlanGets CB 7 Approval

Acting with a team of City Planning Department (CPD) zoning specialists, Community Board 7 overwhelmingly approved a new zoning formula designed to preserve the residential character of College Point’s local neighborhoods, last Monday.
The new zoning rules affect a giant 161-block College Point residential sector bounded by Flushing Bay [west], the East River [north], 132nd Street [east], and 28th Avenue [south].
The zoning proposal will limit new development to a housing type and density that would prevent out-of-character multiple developments [“McMansions”] on more than 80 percent of the lots where such structures are allowed under existing zoning.
The proposed plans still face a rigorous schedule: Hearings are now being scheduled in Queens Borough President Helen Marshall’s office and then by City Planning. It is expected that the City Council will consider the proposal this fall.
Over 20 community speakers described the problems generated by oversized homes in limited-sized lots — congested streets, crowded classrooms and mass transit — all leading to diminished quality of life. Many described the one- and two-family homes that were demolished and replaced with semi-attached, attached or multiple family structures that were out-of-character to surrounding building patterns.
CPD speaker John Young told the meeting that the new rules would help limit residential over-development and foster construction of single-family homes.
Calling for approval of the plan, Fred Mazzarello, President of the College Point Board of Trade called the rezoning proposal “long overdue.” Citing his half-century as a community leader, he declared, “We cannot bring back the past, but we can preserve the future.”
Victor Ross is a freelance writer