05-11-06 Planning Comm. Agenda - Laserfiche WebLink

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April 11, 2006 2367 McMenemy Street Little Canada, MN 55117 Dear Planning Commission and City Council, We own a house on 3.5 acres of property adjacent to McMenemy St. We wish to put an addition of 3 rooms on to our house to accommodate our growing family. When we applied for our building permit we were inforrned that our house is a nonconforming building and that the addition we would like to add, straight off the North end of the house, would also be nonconforming. Strict enforcement of the city ordinance in our case causes an undue and unique hardship to our lives. Due to circumstances unique to our property, we are unable to build anywhere but off of the North end of our house and are therefore seeking a Conditional Use Permit and/or a variance. We believe the variance would be in keeping with the spirit and intent of the ordinance. State Law requires that you, the City, make two findings before granting a variance. Our residence meets the two requirements: 1) That the ordinance causes undue hardship because of unique circumstances to our properly, and 2) That granting a variance keeps within the spirit and intent of the ordinance. We own a large parcel of property, but any addition is limited solely to the North end of our house. The land to the immediate West of our house, less than ten feet from the side of the building, slopes sharply down to a protected wetland area which makes up a substantial portion of our acreage. We cannot fill in this slope due to environmental damage that would be caused to the wetland. This wetland area severely limits the use to which we can put our property due to environmental concerns. To protect the wetland area there is a covenant built into the property deed stating that the wetland can never be developed nor the remaining high ground be divided into any parcels. Due to this restriction the proposed addition off the North end of the house will not infringe on anyone else's property line, nor will the addition be near the end of our property line. Moreover, we are unable to build to the South of our house due to the easement from the Williams gas pipeline. Tltis easement runs to within a foot of the South side of our house. Another hardship unique to our property is the wider-than-normal right of way for McMenemy St., a residential street. A normal residential right of way is 25 feet from the center line; in contrast, the right of way for McMenemy St is 33 feet from the center line. The 8 extra footage of right of way causes our house to be nonconforming. Were our house located on an ordinary residential street, our proposed addition would not require a variance and our house would not be nonconforming. The water works property across the street from our house and the accompanying right of way subjects our property to unique conditions. The final significant hardship is the age and design of the house itself Our home, which is over 50 years old, has a basic layout that limits the type. number, and location of changes that can be made to the existing strucnu•e. We have two useable bedrooms and will soon be afour-person 17-