At Tuesday’s Planning & Zoning Commission meeting featured a discussion of Brunswick School’s proposed 74,000 sq ft indoor sports practice facility on the east side of King Street, up near Westchester Airport.
The proposed location is property the boys private school purchased in 2017 at 100 Cliffdale Rd and 1275 King Street – on the east side of busy King Street, accessible by a tunnel the P&Z commission approved in 2019.
Since word of the proposal spread to public schools families in Greenwich, there has been a strong response on social media.
Given the public schools operating budget shortfall is pressing the BOE to find $4.1 million in cuts, and they even contemplated a pay-to-play sports scenario before taking that off the table, the Brunswick proposal stings.
The focus of comments on social media was that when private schools have purchased contiguous properties to add to their campuses, they come off the tax rolls.
The indoor practice facility, located where Tudor Investments used to be, would exceed allowable FAR in the four acre zone.
They propose a full size indoor field playing surface, with no spectator seating, enclosed year-round, with no air conditioning.
They talked about a text amendment to regulations to allow private schools a greater FAR – .10 FAR in the RA4 zone.
They tossed around the idea of crafting a regulation to permit schools to build a facility of this size and avoid having to seek variances.
The P&Z commission questioned whether the facility might sometimes be open to use by community groups.
P&Z commission chair Margarita Alban pointed out there are schools that have completely maxed out FAR.
She recalled a proposal to change a town reg back in 2018 that would have allowed Greenwich High School to add more FAR.
The campus straddles two zones – RA1 and R20 – and the idea was to rezone it all to R20 so that the FAR could increase to.224.
At the time P&Z director Katie DeLuca said the school couldn’t even add a garden shed.
That text amendment would potentially have allowed both public and private schools in residential zones a 30% bump in Floor Area Ratio (FAR).
At the time, there was the idea for a two-story building at Cardinal Stadium to include toilet facilities, team rooms, weight rooms, concession, and ticket office, and increased access for teams and spectators. A second story would have housed weight rooms and a viewing deck.
In 2018 GFP wrote about the situation.
“Greenwich Academy and Brunswick School have bought dozens of properties in the area of Maher Ave, Patterson, and Northfields, many of which are contiguous, as well as properties across town. Whitby has done it. GCDS has done it with the purchase of Stanwich School, and Brunswick has done it with the purchase of the 43 acre Tudor Jones property, which resulted in a loss to the town of $345,121.24 in property taxes.”
In 2018, residents said they feared unintended consequences of new “educational institutions” being created just to get an FAR bump.
BET member Leslie Tarkington talked about defending residential neighborhoods, saying an increase in FAR for schools would impact residents’ quality of life, diminish neighborhoods’ value to the town’s grand list and have a major impact on land values in town. She said the amendment was “a give away” to private schools.
The text amendment was ultimately withdrawn.
Fast forward to this Tuesday’s meeting.
Attorney Tom Heagney said the property, which is on the east side of King Street in the RA4 zone, was 43 acres.
Brunswick Headmaster Tom Philip explained that the school might otherwise build the facility on the east side of King Street, which is zoned differently, but for a condition of their municipal bonds.
All the land on the west side of King Street had been funded by a municipal bond opportunity, which Mr. Philip said had 10 or 12 more years before being paid off.
He said that every year the school was required to submit a very detailed accounting of what the property is used for.
He added that the facility would be built into a hill and would not be seen in a significant way from King Street. Also he said it could be hidden on the golf course side by large trees.
He said the reason they had already been allowed to build a turf field and track on the property (in 2019) was because it did not count toward FAR. (The track does count as impervious surface.)
Mr. Philip said he had anticipated the question: ‘What does the town get for this?’
He said Brunswick would be open to allowing community groups some use of the facility when Brunswick was not using it.
He acknowledged the “fiscal constraints the town is dealing with.”
“I appreciate the largesse of Mr. Philip and Brunswick,” commissioner Peter Lowe said. “I wonder how much supply the school will actually be able to provide to outside sources.”
“The town of Greenwich is not well endowed with athletic facilities. It’s hard to get court time. It’s hard to get playing time,” Mr. Heagney said.
“We have a nice tradition that I’m pretty proud of, of when we can, making our facilities available to the town – whether it’s for Covid shots in the gym, or making a field available to GYL,” Mr. Philip said.
“Yes, the bulk of the use would be for Brunswick. That’s why we would build it. That’s why we would fund it,” Mr. Philip said, adding however, “Reasonable requests, we could accommodate.”
Commissioner Nick Macri noted the current limit of .075 FAR.
Mr. Heagney said they were suggesting .10 FAR because there were nursing homes in the area.
Mr. Macri pushed back.
“This is something completely different from a nursing home. It’s an educational use and it’s a full sized football field, not a nursing home.”
Mr. Heagney said he mentioned nursing homes because, from a planning standpoint, square footage in that type of facility would be allowed in the 4-acre zone.
Macri asked if they could even run the facility year round, given there is no air conditioning planned for it, whereas a nursing home is occupied 24/7 and 365 days a year.
“I’m having difficulty with the .10 FAR,” Macri said.
Mr. Philip said not having air conditioning was a decision based on funding and the additional cost.
He said there would be duct work and air exchange, and because of the size of the building there could be louvers or something akin to large garage doors.
Commissioner Mary Jenkins also asked about the comparison to nursing homes.
“There is such a visual difference between a large athletic building with no windows that has a kind of commercial feel to it, versus a nursing home, which is just a specialized form of residence,” Jenkins said.
“That’s not a particularly relevant comparison,” she added. “And should this go forward as a text amendment, if you don’t hit the .1 FAR, you’re going to have FAR still available for further development. Is there already some thought about how you would use the additional FAR under that new limit?”
“No,” Mr. Heagney said.
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P&Z chair Alban said the 2018 situation brougt up the question of “spot zoning.” Spot zoning refers to the rezoning of a small, isolated parcel of land within a larger area, often to a use that is inconsistent with the surrounding zoning and the overall master plan.
“What do we do about the schools that aren’t in the RA-4, and Greenwich Academy comes to us and says, ‘We want to do something more and we’re maxed out, and you gave Brunswick extra?'”
“We have to be fair and consistent. There’s a purposeful plan in town to keep reducing FAR as you go into the big zones, and if we begin to bend that, that’s not consistent with our Plan and Conservation and Development. As you know, any amendment to a regulation has to be consistent with the POCD, which says ‘preserve community character’ is our first and highest objective.”
“I did say yesterday that the building looks like a Walmart, but you could fix that,” Alban said.
Ms Alban said proposing an overlay zone might be “more conducive.”
As for the current proposal, she said, “You’re making a regulation just to accommodate this specific use and specific application That’s not good zoning, to me,” a said.
She suggested the applicant either go back to the .075 maximum FAR or come back and convince the commission about a text amendment.
Mr. Philip said, “I get where you’re coming from. I respect and admire it.”
He asked if it was possible to carry over FAR from an adjacent property across the street.
“We had a big discussion about that yesterday, and we didn’t think you could,” Alban said.
Mr. Heagney said there was a statute that would permit the transfer of development rights, but it required the adoption of a local regulation.
“That could be another way to do it,” Alban said.
“Why don’t we look at that,” Mr. Philip said.
“If Mr. Heagney can find a way to sell us conceptual cleanness, I’m good, but I have to be fair to Greenwich High School and Greenwich Academy,” Alban said.
“Let’s figure out if it’s a text amendment or the regulation first,” Alban said.
AS for the 2018 proposal that wold have allowed GHS more FAR for their stadium, Alban said, “We got smashed into the ground.”
Mr. Heagney, who was previously on the P&Z commission himself, recalled that there was a time when the stadium was redone and square footage was needed, they went to the Zoning Board of Appeals for a variance.
“For hardship!” Alban said.
She said she wasn’t sure an overlay zone would be well received.
She said Mr. Heagney might try to merge the properties through a TDR – transfer development rights.
She asked the commissioners, “What is your view of the trade off between community benefit and zoning that opens a Pandora’s box?”
“I don’t think TDR is the way to go,” Macri said. “It gets on a slippery slope.”
“Isn’t it a distinction for Brunswick that we have the FAR across the street,” Heagney asked.
“If you did a TDR, what you could do is transfer the development rights of the extra land – if you could combine the lots – you would have to write it very narrowly if the area of two lots can only be combined if they are adjacent except for a street – or something like that,” Alban said.
Mr. Heagney said an overlay zone could potentially be for athletic facilities.
“I would say educational is a better angle,” Alban said. “Athletic facilities sounds like it could be a bowling alley. I feel like the town is supportive of school needs – mostly.”
Toward the end of the discussion, Mr. Lowe referred to a private school “arms race.”
“The schools need to stay competitive,” Lowe said.
“That’s exactly why we have to do something that works for all schools,” Alban said.
“That’s totally fair,” Mr. Philip said.
See also:
Brunswick School Seeks to Build a 74,000 Sq Ft Indoor Sports Practice Facility
May 4, 2025