Bank variance request falls one vote short
By darlene diebold
Staff Writer

HOLMDEL — In a split vote, the Zoning Board last week denied an application to build a Commerce Bank branch on northbound Laurel Avenue just south of the Route 35 intersection.

The board voted 4-to- 03 in favor of granting the requested use variance, but municipal land use law requires five affirmative votes for such a variance. Edward Wentz and board alternates, Santo Arena and Mary Simpson, voted against the variance. Board members Tom Ploskonka, Robert Campbell, Vice Chairman Cornelius McCaffrey and Chairman Irwin Baron voted in favor.

This was the applicant’s eighth appearance before the board.

The applicant wanted to construct a 3,669-square-foot, one-story bank on a 2.61-acre tract located in two separate zones, neither of which permit banks. The proposal included four drive-through lanes and a 45-space parking lot.

"Overall, I believe that the positives outweigh the negatives," board Chairman Irwin Baron said in advance of the vote. Although he agreed it was a complicated application, he felt that the presentation given by Commerce was sensitive to the environmental and traffic concerns about the site.

The property is bordered to the north by the Route 35 jug handle and to the south by the Laurel Avenue Nature Reserve Area.

"The Environmental Commission is pleased that a decision has been made so that we can go back to building the trail system in the Laurel Avenue Nature Area," commission Chairwoman Roberta Kaufman said outside of the meeting. "The access to Commerce Bank, in the proposal, would have taken out significant stands of trees in the northern part of the bank."

The bank would have been built on three lots, each containing an older home located very close to the road.

A use variance was required because banks are not a permitted use in either the R-40A zone or the O-30 zone. One of the three lots is located in an O-30 zone, which permits single family dwellings, low density office space and municipal office buildings. The other two lots are located in an R-40A zone, which permits single-family homes, libraries, fire houses, museums and schools.

At a previous meeting, Planner John Madden, representing Commerce Bank, argued that none of those uses are realistic and that a bank has many of the same characteristics as an office building.