Montgomery City Board of Justice approves five land-use variances, denies accessory-structure request on Cottondale Road

At a meeting of Montgomery City’s Board of Justice, members approved five variances and special exceptions covering accessory structures, a semi-public use conversion and a height/story variance for a hotel, and denied one request to retain and build accessory structures on a vacant residential lot.

The decisions affect six agenda items: a community-garden storage building at 3125 Bozeman Drive; a two-story storage shed at 801 Zack Court; a denied request at 1230 Cottondale Road for accessory structures without a main dwelling; a 12-by-20 gazebo for 3301 Wilmington Road; a semi-public use for a training/daycare-related operation at 2510 [address as spoken]; and a story/height variance to add a story to a hotel at 1201 Eastern Boulevard.

Why it matters: the approvals allow specific nonstandard buildings or uses to proceed subject to local conditions and permits, while the denial underscores the board’s reluctance to allow equipment- or storage-style uses on vacant residential lots without a primary dwelling.

The board approved the storage building for the neighborhood garden at 3125 Bozeman Drive. Patrick Moss, the petitioner, told the board, “What I'm requesting is, we got a piece of land here that we got a neighborhood garden. And, I wanna put this building there so we can have a place to store our tubes instead of residents having carrying back and forth to the cars and all that stuff.” The board moved to approve the request and the motion carried.

The board also…