Town planners press for fuller environmental review of Niskayuna Harbor PUD

Town planning staff and advisory members urged the town board to require a comprehensive environmental review of the proposed Niskayuna Harbor planned unit development at 2757 Aqueduct Road, saying the current sketch plan raises several potentially significant environmental concerns.

"I think the overarching concerns remain the proximity to the Erie Canal, the proximity of the stormwater to the wetlands, the filling of 2 acres of non-jurisdictional wetlands with the potential to change the hydrology, and...reducing the footprints of the building," said Laura Robertson, town planner, summarizing the Conservation Advisory Council's (CAC) recommendations and the draft findings the CAC approved.

Robertson and CAC members said those five areas of concern — including hydrologic changes and building density — led the CAC to recommend a positive State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR) declaration and for the town to consider an environmental impact statement. One advisory member described the property as containing the full canal bed on both sides, a historical condition they said warrants careful study.

Town legal staff cautioned that the decision about whether to allow segmentation rests with the town board as the lead agency. "The law in and of itself just does not allow [segmentation] in this type of scenario," a staff member advising the committee said, arguing that segmentation is generally disfavored when one board's actions are contingent on another's.

Committee members noted the developer has been asked repeatedly to reduce the project footprint but declined, saying the design would be economically infeasible with those changes. Planners said the planning board will receive additional elevations and profile drawings and that the earliest formal planning-board recommendation could come at its late-July meeting, days before the town board acts.

The committee asked that the CAC or a planning-board representative be present at the town-board agenda meeting to answer questions when the town board considers the SEQR determination. Robertson said a draft CAC report would be available for the town-board packet ahead of that meeting.

Next steps: staff will finalize and circulate the CAC report and the town board, as lead agency, will decide whether to accept segmentation or issue a positive SEQR declaration and require an environmental impact statement.

Authorities referenced in the discussion were SEQR processes and procedures as discussed by the town's legal advisor; no ordinance numbers or statute citations were specified in the transcript.

Ending: The committee agreed to ensure planners and CAC representatives are available for the town-board agenda meeting when the SEQR/segmentation issue is scheduled.