Allan Appel Photo
Brewery Square Aptartments looking east from River Street.
Please permit us to put a fence up, said the applicants from Brewery Square Gatehouse LLP, to the Historic District Commission.
The response: Wait just a minute!
Through your years of neglect, the historic gatehouse at a landmark building in the Quinnipiac Local Historic District had to be torn down. Now you’re asking us give a blessing to your cheesy fence proposal?
Not so fast!
Rendering of the proposed metal fence.
Well, those were not the precise words exchanged. It was very much the upshot expressed in the room, at least among some members of the Historic District Commission.
Boston-based Robert Leahy, one of the partners at the historic Brewery Square Gatehouse Partnership, which owns the104- apartment complex, and attorney Stuart Margolis made their second appearance before the commission this past Wednesday night at City Hall..
At issue before the commissioners was the applicants’ request for a certificate of appropriateness for the erection of a fence to run from the current parged concrete fence along Ferry Street down along the stately 1898 building’s curving driveway.
Why the need for a fence?
Brewery Square’s Leahy makes his case to the commissioners.
In December last year, in an instance of what commissioners had called egregious demolition by neglect, the historic gatehouse at the corner of that property, had to be demolished in the name of public safety by the building department.
Now the applicants wanted to put up a permanent fence to replace the temporary chain link that had been thrown up subsequent to the demolition.
It was the second appearance of Leahy and Margolis before the commissioners. Last month they presented their idea of a parged concrete continuation of the fence that currently exists on Ferry Street in front of the complex’s parking lot.
“The concrete was considered too ‘brutalist’ for the neighborhood,” Leahy summed up his takeaway from that previous meeting.
So now he was submitting plans for “wrought iron fencing” instead. It would mirror the fence that currently exists on a small sliver at the eastern end of the property near where the road ascends into the Ferry Street bridge.
“It’ll be similar to what’s already there with the area behind it to be landscaped for the tenants,” Leahy said.
After he presented a rendering of the metal fence, Commissioner Susan Godshall said her recollection of the meeting was that, while commissioners generally refrain from specifying materials to be used, bricks as an option was favorably discussed. She also asked if Leahy had met with consultants to offer other preservation options.
Commissioners Godshall and Kimberly.
Commissioner George Knight offered another objection: Leahy had described the new proposed fence as “wrought iron” but had not brought a sample. Knight said he doubts the proposed fence is truly iron and material samples are the usual request of the commissioners.
“Steel” then, replied Leahy. “Iron World ornamental fencing, from Eagle Fence in Plainville, which we always use. It would be exactly like what’s there.”
“But we don’t know what’s there,” added Commissioner Tom Kimberly.
“And will the finials match?” Knight added, as a crescendo of small but important absences of detail began to add to a growing skepticism among commissioners.
“For a certificate [of approval], we need the model number, so when they go to verify … Can you look it up?”
Leahy got on his phone to look up the fence and its number in the company’s website. He read the specs aloud, including that the fence would be eight feet seven inches tall.
In that case, added City Plan staffer Nathan Hougrand, “you’ll need a variance.” Eight feet is the limit allowable without a variance.
“Can we go with eight feet?” Leahy replied.
“If Commissioner [Trish] Learned were here, she’d also want to know how it meets the existing wall.”
“These things sound small,” Knight explained to a somewhat frustrated Leahy, “but they’re defining. How the pickets and the posts are terminated. This is only a concept.”
“It’s a standard we expect of applicants,” said Godshall.
Karen Jenkins, the newest commissioner, happens to live in the Brewery Square Apartments. She offered a different point of view: “When do applicants get that information, so they don’t have to come to so many meetings? I’ve seen them come back four times!”
Learned, who was running late, arrived in the middle of the discussion. She asked if members of the public had any input. New Haven Preservation Trust Director of Preservation Services Elizabeth Holt took the chair before the commissioners.
“For the record,” she said, “my feeling is the applicant is doing the bare minimum at this site. It’s discouraging that I wasn’t contacted as an advisor. It’s discouraging they’re doing so little.”
“This has potential to be a handsome fence,” said Godshall, “but I’d never vote for it as a replacement for the context. It’s disrespectful to a national landmark.”
“Let’s keep it to the subject at hand,” Knight offered, “the fence.”
“I’d recommend an artist to an art work on a wall,” chimed in Jenkins.
“That’s not historic,” replied Godshall.
Leahy asked if they could return to make a more detailed presentation at the next meeting.
“For the record,” said Godshall, “with all the information in the world, this is not a sufficient solution.”
A majority of the commissioners voted to table the matter, with the proviso that Leahy return with more specifics for the next meeting, which takes place Aug 14.
Each application, it was explained, is valid for 65 days from the date of filing before it has to be renewed or re-applied for. Aug. 14, said Commissioner Kimberly, would be just about day 64.