Zoning Board approves bakery parking lot Approval comes despite neighbors' concerns over idling trucks BY KATHY CHANG Staff Writer WOODBRIDGE - Although the Zoning Board of Adjustment approved Alblio Santos' application to construct a new parking lot for his business' delivery trucks, the board's Chairman, Bernard McLaughlin, firmly told Santos, owner of the Santos Bakery on Rahway Avenue in Avenel, to be a good neighbor or else. "I live around that area, and I see that you have not complied with what you have been told at the last meeting [in January 2007]," McLaughlin said as he addressed Santos, his lawyer John DeNoia, and his planner and engineer Angelo Valettuto after the board meeting on Jan. 17. The three nodded their heads in compliance. The board voted 6-1 in favor of Santos' application under the name AMS Associates Inc. (Santos Bakery) at the board meeting. Board member Frank D'Arcio was the lone dissent. "Here's an opportunity to clean the site up, to pull the trucks off the street and at least make that corner cleaner," said McLaughlin. The applicant proposes to continue operating his wholesale bakery at the location, 1050 Rahway Ave., and to create a stacked overnight parking lot for eight bakery vehicles. The lot is adjacent to the bakery site. A 25-foot-wide landscape buffer is proposed on the easternmost portion of the site. The center area of the buffer will have a miniature 3-foot-high berm with a mixture of 6-foot-tall evergreen trees. Areas of new sidewalk, curb and landscaping are also proposed. "No idling" signage has been provided on the site. Santos' property currently contains a rectangular 9,000-square-foot parcel of land located along the south side of Rahway Avenue and Homer Court. It now includes the abutting 4,200-square-foot lot, which is in the R-4 Residential zone, at the corner of Homer Court and Mereline Avenue.Atwo-story bakery building exists on the site and is located in the B-1 Neighborhood Commercial Zone. In January 2007, the board had denied the applicant's proposal to construct a new parking lot containing 10 parking stalls in an existing stone area to the east of the bakery, citing that fumes from the delivery trucks would be a detriment to the area. That proposal was closer to the residents' homes. The resolution passed by the board includes seven conditions that the bakery needs to comply with. The conditions include that deliveries to the site by 18-wheel tractor-trailers must be performed completely within the confines of the site and must not intrude upon Homer Court, and the applicant must operate the site in a way that prevents conflict or intrusion upon the public right of way. Santos testified at the Jan. 17, 2008, meeting that there were 24-foot trucks that made deliveries to his bakery. Residents who came to the meeting in January 2007 returned to the meeting on Jan. 17, 2008, to testify to the board that the problems of idling trucks, the unloading and loading of trucks at 3 a.m., the overflowing garbage Dumpsters, and drainage problems that existed a year ago have not changed. Edna Tabon, who lives across the street from the bakery on Mereline Avenue, showed the board five sheets of photographs depicting the problems that her family and neighbors endure. Francis Betsko, who has worked in the bakery for 12 years under the previous owner and six years under the current owner, testified at the meeting in January 2007 that the business has increased and a state inspector inspects the place every year.