BELFAST - In a city filled with ornate old homes, many of which have been restored in recent years, Seaview Terrace has become an unlikely battleground for preserving the historic character of a street.

Built in the early 1960s for a subdivision, the road originally ran from Northport Avenue to Congress Street but was almost immediately split by the Route 1 bypass, creating the accidental cul-de-sac on the east side known today as Seaview Terrace. The initial development was unremarkable and by some estimates hastily planned. Many of the modest ranch houses built in the ‘60s remain essentially unchanged today.

Yet residents of the street who addressed the City Council on Tuesday spoke passionately about their street, describing it as quiet haven amidst an otherwise busy part of the city.

As one resident, Kathleen Kearns, put it, “We like it that way.”

A slate of proposed zoning changes scheduled for public hearings starting later this month will take in all properties inside the bypass. Among more sweeping changes proposed for minimum lot sizes and setbacks, the new zoning would earmark Seaview Terrace and several others streets in the vicinity of Waldo County General Hospital for new health care offices.

The so-called Residential 2 district that includes Seaview Terrace today allows such offices. In fact most of the city’s zoning districts currently allow some version of health care offices.

But as Kearns noted, while medical offices have popped up on surrounding streets, Seaview Terrace has remained completely residential.

“Despite the opportunity, there are no doctors’ offices on this street,” she said. “There has been no natural selection in this direction.” 

Exacerbating the issue for some residents is the proposal to eliminate health care offices from a list of permitted uses in the two other residential zones inside the bypass, potentially driving more development into the zone surrounding the hospital.

According to city’s Future Land Use Plan the goal of the new Residential 3 district is just that: “to provide an area in which health care facilities/offices and professional offices are recognized as a primary use, and to establish this area near Waldo County General Hospital.”

The plan goes on to say that, though new housing would be permitted, there is very little room for expansion in that direction. The more likely outcome, it says, would be the conversion of existing homes into health care offices:

“The City believes it is appropriate to allow new housing in the area ... but it wants current and future residents in this area to recognize that a health care office or facility likely could become their neighbor.”

Some Seaview Terrace residents who spoke on Tuesday rejected the idea of being grouped with nearby Wight Street, which is already home to a mix of health care offices and single family homes.

“Wight Street is a fast moving through street; we’re a slow-moving residential street,” said resident Dawn Marriner. “We’re a neighborhood where kids go out and play because there’s not a lot of traffic.”

Mark Kelley, who recently moved to Seaview Terrace after what he described as a two year search for a home in Belfast, said he felt like he was being blamed for the 1985 ordinance that originally allowed health care offices on the street. Kelley said the realtor who sold him the home didn’t present the property in a way that suggested the scope of non-residential uses available under current zoning regulations.

“It should never have been in R2. It should have been in R1,” he said. The Residential 1 designation was mentioned by other residents because it permits fewer non-residential uses than Residential zones 2 and 3.

Kelley questioned whether the upcoming public hearings were merely a formality. He cited a letter, no longer in his possession, that he said had a coercive tone, implying that residents should respect the work and findings of city officials and adopt the new ordinances as presented.

Slocum rejected the notion that anything was predetermined. “This is a wide open process,” he said. Other Councilors expressed a similar faith in the public hearing process.

City Councilor Mike Hurley cautioned that zoning ordinances could cut both ways. Until fairly recently, he said, Belfast, leaned toward allowing just about anything.

“You want a dog kennel, with a gravel pit, with a mining operation? You got it,” he said.

On the flip side, he said, more restrictive zoning, like what Seaview Terrace residents appeared to be asking for, is sometimes seen as being anti-business. Hurley said he wouldn’t be surprised if this was the case in 1985 when Seaview Terrace was made part of the Residential 2 zone.

Public hearings on proposed zoning changes for all districts inside the bypass will be held at the Troy Howard Middle School cafeteria at 6:30 p.m. on the following days: 

• Proposed Residential 1 zoning district - June 25
• Proposed Residential 2 and Residential 3 zoning districts - July 2
• Proposed Downtown Commercial and Waterfront Mixed Use zoning districts - July 8

View maps and supporting documents:

Planning Board Hearings 2014-Existing Zoning
Planning Board Hearings 2014-Amendments
Planning Board Hearings 2014-Future Plans