Developers eying Warren Road property for new housing development

A 24.5-acre property on Warren Road could be the site for a new housing development in the village of Lansing. 

The property at 680 Warren Rd., near the Northwoods Apartments and Dart Drive, was the topic of conversation at the Aug. 27 Village of Lansing Planning Board meeting. Freeville businesswoman Ebru Arslan said she represented a team of developers who want to build new housing on the property. Arslan said she was mostly looking to see what the board would want out of a potential development of that land. The 24.5 acres of land are listed on Zillow for $795,000.

“I am trying to understand what are the basic facts about this land: how much of it is buildable, what are the real challenges and how the wetlands have changed since 2018,” she said. “Those are deep questions I need to consult professionals for. What I am hoping to get is the sense from this group of what is buildable and what is acceptable.”

Village Code Officer Mike Scott said a group of investors had asked about the same parcel in 2020. That group had requested a cluster subdivision action from the board to be able to build housing in the area. A cluster development is essentially a subdivision plat in which the applicable zoning regulations are modified to allow for an alternative configuration of the property.

Scott said that the property is located in wetlands.

“So, it made sense to do a cluster subdivision in order to get the number of units in there to make it profitable for someone to come in and build,” Scott said of the 2020 plan by Solar Home Factory, the developer that planned to develop the land. “Solar Home came in for an informal review. They had a good layout and a good plan. They came in for a couple meetings and then disappeared after that.”

Arslan said the group pitching in 2020 lost their investors due to the COVID-19 pandemic in April that year.

For Scott, the property is also tricky because of a nearby stream.

“It has a stream protected by the [New York State Department of Environmental Conservation] that runs to the north, parallel with Northwood Drive. You’ve got to stay at least 50 feet away from that,” he said. 

The parcel is adjacent to Dart Drive, too, which Scott said would require developers to plan for a second emergency vehicle access, as well as some buffering in the form of foliage or shrubs to screen things from the residents on Dart Drive.

The plan from 2020 by Solar Home Factory promised a 43-unit for-sale housing development on the site, according to an Ithaca Voice article. The residences, originally proposed as duplexes but later modified to detached homes, would have been energy-efficient. All of the homes’ energy needs would have been fulfilled by solar panels.

Arslan told the board that any houses built by her development group will be for sale. There are no plans for rental housing at this time, she noted.

“The infrastructure would be installed in one shot, so that the disturbance to neighbors will be limited,” Arslan said. “The houses may be done in stages, in phases. We would like to get the big construction work done at once, and the interiors in stages.”

Arslan did not discuss a potential size for the developer, but Scott noted that Solar Home Factory’s development was seen as ideal back when its plan was first proposed. That number was around 40-50 homes. Arslan’s plan could include townhouses, duplexes and triplexes, she said during the meeting. 

Legal covenants regarding attached houses from the 1950s could also post another significant challenge to developers interested in the area. Clearing up that hurdle could eat up an entire year, Scott said. 

“It’s not our place to say what you can and can’t propose,” Planning Board Chair Michael Baker said. “What the previous developer proposed, the board was open to.”

Lansing at Large appears every week in Tompkins Weekly. Send story ideas to editorial@vizellamedia.com. Contact Eddie Velazquez at edvel37@gmail.com or on X (formerly Twitter) @ezvelazquez.

In brief:

The Lansing Community Library’s Halloween costume exchange is officially open.

“Come on by and take a look at what we have available,” reads a post on the library’s website. “If you find something you like, it’s all yours! And if you have any extra costumes that you’d like to pass on, just bring them to the circulation desk, and we’ll add them to our costume exchange.”

The Halloween costume exchange is open on the lower level of the library in the community room during regular library hours.