Nearly thirty residents braved a light snow and icy conditions on February 13 to attend a Town of Crawford Planning Board meeting where a "scoping session" for the Wolfe Rock development took place. The 154-unit townhouse style condominium community is proposed for a total area of 63 acres with approximately 31 acres comprising flood zones, steep slopes and wetlands.

The site's developers, Mercurio, Norton and Tarolli, are proposing, among other things, to turn Edmunds Lane, a dead end street located near several Pine Bush schools, into part of a loop that would extend south parallel to Route 302 where it would exit through a newly constructed road across from Stock Market Road. And that road would have to go through areas designated as wetlands that are currently owned by the Roman Catholic Church of The Infant Savior.

The audience in attendance appeared to be largely against the development as the mood of the room was summed up by one resident who asked the board, "At what point in this process can you say 'no'?" The gentleman was assured that the board would follow the correct procedures and would have a chance to make its decision once the scoping process had been completed and the developer has had a chance to account for the residents' concerns in an impact statement that would be submitted to the town for review in the future.

The scoping session offered residents a chance to ask a variety of questions regarding the proposed development's impact on the environment, fire safety, water quantity and quality and increased enrollment in local schools. By far, one of the largest concerns voiced by the audience was the amount of traffic the development would create on an already busy road.

A number of residents estimated that currently, the time it takes to go from Edmunds Lane to Route 52, a third of a mile, can be as much as 15 to 20 minutes between 7:15 a.m. and 8:35 p.m. and 2:10 p.m. and 2:40 p.m. when students are being bussed in or out. Similar wait times can occur when the school holds evening events such as dances.

In addition to travel time, the increased traffic raised several issues with regard to child safety issues as the road and its sidewalks are used heavily by students to walk into the hamlet's business district or walk home.

Still others raised the nation's poor housing market and the question of over-development within the hamlet by citing another development located off of Boniface Drive that residents say is in the process of being completed with a number of those homes empty. "Why are people going to want to move there [Wolfe Creek] when they could move into these others homes?" asked one audience member.

The planning board decided to extend the verbal comments portion of the scoping session to next week's Wednesday, February 27 meeting. Anyone not able to attend is invited to submit written accounts of their concerns that will, in turn, be submitted to the developers who must study the impacts and respond with their views and plans to mitigate each issue.

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