Lawsuit Over Valley Rd. Variance Heads To Princeton Zoning Board Closed Session

PRINCETON, NJ — The Princeton Zoning Board of Adjustment is set to discuss a lawsuit filed over one of its recent variance approvals in closed session at its meeting Wednesday, according to the board's agenda.

The suit, Lambert v. Princeton Zoning Board of Adjustment, was filed June 29 in Mercer County Superior Court by Gail Lambert, who owns the property at 58 Valley Road. The suit names the ZBA along with Lambert's neighbors, Christopher Chan and Luoxi Min, who own the adjacent property at 64 Valley Road.

Lambert is seeking to overturn the board's May 13 approval of a variance that would allow Chan and Min to demolish their existing home and construct a new two-story dwelling with an accessory dwelling unit (ADU).

According to the complaint, the ZBA granted Chan and Min a C(1) variance for lot width and lot frontage, allowing them to replace their existing 770-square-foot home with a new 2,282-square-foot structure, along with an attached garage and ADU. The property is nonconforming under borough code, which requires 85 feet of lot width and frontage; the lot measures roughly 75 feet on both counts.

The lawsuit centers on a public hearing the board held April 22 on the application. Lambert's complaint alleges the public notice issued ahead of that hearing described the request as a narrow variance limited to lot width and frontage, while representing that the rest of the project would comply with zoning requirements. But the complaint says the board's actual review at the hearing extended well beyond that narrow scope, focusing heavily on the design, scale and placement of the proposed ADU — particularly its proximity to Lambert's property line.

The complaint states that Lambert appeared at the April hearing and raised concerns about the project's impact on her privacy, noting that the ADU would sit five feet from her property line with its front door and windows facing her yard. The board's resolution acknowledged those concerns and discussed the need for landscape buffering along the shared property line, according to the complaint.

Despite that, the lawsuit alleges, the board approved the variance without requiring a buffering plan up front, instead making it a condition to be reviewed later by engineering and zoning staff. Lambert's attorneys argue that deferral amounted to an improper delegation of the board's authority and that the board never made a clear finding that the project would cause no substantial detriment to the public good, as required under state law.

The suit, filed by attorney Vidhaath Sripathi of Hill Wallack LLP, asks the court to vacate the board's resolution, declare that the applicants failed to meet notice requirements under the Municipal Land Use Law, and award costs and attorneys' fees.

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