Second underground garage proposed for Point Breeze
BY PETER B. BRACE
Point Breeze Hotel owner Bob Matthews is now proposing to build another underground parking garage, this one behind the hotel, for 49 vehicles with three tennis courts above.

To do this, he is temporarily moving five of his cottages on 69, 71, 73 and 75 Easton St. out of the way. When Matthews relocates the cottages, placing them along Easton Street inside his privet hedges with the tennis courts and underground parking between the cottages and his northern lot lines, he will have converted them from seven units with 12 bedrooms to 20, one-bedroom units.

The tennis courts will be operated as a tennis club by the Point Breeze’s management structure, so no additional employees are to be hired. Thirty-six of them are going to be housed in a dorm behind the hotel.

Matthews’ island attorney, Sarah Alger, is asking the board for waivers from the open space requirement since the tennis courts/parking garage will eat up most of it on these four lots and from the inclusionary housing requirement since Matthews is providing so much living space for his employees. But what seemed to concern the Planning Board the most was water drainage of the property given the prevailing soggy conditions for most of the Brant Point area.

“I hope that water is going to be handled,” said Planning Board member Frank Spriggs. “We have that big flood going down Easton Street, which we have quite frequently during storms.”

To dry up what will obviously be a drainage nightmare, the courts would be surrounded by drains that would flow into a series of two holding tanks that can gradually drain water into the town’s stormwater drainage system, which empties into Nantucket Harbor.

Fellow board member Barry Rector agreed with Spriggs and asked that Matthews contribute to the inflow/infiltration repairs to the town’s wastewater collection system in the area. He also stressed the importance of emergency fire and rescue vehicle access to the site and praised Matthews for his employee housing efforts. But Rector did want Matthews team to redo his parking formulas.

“The parking needs to be recalculated,” said Rector. “I’m just really curious to see how this really plays out at the end.”

Under Matthews’ existing parking plan approved by the Planning Board as part of his special permit for his major commercial development, which he got in July 2005, Matthews made room for 18 vehicles, 14 of them in an underground parking area beneath the terrace area between his restaurant, Chancellor’s and his 4,091- square-foot addition, which is going to be a replica of the original Point Breeze hotel.

Abutters of the Point Breeze had fewer complaints this time around, and more questions and praise.

“I just want to say that I support the underground parking,” said Gary Winn whose mother, Sharon Doucette, lives at 25 North Water St. “Nantucket should have more underground parking. It will really help this town; it will alleviate congestion.”

And Pete Kaizer, who lives at 8 North Beach St., inquired about fencing and hedges. Alger said the fence around the court would be 10 feet tall and there would also be an eight-foot privet hedge.

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