Board Approves Rear Addition and Kitchen Expansion at 118 Essex Avenue

Glen Ridge's Board of Adjustment unanimously approved a variance at its February 21, 2019 meeting allowing Benjamin and Elizabeth Bowman to expand and reconfigure the kitchen of their 1930s-era home at 118 Essex Avenue. Architect Mark Wright told the board the plan calls for demolishing the existing one-story rear portion of the house and building a larger one-story addition that follows the same legally nonconforming 3.7-foot side-yard setback as the current structure, meaning the addition would come no closer to the property line than the existing house already does. No members of the public commented, and the board approved the application as submitted after asking Wright to detail the addition's size and the extent of the setback nonconformity.