Neighbors File Lawsuit Against Commission On Wychmere Decision

HARWICH – Three neighbors along Snow Inn Road have appealed the Cape Cod Commission’s decision to approve redevelopment of the historic Snow Inn.

The lawsuit was filed by Snow Inn Road residents Colleen O’Brien, Michelle Vasil and Lucy Steere in Barnstable Superior Court on March 12.

The commission approved the regional impact application for the redevelopment project sought by Wychmere Harbor Real Estate LLC on Feb 5.

The Snow Inn dates back to 1892 and is located at the end of Snow Inn Road. It presently contains 32 rooms, and the proposal is to replace it with a 72-room hotel, an 80-seat restaurant and 60-seat lounge.

Over the past year the property owners went before the commission twice seeking approval of a redevelopment plan for the property. The initial proposal was withdrawn without prejudice when the commission determined coastal resilience issues needed to be resolved.

The second application addressed those issues to the satisfaction of the commission by minimizing development in the floodplain and relocating the wastewater treatment facilities outside the floodplain. However, traffic and safety issues on Snow Inn Road, a dead end, and at the intersection of the road with Route 28, remained major concerns of neighbors.

 The proposed development “is expected to generate even greater use of the hotel and attendant impacts on plaintiffs, including, but not limited to additional traffic and congestion, increased noise and lighting, loss of privacy, and diminished property values,” according to the complaint. “The restaurant and lounge, which are open to the public, are expected to add to these impacts.”

 The plaintiffs own property on Snow Inn Road, a narrow lane that dead ends at the hotel, and they are already adversely impacted throughout most of the year by the hotel activities, the suit alleges. Pedestrian movement to and from the beaches is adversely impacted by traffic, driveways are blocked by hotel guests, the document claims.

 Snow Inn Road contains numerous single-family residences and is the only road leading to and from the hotel. The lack of an alternative route to the hotel makes that road highly congested, resulting in numerous accidents, and causes safety risks to pedestrians on the adjacent shoulders traveling to and from the town beaches, the suit alleges.

 The commission avoided any discussion of the 140 seats for the restaurant and lounge in its assessment of the traffic impact and assessment study, which will have a direct bearing on the traffic on Snow Inn Road, the suit claims. The commission did not require a peer review consultant to analyze the traffic impact assessment study, it alleges.

 Brennan Consulting, retained by neighbors, claimed that the accident rate at the intersection of Route 28 and Snow Inn Road is 192 percent higher than average. 

 The commission’s decision failed to include mitigation to reduce crashes at the intersection, the suit claims, instead speculating that the crashes result from limited sight distance. The lawsuit also takes issue with the project proponents’ traffic mitigation plan to use offsite facilities to eliminate congestion on Snow Inn Road.

 The complaint also cites the impact of the doubling of the size of the hotel blocks on the residential view of the ocean and beaches and claims that no lighting details were presented to the commission.

 “The Vasil and O’Brien properties are directly across Snow Inn Road, which ends in a dead end at the hotel, and will bear the brunt of impacts from increased traffic and congestion, new and increased lighting, additional noise from the increased number of units and parking, as well as invasion of privacy,” the complaint reads.

The property owners ask the court to annul the decision or remand it to the commission for further hearings, studies and findings consistent with the goals of the Cape Cod Commission Act.