E. Frances Cole & Another v. Boston Edison

This is the second appeal by neighbors who object to the establishment of a shopping center near Catonsville from the action of the Circuit Court for Baltimore County in affirming the reclassification of the proposed site from residential to commercial. In 1952 the Board of Zoning Appeals reclassified to commercial three acres of a sixty-five acre tract on which the appellee, Colonial Gardens, Inc., was building houses, and the Circuit Court affirmed. We noted on the first appeal from that action, in Temmink v. Board of Zoning Appeals, 205 Md. 489, that there was no claim that there had been any mistake in the original zoning in 1945 but that it was urged that there had been a substantial change in the neighborhood. We noted also, that: "In the present case, however, there was a sharp conflict in the testimony before the Board of Zoning Appeals as to whether there has been such a substantial change in the neighborhood and such an urgent need for a shopping center as to justify reclassification. * * * There was also a conflict in the testimony as to whether the proposed shopping center would produce traffic jams and hazards on the streets in this area." The opinion pointed out what has been said so many times that only where there is no room for reasonable debate as to whether the facts justified the Boards action or where the record is devoid of supporting facts, may the court hold the action of the Board void. We reversed the case because the Board of Zoning Appeals relied heavily in reaching its decision on a report of the Planning Commission, which was not in evidence. We said: "* * * the question whether the action of a zoning board was arbitrary must be determined from the facts from which the conclusion was drawn, not from the conclusion itself. In reviewing the action of the zoning board, the court on appeal considers the boards action, not the opinion of its members. We will therefore reverse the order appealed from and remand the case for further hearing when the report of the Planning Commission may be introduced in evidence, and the parties may produce any further evidence and have the right of cross-examination".