The Montgomery County Planning Board has rejected a proposal for a French international school, agreeing with Potomac residents who said a large educational facility would be incompatible with the neighborhood.
By a vote of 4 to 1, the board decided not to recommend approval of school officials' request for a special exception from the county's zoning laws to allow the school to be built on land zoned for homes.
Board members who opposed the proposal said they were concerned about increased traffic and overdevelopment of the land on River Road if the school were built.
"We thought there was too much development on too little land," said Gus Bauman, chairman of the Planning Board. "It was going to create traffic congestion on River Road given the scale of the development. We felt any development on that section of the road would overburden it to an extent it couldn't hold."
Davis Richardson, who voted for the French school, said the school's building plan could be corrected to address transportation, environmental and landscaping issues.
"I saw a real effort on the part of the French school to compromise on many of the problems raised by the residents," Richardson said. "They are perfectly willing to make the required changes."
The board's proposal will be sent to the county Board of Appeals, which will decide whether to grant the special exception. However, the recommendation of the Planning Board is expected to weigh heavily in the appeals board's review.
With public hearings before the appeals board scheduled for April 6 and 7 next year, residents and school officials are preparing for a new battle. The hearings will be at 9:30 a.m. in the second-floor hearing room of the Stella B. Werner Council Office Building, 100 Maryland Ave., Rockville.
The school would be constructed in a semi-wooded and wetlands area facing River Road, a main thoroughfare in a neighborhood with houses ranging from $400,000 to $1 million.
Almost a year into the controversy, the dispute seems no closer to a compromise, despite occasional overtures from both sides. Angry residents say the campus would disrupt the neighborhood with traffic and noise.
The school would have about 1,200 students from countries such as France, Vietnam and French-speaking African countries. There would be classes for elementary, junior high and high school students.
The 25-acre campus would include an administration building, an outdoor sports field, dining hall, gymnasium and a courtyard. The school also would operate 19 buses to transport students living in areas such as Chevy Chase and Bethesda.
But before construction can begin, the school needs a special exception from the county to build five buildings on land designated for 12 homes.
Representatives of two community groups -- the West Montgomery County Civic Association and the River Road Citizens Coalition -- contend that a dense and crowded campus is incompatible with the residential neighborhood. They fear the students would become a daily nuisance.
They also said there are already 10 other educational institutes in Potomac, bringing the community to full capacity.
"We're not opposed to education. We're not opposed to the French school itself. It's just their plan to put it on this site brings many other problems to the community . . . environmental, noise, traffic," said Robert Younes, a River Road Coalition member. "We feel the traffic on River Road now is beyond capacity. To have added traffic will be a disaster."
Neither side seems likely now to budge on the issues surrounding the school proposal.
About a year ago, Lycee-Rochambeau of Washington, a private foundation, bought the land and decided to do something about crowding at two other French international schools: Rollingwood Elementary School in Chevy Chase and Forest Road School in Bethesda. The foundation wanted to consolidate the schools on one large campus to meet increasing student needs.
Since then, officials representing the French school said they have conducted environmental, transportation and landscaping studies of the building site. Based on their findings, they say the school will not alter the community or cause traffic to worsen as residents claim.
The school proposal is intended to limit levels of traffic and noise and to preserve the character of the area. Officials said the plan calls for nearly 70 percent of the students to be bused to campus, with 20 percent to ride in car pools. They said a few students would be allowed to drive to school. In addition, they plan to preserve a 100-year-old house and a wetlands area on the school's property.
Since the Nov. 4 vote, school officials have started conducting new studies of the school's effect on the neighborhood.
"The expert testimony has been misconstrued by some of the residents," said Harry Lerch, a lawyer with the firm Lerch, Early & Brewer, of Bethesda, who is representing the school. "We are taking all their concerns seriously. We have urged the neighbors to meet with us and work together to resolve the issue. But they have refused."
Despite such measures, county Planning Board members were reluctant to accept the school's plan to handle traffic and protect the environment, which includes the wetlands. Homeowners said they are concerned about how the school would keep its promises.
"They had worked out such a complicated system to handle extra traffic," Bauman said. "The scheme was quite problematic. There were too many questions not fully answered."
