Richmond’s adopted wetland application needs more than a sketch
Richmond’s wetland development application requires a professional wetland delineation and assessment, a site plan locating the proposed work relative to the wetland and buffer, the state Wetlands Program permit, and an erosion-prevention and sediment-control plan. Clearing that involves a machine approach through the buffer must show that approach too. An aerial photograph of the intended opening does not supply those missing application documents.
The cited Richmond buffer widths are 100 feet for Class I and 50 feet for Class II wetlands. For a hypothetical stump 40 feet from a delineated Class II edge, it is ten feet inside that 50-foot comparison. Refer the actual activity and any allowed-use or exemption question to the Wetlands Program and Town.
Moving the chip pile outside the buffer does not authorize the stump excavation that remains inside it.
Richmond section 6.9.6 separately addresses creating new lawns and pavement in wetlands or buffers, requiring state approval. A request to make a brushy corner mowable can therefore be different from maintaining an existing lawn. Describe the intended finished use before cutting the vegetation, and retain any approved native restoration planting on the clearing plan.
Richmond clearing quantities and the accepted finish
For Richmond construction over 20 percent slope, section 6.11 calls for engineering plans covering erosion control and safe construction and refers to access standards. That is a construction-review condition, not a manufacturer’s operating angle. Have the contractor price the approved route, retained ground and stabilization sequence.
Do not average a short steep approach into a flatter work block to avoid identifying it.
Keep the Richmond delineation, approved site drawing and erosion plan available during clearing. When the machine work ends, check where soil was exposed and whether the specified stabilization remains incomplete. A separate price for root removal, grading and the future lawn prevents the vegetation pass from being mistaken for a finished, approved landscape.