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Closer rendering front and side 4-19-16

‘Shake Shack Is a Go’ — to Open This Fall

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Update, 8:51 p.m., Thursday and 6:12 a.m., Friday:

David Genovese, principal of Baywater Properties LLC, an affiliate of which owns the site where Shake Shack will be built, announced that the restaurant has agreed to come to Darien:
Shake Shack is a go. We expect to file for building permit next week, to begin construction later this month or in early July and to open the restaurant in the fall. Construction is estimated to take 4 months. In a comment on Darienite.com’s Facebook timeline, Genovese discussed some of the reasons why getting the Shake Shack proposal approved was difficult:

“This took us a lot more time than we expected, and cost substantially more than we thought it would. We did not prove to the satisfaction of the ZBA [Zoning Board of Appeals] at the first hearing that there was a hardship.

Business
Closer rendering front and side 4-19-16

Shake Shack Now Faces Higher Hurdle in Darien, Even as P&Z Approves Application

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Shake Shack’s application to open a restaurant on the Post Road received unanimous approval from the Darien Planning & Zoning Commission Tuesday, but the major hurdle before another crucial town board recently got higher. The P&Z voted unanimously to approve the restaurant’s application to open a restaurant at 1340 Post Road, the former site of Chuck’s Steak House. But a major sticking point with town land-use officials over the restaurant’s application has always been the larger signs that Shake Shack wants — bigger than what town regulations currently allow. The largest proposed sign would be 22 inches high; town regulations now set the maximum at 10 inches. That argument is before the Zoning Board of Appeals, which recently hired a consultant to do a “peer review” on the signage proposed in Shake Shack’s most recent application.