BRIDGEPORT — Growing up on Palmetto Road in the 1950s and 1960s, Shelley O'Brien and her young friends in that North End neighborhood often played in several nearby acres of untouched nature along Serpentine Drive.
"A wood with a brook that ran through it," she said. "A wood where we could hike, pitch tents, build underground forts."
But that view may soon change. Current owners, the Russo family, have submitted an application to subdivide the 14.75 acres into a dozen residential lots, most fronting Serpentine Drive.
The Bridgeport Inland Wetlands & Watercourses Agency was supposed to hold a public hearing on the proposal in late August but it was postponed.
That gave opponents of the effort more time to try and stop the development. One option under consideration is for the Russos to sell to the Aspetuck Land Trust, which currently manages preserves mainly in Monroe, Fairfield, Southport, Easton, Weston and Westport and is trying to make inroads in Bridgeport.