New London — One day after a Superior Court judge cleared a major land-use obstacle from its path, the owners of the former Edgerton School property have submitted plans to the city for a 72-unit housing development.

F.W. Edgerton LLC submitted the plans for The Edgerton on Friday that call for 10 residential buildings and a 5,000-square-foot community building on 3.89 acres off Cedar Grove Avenue.

F.W. Edgerton is seeking special permit and site plan approval for a development that originally was conceived as replacement housing for the 124 families at the troubled Thames River Apartments off Crystal Avenue.

But plans for a 124-unit affordable housing complex consistently had faced opposition from neighbors and later stalled when the Planning and Zoning Commission rejected the idea of altering zoning to allow the development.

The former school site is located in a residential neighborhood adjacent to the busy Colman Street commercial strip, where zoning regulations bar any residential developments.

Attorney Matthew Greene, who represents F.W. Edgerton, filed an appeal of the commission’s ruling, but later secured approval of a stipulated judgment from the commission. The commission approved the judgment in part to avoid a protracted legal fight.

Judge Timothy Bates approved the settlement on Thursday. An appeal still is possible.

The stipulated judgment allows residential developments in the so-called C-2 zone surrounding Colman Street but restricts any developments from using frontage on Colman Street, severely limiting the possibility of any future projects.

The judgment also calls for F.W. Edgerton to provide at least 20 shared parking spaces for the adjacent Veterans Field and bars F.W. Edgerton from applying for any variances.

“Obviously, we are pleased an agreement was reached with Planning and Zoning Commission and my clients look forward to moving forward with the project,” Greene said. “It’s a quality residential development that will benefit the entire city.”

The Planning and Zoning Commission is expected to take up the plans later this month.

F.W. Edgerton is composed of the team of Massachusetts-based Peabody Properties and the nonprofit Affordable Housing and Services Collaborative.

The New London Housing Authority enlisted the companies, and later contributed $150,000 to them, to find a suitable site to move the families out of the federally subsidized complex off Crystal Avenue as the result of a class-action lawsuit from residents who had complained of unsafe and sanitary conditions and an overall lack of maintenance at the aging high-rises.

Because of the delays in the establishment of replacement housing and issues that arose at the high-rises, the Housing Authority has moved forward with a relocation process linked to mobile Section 8 housing vouchers it hopes to obtain from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. The vouchers will allow tenants to move wherever they are accepted.

Peabody and Affordable Housing and Services Collaborative altered the plans for the development by not only scaling back the size from 124 units to 72 units but creating a mixed-income development built with low-income housing tax credits. At least 10 percent of the complex will accommodate families that earn less than 25 percent of the median area income.

Preliminary plans call for mostly three-story buildings and a mix of apartment sizes — eight one-bedroom, 50 three-bedroom and 14 four-bedroom. Peabody Properties plans to own and manage the complex, providing property management and maintenance supervisors and a resident services coordinator.

In addition to the 3.33-acre Edgerton property, F.W. Edgerton has purchased or has options on three other adjacent properties totaling 0.56 acres.

Crystal Avenue residents are expected to be offered units, but many tenants are expected to be relocated from the Thames River Apartments by year's end and well before the project even starts.

g.smith@theday.com