A neighbor of the Harbor View Hotel is challenging the hotel’s recent zoning board approval for a long-sought expansion, filing a lawsuit in Dukes County Superior Court last week.

Lynn Allegaert, the owner of a property on Thayer street in Edgartown, has appealed the Edgartown board’s March decision to approve the hotel’s plans to renovate three cottages and build a new guesthouse with a spa. Ms. Allegaert is asking a judge to annul the decision, contending it goes against previous restrictions on the downtown property and will hurt the surrounding neighborhood.

In her appeal filed on May 1, Ms Allegaert argued that the new construction, including the planned new Pease Cottage, expands on the hotel in the middle of a historic residential area and shouldn’t be allowed.

Town zoning bylaws state the zoning board can only allow an expansion on a property like the Harbor View, which pre-exists and doesn’t conform with more recent zoning regulations, if it isn’t detrimental to the neighborhood, according to the lawsuit.

Ms. Allegaert claims that the cottage will increase noise, contribute to light pollution and restrict sunshine during the day. The expansion also, according to Ms. Allegaert, violates limits established by the zoning board in 1992 that restricted lighting on a green space at the hotel property and regulated the number of events that could be held there.

Those restrictions were not taken into account in the zoning board’s decision approving the Harbor View’s expansion plans, Ms. Allegaert claims.

The lawsuit is another impediment to a project that has been in the works for more than a decade.

The hotel initially floated plans in 2008, but they were shelved due to the economic downturn. In 2018, the hotel re-applied with modified plans, but a change in ownership and the pandemic delayed the work once again.

In 2021, the hotel returned with a proposal to add a guest house and the spa. The project was approved by the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, but came with a laundry list of conditions that sparked a lawsuit from the hotel.

The two eventually settled outside of court, and the hotel proceeded to the Edgartown zoning board for local approvals. The project was unanimously approved by the board in March.

“I think they’ve done everything they can to appease the abutters, and they’ve actually come with a reduced plan,” zoning board member Thomas Pierce said at the time. “I really can’t find anything to object to.”

Daniel Larkosh, the attorney for Ms. Allegaert, said his client objects to the construction of the Pease Cottage next to her home and argued the zoning board exceeded its authority in allowing the new building.

“It’s just gone too far,” he said.

Harbor View attorney Kevin O’Flaherty said he hadn’t seen the lawsuit yet, but he was confident the zoning board had acted properly when it granted the special permit.

James Hagerty, the Edgartown town administrator, declined to comment on the case.

Ms. Allegaert has been part of other appeals against the hotel, including a suit against the granting of a special permit to build a hotel pool bar.