NORTON - Three years after buying the site at auction, the Chateau restaurant's owners want to expand their parking through a zoning change.

The Nocera family would buy and bulldoze an adjacent house at 54 Bay Road if voters at the Oct. 6 fall annual town meeting change the zoning there and at the restaurant on Lake Winnecunnet, to commercial or village commercial.

The proposed parking lot of at least 46 spaces would "alleviate the congested parking now surrounding the restaurant," Mansfield attorney Edward Valanzola, representing the Noceras, told Town Planner Charles Gabriel in a July 18 letter.

Chateau spokesman Joseph Nocera declined comment.

The Noceras, who own and operate the Chateau restaurants in Norton, Norwood, Stoughton, Waltham and Andover, bought the former Ann's Place at auction for $1.65 million in July 2005. The Noceras renovated the establishment extensively and then reopened under its new name in June 2006.

MICHAEL GELBWASSER covers Norton for The Sun Chronicle. He can be reached at 508-236-0439 or at mgelbwasser@thesunchronicle.com.