March 11, 2026 – Planning Board – Video & Transcript

March 11, 2026 - Planning Board

Autoscroll:

Good evening. It's March 11th, 2026 at 7pm. And this is a meeting of the Wayland Planning Board. The agenda for this evening. Well, why don't I call the meeting to order first. I call the meeting to order by roll call. Robin Borgestedt. Here. Larry Kiernan. Here. Jesse Newberry. Here. Annette Lewis. Here. I remind you, he's not here. We're expecting him, but he's not here. The agenda for this evening. And again, this is available. Remote access only meeting. It's on Zoom. It will be broadcasts on Wacom as soon as possible after the meeting. At 7.05, we're going to review and approve draft minutes of, hopefully, of February the 9th and February the 11th, 2026. Then we're having updates from the town planner in the chair. And there are several different items there. And then we're going to do discussing the proposed Route 20 planned redevelopment district. And then board comments and concerns. I'm not necessarily sure if there are several things that will be coming up, but they're not. They're just a matter of briefing you and then adjourn. So, um, can we start with the minutes for, oh, hi, Ira. Will you unmute yourself and say that you're here? Yeah. Hi, Ira. I remind you I'm here. Terrific. And it is, what time is it? It's 7.02 when you start. Pardon me? Okay. Thank you. Here's the minutes from February 9th. Um, I believe Annette provided me comments. And this was the meeting we had with the, um, Scenic Road. Then we had our own meeting. Then we went to the select board. And then we came back and had our own meeting. This was a, uh, a really fun one to put together. There's so many, so many videos of meetings. That means. Okay. There's an I at the end. Yeah. Consider. Yeah. When I sent it to you, Robert, I sent you a markup and I also sent you track changes. Um, and the reason I did that was because I could see I missed some things like the extra eye that shouldn't be there. Um, when I did the track changes. Um, so it would be helpful if you would use the clean version in the future, because there's some other things that didn't make it or that I missed. Yeah. I went for the, went for the non clean version. So I can see what things that were that you, that you change. That's fine that you see them that way, but it just makes things strange because the eye, and then there were a few other places where there were periods that shouldn't be there and things like that. Mm hmm. No, understood. I can point them. Well, let's let everybody make comments and see if they have any. And then I can point out some of the minor things. I think I got comments in here too, but I I've been doing the track changes as well. Just cause I think it's helpful. Yeah. I think it's helpful too. And Robert has the one in track changes. If you want that one to go up. Yeah. That would be better. I think I. Yeah. I think it's just. Yeah. Did you want to pull up the track changes? Yes. That's what the. I have to go for my emails again. I have it. Oh, but I don't know how to put them up. All right. And I would prefer to see the minutes before we send out the packet. If that's possible. Yeah. Because I wasn't here. That's why. No, I know. The ones in track changes that I sent you anyway, had an ASL at the end. Do you want me to just send it to you now, Robert? No, I have it. Just trying to save it. Yeah. Second. The edits that I usually do are just for clarification and to make sure that somebody coming after us will understand what we talked about. Hold on. Are you putting it back up? Yeah. I'm trying to. It was wrong. It was stuck in read only. That's not really helpful. I just couldn't make any changes now. That's not helpful. So there's some changes to the tech of the meeting that the front hearing we had. Upper case. Some words. Some letters. Mention that we recessed to own in-person meeting and Zoom link. The next page. A little more detail of what we were talking to the select board about with the joint hearing. Ryan's more context to some of these. The zone amendments. Let people read them, Robert. Don't go too fast. Robert. Are these different from the ones you sent out today or yesterday? No. They're the same as what he sent out today. They look the same. Yeah. But they're different from what he sent out on Friday. If that's what he sent out Thursday, Friday. Whenever you're ready to go to the next page, just somebody say you're ready. I'm all set. Same here. Yeah, I'm fine. I reviewed them just a few minutes ago. Yeah, me too. And then I wanted to point out that Nick Munkenbeck is one of the attendees if we want to elevate him. Oh. Great. He's the only attendee other than us, so. And that's it. So is everybody okay with that, and do you have any other changes? I'm all set. Looks good. Can I have a motion to approve the minutes of 2-9-26 as amended? I'll make the motion to approve the minutes. Seconded. Seconded. All in favor, Robin Borgestedt? Yes. Larry Kiernan? Yes. Jesse Newberry? Yes. Ira Montague? Yes. Annette Lewis? Yes. Okay. Then the minutes of 2-11-26. And I think you sent those to us with the track changes, Robert. I'm minor. I'm not. You did. And my recollection is that they had the track changes. Okay. Hi, Nick. Nice to see you. Hi, everybody. Still not super quiet here yet. Oh. These are the ones that were, yeah, in the packet. Okay. These don't have whatever. I already reviewed these before the meeting. So I'm all set. Okay. I'll second. All in favor. Robin Borgestedt? Yes. Larry Kiernan? Yes. Jesse Newberry? Yes. Ira Montague? Yes. Ira Montague? Yes. Annette Lewis? Yes. Great. Okay. Okay. I move to approve the minutes from February 11th, 2026 as amended. I'll second. All in favor. Robin Borgestedt? Yes. Larry Kiernan? Yes. Jesse Newberry? Yes. Ira Montague? Yes. Annette Lewis? Yes. Great. Okay.
Moving on. Robert, you want to take over with your request for peer review for 67A Locust Street? Sure. I received a site plan for a assisted, a shared living facility at 67A Locust Street, a.k.a. 1 Hobbs Road, which is now what the call it now. What do they call it? 1 Hobbs Road. Hobbs? H-O-B-B-S? Yes. That's correct. That's the new address. And that's been verified with the assessors of it. The town assessor has that as their address now. Okay. We are requesting a peer review, a joint peer review with the conservation commission and the planning board. I need a forward to seek a peer review before we can sign a contract as the town. Can I ask you just several questions? Sure. Do you not need to have the Board of Health as well? Yeah. You can throw that in too. I'll say a peer review on behalf of the land use. The land use groups. Okay. That's fine. And the application is not complete yet. That's going to be another question. The peer review will not be going out yet until the application is certified as complete. And as of today, it's still not complete. Okay. So it might be a little bit longer. So I'm not quite ready yet, but we'll probably start to seek a peer review, but the work will not begin until it's certified as being completed. Okay. And the public hearing cannot be heard until it's completed. And then we send it up to different boards. Right. And they have 30 days to comment. Correct. So I don't know when they're hearing it be yet. What was it? Okay. And it's a shared living. It's a shared living. Is that what you called it? Yep. Shared living. And that would fall under the Dover amendment? Yep. It would. Under education. Smile.
Can't make me.
I'm trying to find it. It's not up there yet because it wasn't complete. No. Like the actual like address. Oh, 67A is all that you'll see. Cause it won't have been updated yet. Okay. So this is kind of like the corner there. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. The assessor's information in their own system is updated, but it won't be on the GIS. Cause they only do like, like once a year or twice a year. It actually updates on a GIS. It takes a little time. So when you, when you notice this, Robert, you should still list it then as 67 or one Hobbs road, AKA 67 locker. Yeah. That's what I called him. And then when I reviewed them. Okay. Cause I wasn't sure. This is that lot where there's like an old barn that looked like they were trying to rehab or something. Right. Yeah. I mean, it's been, we've been walking tribal on this for like the last. Yeah. Gosh, two and a half years. It's been, it's been the pipeline in the process. So. What's the lock? Say it again. Say it again. What is the size of the lock? Hmm. Three quarters of an acre. Oh, it's going to be, it's going to be, it's going to be a new building and about six parking spaces. Um, so far. That's all. So, but I do inquire that believe that the town, um, the town treasure requires us to, uh, seek a foreign before we, before we actually do a peer review. Just to make sure that the board is actually agreed to it. And not that staff is going off the grid and, and just, you know, conducting the peer reviews. Right. So, um, does anyone have any other questions of Robert? Is it okay with you that we authorize this? And do you, you make, before you, uh, do, I don't know how you do the, the sequence, but you need to make sure that you have the money in hand before we do the hiring. We, I don't, we don't, and to the money. And I don't sign back the contract and to, from, from Michael McCall. I don't sign it. I don't sign it back to, to even to the, uh, consultant and to be the money in hand. Yeah. So can I have a motion to, um, request peer reviews for one other question? Um, the peer reviews, it'll be civil and. What else? Yeah. Just civil. Just civil. If no wet answer. Um, I mean, I don't know if this with, with stormwater, but it's not, it's not going to be a trap. There's no, there's no traffic component to it. Okay. Um, it won't be movement of people leaving and going. Um, if what it's going to be is, I think, believe it's five or six units, um, small units inside the house, um, inside the building. And it'd be one unit where someone will be, uh, coming and going to like, live there on, uh, you know, on the, uh, on the nights too. So someone's in the house to help. Um, and these are people who have, um, um, any little bit of assistance would be a kitchen, but they, each one will have their own bedroom. And I believe a bathroom or a shared bedroom, a shared bathroom, but so there won't be much traffic. I know that's, I don't think people will be asking about, well, that's going to happen, but these people won't be really having cars. People maybe think about, um, yeah, the, uh, affordable issue. Um, if it doesn't have its own bathroom, then it wouldn't necessarily fit into the dwelling unit thing. I would have to go, I have to go back to the plans. I, I'm going to think about that because we don't want something counting as more housing. If we can't get the affordable component with it, if there's a way to do that. Yeah. I mean, I've been focusing on what, what they submitted and the requirements. And I'll, I'll take a look at, but. Okay. I can actually, I can answer that question. If you give me, if you give me a second, I can look at the plans. Um, let me see. But honestly, a lot of it, it's just like little needy things that need to be fixed. It's just not, there's just, if I can knock some of these things, down now, then we have less issues later down the road. Oh, that's good. That's, that's what I'm concerned about. It just, I mean, we don't have to deal with, we can kind of hopefully streamline it as honestly, as fast as possible. Um, let's see. I don't want to take too much time, but it's okay. You know, you want a motion to request a joint peer review for the land use group. Once the application is complete for this 67 a locker. Correct. So moved. Is there a second? I'll second. Boy, you're a team tonight, huh? Anyone can feel free to jump in. Robin Borgestedt. Yes. Larry Kiernan. Yes. Jesse Newberry. Yes. Ira Montague. Yes. Annette Lewis. Yes. Perfect. Thank you so much. Um, with regard to, uh, the zoning articles that we've submitted for, uh, annual town meeting. Um, I don't know. I know that, um, you probably, I mean, I think we've been copying everybody, but on the housekeeping one and the floodplain one, um, the finance committee did not, uh, want to write comments. So. We're relying on our report. Um, I don't know how they voted on them, but I'm assuming that they voted to send them forward. Um, with regard to this. Hold on. Is there any, is there a reason why they don't want to point me or they just, or is it so housekeeping? You know, it just, they didn't think there was any financial impact. Okay. Yeah. They have a financial impact. So that was two of them. Um, the, uh, one on solar, uh, energy. Um, Jesse spoke with the energy committee and then made the determination, uh, to withdraw it. So we request as, as per our vote. And I, uh, requested of the select board that they allow us to, uh, withdraw the article, which they did. So that's three of them. Uh, then we had, um, the ADU one. Um, I don't know what the vote was on that, or if they voted, do you know, Robin? Yeah, it was unanimous. Terrific. Um, and Robin, uh, worked with, um, Pam. Okay. Pam Roman. Thank you. Uh, on the comments. Uh, we have, um, I think that they incorporated their comments and ours together. So I don't think we have a separate set, which is so bad, but we could have done a separate set if we wanted to. Um, then I think that's four, right? The other one is the MBTA, uh, West district. Um, the finance committee voted unanimously to support it. The select board voted three to two, not to support it. Um, and, uh, I don't even know how to characterize the discussion. Um, I watched it late last night when it finally got up online, uh, on way camp. Um, I think they've sort of gotten over the concern about the height, uh, from, in terms of, uh, public safety, although. You couldn't tell. Um, and then, uh, the question was focused on, uh, Tom Fay had said, it's the gateway to Wayland and therefore it shouldn't be that tall. Uh, it was pointed out to him that actually, and we didn't even know this when we were doing the, um, the MBTA zoning, but even though the bylaw calls for, um, for, um, no more than 45 feet for river's edge to Oxbow, they got a variance. They got three, well, multiple variances, one that allowed them to increase the number of units, and then one that allowed them to increase the height. So the three buildings are 52 feet, 53 feet, and 58 feet. I remember when we talked about this, I thought that they were higher. Yeah. Yeah. Right. But I didn't, I mean, I, yeah, I know. Robert wasn't here at the time and I wasn't on the board at the time. Yeah. I don't think. Um, so, um, uh, and that was pointed out to him, but that's when he said, Oh, it's the gateway to Wayland, blah, blah, blah. And then you have the Sudbury landfill right there. Yeah. It's not really the gateway. Like you pass back into Sudbury there. Yeah. So you really feel like you're in Sudbury. Um, and what was the other comment? Oh, they wanted. Two of them wanted to get more affordable housing. And under the MBTA thing, we could only have 10%. And they thought they should get more. So to me, it makes no sense because they've been, they've been, Oh, I thought the economic development committee, the finance committee and the select board have been talking about, let's get more multifamily housing because it will help because it'll give us money to do other things in town. And usually you don't get a lot of children, so we wouldn't have a real impact on the schools. And it just boggles my mind. Because the economic development community has been pushing how this, however, it was a economic development engine and has been so helpful. And, and look how great the project is. And you try to, you know, copy and paste that. And now you're getting pushback. So. It's almost like it was about something else in it. It was. I mean, I think it was about something else. There's been a lot of push about how we need to get, we need to grow the tax base or increase, you know, some kind of growth. And this is, you know, a shot to do that. And now, you know, we don't need to, we don't, we don't want this. It's. I've also. He's got to pick what you want. How you want to do it. I don't know. I've also done some more research. Because I wanted to just. Understand what the issues are for people who want to do. Considerable amount of multifamily housing. And. Because the carrying costs are so high. Lenders want to make sure that there's a certain amount of return and they've got a minimum number. And. Oh. You know, that that's what sorts starts driving things. Uh. So. What do you mean the carrying cost is so. When you're. Well, you have to. You. You have to get the site ready for construction. Yeah. You have to do the permitting. You have to do the construction. And as it's been explained. To me and what I saw in a report. Was. That. The foundation. And the roof stuff. And the. Like the HVAC stuff. Yeah. Essentially fixed. And. Ah. Your cost. And. The way that you start. Making it break even. And also you have to worry about the financing costs. Because people don't have that kind of money. Right. And. The way that you start making it make sense is by the floors in between the top and the bottom. Yeah. More. Yeah. Hmm. So, I mean, we're going to be. I. I don't know. I. It's one of the select board people thought that they could get a variance. Um. That's how Alta Oxbow did it. And. I personally think that it was not appropriate. It didn't meet any of this in my mind, any of the standards for a variance. So, I. You know. And. If the town decides. That the height should be higher. That's one thing. Uh. To have it just left to the zoning board. Whenever something comes up makes not a lot of sense to me. Yeah. So. Um. That's it on. Those. Um. The. Um. Where are we? The select board has submitted an article to us. I don't know if you've had a chance to look at it. I believe I. We copied you all on it. Um. We have to have a hearing and Robert is dealing with that. Um. I don't know if you've looked at it yet. I don't understand it. Um. And I've been trying to. I mean, I haven't been. I just looked at it and I was. I didn't know whether to reach out. And. And have the select men. Tell us what they're trying to accomplish. Cause it doesn't work on the paper. Uh. Or. If we should just have the hearing and let it play out. This is the one to. For how do you appeal. Right. Yeah. I mean, we had a brief discussion with them, but. We did. If you. Yeah. It talks about amending. Section. Um. 603. By adding. 610. But. 10. Has nothing to do with 603. Independently. It's part of the whole site plan. Right. For all site plans, not just Dover amendment site plans. And 603 is Dover amendment. Sorry. Who sent this? Um. Doug. Send it to us. We have the select board. And it's in the meeting packet. It's article EE. Oh. It takes. It takes. It also seems to take out the appeal. For site plan. For the. Um. Zoning board. Hmm. I went back and looked at the legislative history by looking at the old warrants and comments on them. And. When we have. Get ready for a hearing. I'll put something together and we can talk about it. Um. So that I could just. I wanted to make sure we. We would be able to understand the history of why it was even there. Is. I thought that their original plan for this article was to make it so you didn't have to appeal to the ZBA at all. That you could go straight to court. That's what I thought. And now they've put the ZBA back in. Right. Well, but only if it's greater than 10,000 square feet. Right. 25,000 square feet in a site. Um. That the way it's written now, it would apply to. All special all site plans that the planning board reviews only the planning board. And. So when we get to things like new schools. Um. New public buildings. They would all be able to be appealed. And you can be sure. That they will be. I'm not unsure what the. What is it does. It kind of paints every say plan. And that's not really quite. Not the author of this article. That's not as appear to be what they're trying to get at. But. Well, I don't know because they didn't say it. Yeah. I mean, it's. It opens up Pandora's box. Oh, anyway. Um. I think board members just on their own read this over. And then. Kind of bringing kind of questions to the public hearing. Um. Which is. Required to be held. Within 65 days as. As the final language reader for which I believe was last. Last Tuesday. I think it was officially. The third is when it came in. March the third. So. March the third. March the third. I guess the answer is down in their background information. Because they're saying. This allows a party to appeal. Prior to the issuance of a building permit. The language they've written doesn't actually say that. No. It used to say it. He doesn't have the strikeouts either. Of what. Right. So. So now the two things don't match. Right. There's nothing. In there that would prevent the issuance of a building permit. While that appeal is going on or. That's true. Before. I mean is there. Is there a natural delay. Between our decision and the issuance of a. Building permit. Usually. The delay is when the applicant submits for a building. Right. But if they were ready to submit the next day. If somebody really had their ducks in a row. And they were ready to go as soon as we issued our decision. Right. That 20 days doesn't get you anywhere. There could be in theory a building permit in that time. Well, you couldn't. You couldn't get a building permit within 20 days. Because you have to file it at the register of deeds. So. Well. If we issue our decision on a Tuesday. Can't they take it to the register of deeds on Wednesday. And come back for building permit. Well, they could. Because it doesn't have a 20 day waiting period. Yeah. Normally. This doesn't do what the description says. The question is. Should we just leave it and deal with it at a hearing. And then deal with it when we write a report. Or should we try and. And I mean, I don't know even if we can sort it out. Because they submitted it to us in the times running. I would vote for hearing. I think we have to do the hearing. But yeah. Okay. This is the way they submitted it. Then this is what we have a hearing on. Okay. It's not our article. Right. No, it's not our article. Okay. Okay. Do you feel differently, Annette? No. Would you like to explain to us? How you feel? No. Okay. That's why I'm asking you. Yeah. No. I. This is their article. We just have to have the hearing on it. We'll have it the way it is. Okay. Yeah. Okay. What else is there? Oh. On the planning board report. You'll recall that the one that we voted on had five articles. And it's called the report to town meeting. Since we have now dropped off the solar article. Robert and I separated it out so that we have. But I want to make sure that we get a vote on it. So that we have four articles that are at town meeting. And this is a report to town meeting. And then we'll have the other report, but it won't be to town meeting. It'll just be our report. Does that make sense? Okay. And so we've changed the header on that one only. So that it says report of the planning board, but doesn't say town meeting. So if that's okay with everybody, I would just like to, again, take a vote to make sure that we're all set. Okay. Can I have a motion to approve breaking apart? May I have a motion to approve breaking apart the report on our zoning articles and having the four that go to town meeting be in one report. And then the one that is not going to town meeting, which is the solar energy one, being in a separate report. So moved. Larry, you want a second? I thought we were going for the full Monday. Kept my mouth shut on purpose. Second. Yeah. Yeah. Second. Yeah. All in favor. Robin Borgestedt. Yes. Larry Kiernan. Yes. Jesse Newberry. Yes. Ira Montague. Yes. Annette Lewis. Yes. So let me just make sure that I hit everything. Okay. Our next meeting is on March the 25th by Zoom. It's the Carroll School. I'm hoping that we'll be able to get everything done and perhaps close the hearing if we're lucky on that evening. So, Robert, the one report that came in from the Carroll School, our consultant is looking at that and will have information for us in advance of our meeting. Hopefully. And has he finished everything else in writing? He has, hasn't he? He didn't have anything else outstanding. I think so. Yeah. Okay. Um, I did, um, I had sent Michael McCall two emails, uh, requesting, um, access to town council on the two issues that came up at the last meeting. The one about, um, whether we could impose conditions on traffic stuff and money, uh, F during this process for, uh, future use. And then, and then, um, the other was, um, or more money than they've offered, uh, and the other one was, um, how to deal with the garage that isn't a part of the site plan application. Uh, I sent him one email on the third, send him another one, uh, yesterday. Um, but I haven't heard back, um, and I will perhaps try and walk in. Uh, also at last evening, not last Monday evening, select board meeting, they added, uh, an item to their agenda. At the almost last minute, uh, saying, uh, calling for, uh, a discussion on hiring special counsel for Dover amendment cases. And, um, so I listened to it. Um, they all voted in favor of doing that. They told Michael McCall that he should do look for, uh, someone. Um, and I had asked Bill Whitney if he would, um, would, um, at least say that it would be helpful if they're going to hire counsel, uh, that they let the zoning board and the planning board have some input on who that council might be. Uh, because we're the ones who have to work with them. Uh, Michael McCall said that, um, you know, our town council had been doing a fine job and both boards had been happy. Uh, and that was about it. And then they said, no, we want to do this. I, it's going to be very interesting. I don't know that there's anybody out there who does our side. There are a lot of people on the other side. Yeah. Um, you know, you wouldn't really want those people on your side because it doesn't work real well. So I don't know. Interesting. Yeah. It would be interesting to look at some of the cases, not that they've all gone very well, but to look at some of the cases like the Belmont case and see who was on the other side of those cases and kind of pursue it that way. I bet some of them have the same attorneys on, um, on them. So, yeah. And some of them have a small attorneys, like in the Western part of the state. Yep. It is a special area though. Um, uh, does our town council have much experience with it? Yes. She does. I mean, we've, we've all been reading all the background. Uh, when I have discussions with her, we're on the same page, we're talking about the same stuff. She knows what the case law is. She knows what we can't do and can't. I mean, I thought she'd been pretty helpful. Yeah. Hmm. Who handled the Whalen case, the cemetery case? Was it town council or somebody else? Do we know? What cemetery case? Um, there was the case involving, um, The Coptic church? No, the cemetery, the one up off of, uh, 126. Oh, um, the one, you know, Mendler's. Yeah. The one thing, um, I think that was our town council. So, okay. I don't know if it was her, the, the, uh, we have the whole firm. Yeah. We have two contact people. Yeah. So I don't know. We can look at some of the cases and see who's handled. Yeah. I mean, I have been looking at them for a while. Yeah. Are there others coming up? Rob, are there others coming up other than that? I have, I have one that I'm looking at right now and I have one that's in the pipeline. Yep. Oh man. Two more coming up. Yeah. The problem is that there is, the case law is pretty clear and there's just not a lot of leeway. No. And what has to happen is the law has to change. The actual statute has to get fixed. Yeah. Really what we should be doing, the town should be doing is, uh, lobbying the legislature. Not that you would want to do away with the Dover amendment completely, but there are some things that come into play. Traffic, among others. Yeah. Okay. Uh, let's see. Corny? Um, I guess that's it for me. What do you have, Robert? Anything else? No, I mean, I'm just getting back on vacation, so I'm just trying to catch up on everything. So it's been, um, I will say that the copic church has, uh, submitted their revisions to, to the requirements for under the section 4.2.2, which gave the copic church, I believe nine items to revise their plans. Um, and I'm reviewing the plans for compliance. Um, and I have, we'll have some comments back to them, things that are question marks and things that are, it appears that they will be changing the plans and that can be addressed. That they will be changing the plans as in not what we approved, but something else. Yes, that is correct. Oh, well, that'll be fun. Um, they are, they're removing four parking spaces. And I believe it looks like the two, to address the conservation commission's, um, uh, discussion with them. So, cause they have not, they have not closed out the conservation commission, but on their plans, they have removed four parking spaces. So have they removed four, does that peg them under their number? It's no, it's right there. It hit, hit the number. Exactly. I think it's, I think they, I think they, they, I think they, they, they just, I mean, maybe not, but, but they're going to reduce the number of people who they attend. It's, it's kind of a mess. It's kind of like the worst case scenario that the, we do all this work and they, and they change the plans. Um, remember Robert, that we said that we would let the five affordable units have parking spaces and not make them increase their number of parking spaces. So they might not have that extra leeway. Right. I know. I thought they were right up against it. Me too. I thought they were. And that's why we had to give them kind of a waiver for the affordable units to use the parking spaces. Yeah. That's one. Um, they also added some plan sheets in there and I have to kind of figure out if that makes sense. One, the plan sheets was part of the condition that they need to address with the, um, swept analysis of a fire truck. So that one's okay. But there's a few other plan sheets that they just added in there. Yeah. Well, they better explain why. And then I'm, I'm happy with these things over because I caught something else too. Um, they did a, a complete, uh, affordable. No, no, they took all the affordable units and stacked them all along one, one part of the, of the property. Yeah. Um, then that's completely against the affordability. Um, condition. It says it has to be proportionally, um, similar size and it has to be within the development, you know, different areas. So I took all the numbers and flew into Excel sheet, the number of units, the size of the unit, what floor is on. Um, and then kind of played around a bit and said, Hey, what's the average size of a unit? And how do you, how do you kind of play around with it to get a better, closer number of, closer square footage. And so I have a proposal for them that I would, what I would do to make what seems to be fair. Um, because what they tried to do, it's five of the 11 smallest units, which is not okay. That's not okay. So there's a few, I don't know who does it's, it's very clear that someone who, who's not familiar with affordable housing just kind of popped on there. So I'm kind of curious who, who did that because it's, it's slightly lazy and also it violates the decision that we wrote. So, so also, um, when you're doing the review, make sure that you check the legends because the legends did not pick up everything that was on the plans. Yeah, this I've, I've been looking at this, that they should some wall, all they, they proposed the stone wall and show, they show all that. Um, but I'm trying to hit some of the bigger, bigger things that are like, completely like, this is not even like completely right. So it's a good effort. And they did provide me a, uh, letter. And that shows you like what they changed. We had asked them, I believe on the front to have an index of the plans. And the date, like in a matrix, the date that they were first submitted, when the next change was, when the next change was, when the next change was. I'll go back to see if they did that, but they did have a, they did give me, provide me a sheet that each sheet, it talks about what was changed. Well, that's good to know, but they, they need to also do a, it in the index so that we can easily compare. So I am going to take a look at it again, because I would like to make sure that there's a fair review, but, um, yeah, definitely, definitely not quite thumbs up yet. Let's put that way. And then, um, you're going to have the consultant look at that too, or not. I can, but we don't, we don't have, you know, you know, you only, I don't want, I don't want any of our funds left. Okay. So what we do depends on how much. They do in changes, I guess. I do need to go over with, I'm going to plan on with all the land use, uh, department heads and members to go through the conditions. And, you know, prior to this, prior to that, because there's a lot of pride to a lot of conditions and we need to make sure they're right. But we're not quite there yet, but, but they probably don't want to move as fast as possible. So I need to wrap up my review this week. When, uh, before you came in between Sarkis and when you came, I had to do one. Um, we did a very detailed decision for, um, 105 Plain Road. It was a conservation cluster. And what I did was I created a separate memo for each board or and or department that was going to have to follow through and just picked off the sections with the numbers from the conditions of what they had to do so that they didn't have to wade through what everybody else had to do. Yeah. It makes it a hell of a lot easier. Yeah. Okay. Anything else, Robert? This is so exciting. Uh, not really. I'm trying, I'm actually trying to think, to be honest. Not really. I've been just dealing with that. Okay. It's been fun. One thing. Um, we got, um, recently, uh, an email from Lauren, uh, Hamlet, Lauren Hamlet. Um, I don't know that anybody responded to it yet. Um, and I wasn't sure if we should, rather than just saying, thank you for your comments. If we should just give her a little information, like send her the attorney general's, um, guidelines for Dover amendment cases, uh, point to, uh, the condition that says they have to get all of their approvals before they can get a building permit. Um, that they haven't done the scenic road thing yet. Uh, they still have to do that. Um, and I can't remember what else she said, but just not long, but just pointing those things out. You think that I don't want to get into a discussion with her. Yeah. I think it is helpful cause it is confusing, um, what gets decided where, uh, on things and that may be helpful for her and others. I think we could probably come up with like a standard response on Dover cases where the person is suggesting that we. You know, should have ruled on something that we have no power. What was the other thing deciding about environmental thing? I mean, yeah. Conservation can certainly do that. Yeah. But that that's not right in our realm of review for these cases. Right. Well, as you recall, for both of the cases, all three of the cases that we've had for probably the first five hearings, I would read what we can do. And. Right. Okay. Um, is it okay if I prepare something short for her? Yeah. Yes. To everybody. So that everybody's in the loop. Okay. Um, Is she the same one who wrote the letter to the editor in the Wayland Post? No, that was, um, Rayanne Duff. Okay. I, I, I saw that too. It wasn't, I wasn't sure if she would. No, we've gotten a lot of love letters. Yeah. Um, are there any other board comments and concerns at the moment before we move on to, uh, the Route 20 planned redevelopment district? No. And I sent Robert today, my draft of the comments for town meeting, you know, last time we, you had us and we did need to draft up sort of what our prepared statement would be. Right. Good for you. I, well, I know I took my one from last, from last year and, you know, spun it around and, and made it so that it's ready to go. So Robert has that already. So when you're ready, you can ask him for it. So. Okay. On that, on that note, do we want PowerPoint slides of all the articles? Hmm. I don't think we need to. It's in the book. I don't think so either. Just asking before I create the menu. Yeah. She doesn't usually put them up on the, it's, it's in the warrant. And I, I, I'm just thinking in my head what they all are. I only been at one time meeting, so if I don't weigh in, cause I was, I was out sick last year with, with us and my bugs. So I missed it. Um, and the year for, I don't think we had zoning cause I, we just, I just started so we didn't have. Usually, um, we don't put stuff up on the screen just to put it up on the screen. If there's something, if there's, um, a plan that you need to put up like a map. Yeah. If we're changing the town map, we would put that up. Right. Um, otherwise if it's text that's already in the warrant, the moderator isn't hot to have. Every town is different. That's the thing. Every town. They are. All different. One, they want everybody to have one slide. We need to have it. And have a, a giant roll of power, power slide and go through all of it. So I was just asking before we actually do anything or need to do anything. My guess is that Miranda would just want to do whatever moves things along the quickest and putting text up on the screen is not going to be isn't quickest. No. Um, and we don't know yet if, um, our things will wind up being, uh, abbreviated presentation. Um, I think they're going to try and do that. Um, at least for what I saw originally, that's what the select men were proposing, but I, it was just a draft. So who knows? Um, with regard to moving on to, uh, the route 20 planned redevelopment district zoning discussion. Um, after our meeting with the select board, um, I did speak with the chair and she suggested that we try and figure out what kinds of changes we might want to do. Uh, and I, the board did, uh, say that our board did say that they would really like help from someone. Uh, so I, I sat yesterday and went through all of the information that we had put together before. We've had, um, Robert, do you want to put the thing up? I, I, I will find it here in a minute so that I have it. Yes. Um, I went through, um, the minutes that we had. Um, we discussed this at, I believe three different planning board meetings. And I went through the minutes and the memos that Robert had prepared and tried to put together. Um, if we were going to have someone help us. Uh, what our overall goals were, what constraints there were in the district, in the area, uh, what the zoning provisions are that we would need to be dealing with. Um, and what would be allowed as of right, what would be allowed as a special permit. I didn't specify those things, but I laid out that those are the kinds of things we needed to think about. So I'd like to go through in general what this is and get your comments. Robert, did you have any additional comments? Yeah. The only other thing that we think about is a lot of times we think about new uses and other places in town or just everywhere. Parking, the use of a parking space is, is, is very big. And that really is a strain. That's a constraint that. Right. You need X amount of parking spaces for retail or restaurant. Is there a way to have mixed parking where you can have as much parking? Because it's gonna, it's gonna dig in. It's gonna eat up your, the space. Right. So something that, some kind of goal that helps to either review and have special parking regulations for the planned development area or some more language that has that, that helps reduce parking in some way. Um, and what's the best way to do that, I guess. I mean, I don't, I don't think it quite, I don't think the goals in here to quite put that down, but that'd be something I would be interested if someone was actually going to help write zoning. Um, how, if there are cases that they can, they can use from other places that to treat that goal to reduce parking spaces, because it really digs up. I'm just, I'm dealing with a property right now. And, and they're just trying to figure out how to, how to meet parking. I mean, the parking, it's so very big and we have had, we haven't had someone take a look at our parking regulations in probably many years. Cause it's just other. I thought, I, I didn't think that they were that big, but I thought that there were too many park. I thought people felt that there were too many, it called for too, too much parking. Yeah. It's, it's like, you know, the CVS, like CVS site, um, and, um, uh, from, uh, West Plain. West Plain. We just have too many parking spaces and that's based on the park and zoning. Right. But isn't it a square footage thing? It is. Yeah. Okay. Is there a way to reduce that? Yeah. Right. So you can come up with some kind of a different standard rather than square footage of a building, right? Yeah. Okay. So I think that we've, and tell me if you don't agree or you do agree or we need to add more in the goals. The overall goal that I thought that the board had spoken about was creating vibrancy and interconnectivity. And we have to define the extent of the zone clearly. Uh, and, um, we need reduced size and visibility of parking areas and looking for pooled use of parking spaces. Uh, we wanted the buildings relatively close to the street. Um, we wanted walkability and connection to the rail trail, the town center shopping center and businesses on the North and South sides of route 20. We wanted to encourage landscaping, outdoor seating and amenities and possibly increase the commercial tax base. And Robert had reduced shared parking regulations. Um, I think, okay. I think that would probably be, uh, reduce number of required parking spaces or find a new standard for determining number of parking spaces. Maybe. Didn't we also have, uh, residential. Yes. That comes up later. Yeah. Oh, all right. Yeah. Okay. I just had a thought about parking. So if we had a provision that allowed adjacent landowners to make an application to, to somebody, to some, whoever grants this sort of a permit, I assume it would be us to apply, to share their parking allocations so that they could, instead of each one having to satisfy the requirement by a hundred percent, if they each could satisfy it by a certain percentage, a reduced percentage, if they applied for a waiver together of some sort and had some sort of an agreement in perpetuity between the two of them that this parking would remain shared. Yes. That's complicated. Do you think that perhaps we might be able to do it so that it could be more of an as of right kind of thing rather than having to go through another permitting? Well, yes and no, because what if let's say both businesses are restaurants that are open at the same hours, then that's not going to work. But if one of them is a dry cleaner and the other one is a restaurant, then we would be like, yes, that definitely works. You guys can do that. So there may be circumstances where we're like, no, that's not going to work. And others where we say, yes, that's fine. So I don't, I think it takes some review to a certain extent. I don't think the perpetuity will necessarily work because I know as if I were a landowner, or I wouldn't agree to. Right. But for some period of time. Yeah. But if it's not in perpetuity and one of them says, I'm done with you, we can't share our parking anymore, then, then they have a problem. Yep. Then they don't have enough parking for their uses. So do they then lose their ability to operate their businesses for those purposes? Well, we wouldn't know that they had had. Right. Yeah. And it may be that it's enough that they go before the town planner, but they should have to go before somebody and say, look, see, we have this, we don't have overlapping parking needs. So we don't need that much parking. You know, I have a business where people run in and out for 10 minutes and they have a business where people run in and out for 10 minutes. So we're good. But if it was, for example, two restaurants that were open the same hours, that wouldn't work, you know, or two doctor's offices that are open the same hours that that may not work. That was just a thought. I'm just writing myself notes. Me too. Good. If it would help, Robert could send you this, perhaps, or I could do it right now. And you could make changes on the document. I thought he was going to share it with people. But would you like me to do that? Yeah, you can send it. Or Robert can. I'll send it right now. Okay. Yeah, that'd help. Yeah, perhaps we can all take a look at it. And then the next time we talk about it, we'll have more. Right. Yeah, I just finished it yesterday. I'm sorry. Yeah, no, no problem. Okay. I'm having trouble keeping up with everything. Yeah, we are. Yeah. Are there any other things in the goals part that would be telling somebody, look, this is what we're really trying to accomplish? The coming back? Yeah. I think there's a, you know, from the, the study that was done from the beta thing. Right. You know, there's sort of a definite sort of look that we're going for. And we talked at the last couple of meetings that we talked about, you know, looking at CVS, where you've got some grass, a sidewalk, and then some more greenery. And so particularly on the Route 20 side, but I would think we want to mirror that to the extent we can on the rail trail side, that we want it to look nice. And there should be, you know, some greenery in the sidewalk or the greenery. And if you're having outdoor eating or whatever is going to be on the rail trail side, we want to specify that. As we're doing that, I don't disagree with you. Some of those lots are very shallow. I know. And we're going to have setback requirements. And I'm not sure that they'll be able to handle the, and some of them, the parking, the building, and the buffers on two sides and a sidewalk in the front. But, you know, the, the buffer, let's say in front of CVS is huge, but we can, you know, narrow that down, but have the same goal that there'd be some greenery and the sidewalk, you know, and between the sidewalk and CVS is a huge buffer. And then you just need to have something growing there. It doesn't have to be. Right. I wasn't thinking about that part, that part you might be able to handle. I was thinking about going the rail trail part, but the same thing, it can be just reduced and you don't need a sidewalk on the rail trail, but there should be, there should be, have to be some sort of vegetation that looks organized. Not just weeds. Okay. There should be some sort of a, something to make it look nice and inviting and a door, maybe if it's the right kind of business, you know, if it's the kind of business that is asking for foot traffic. I mean, if it's an auto body shop, maybe they don't need to have a door on the, on the rail trail side, but. Yeah. But when we did the town center thing, some of the members of the board wanted to have access from two sides. And the people who were going to be renting were not comfortable with that because then you have to watch two doors. Right. Um, so they really just want it. Some of them have two doors, but you can't use the two doors. Yeah. Um, but you know, I think, is there anything wrong with requiring two doors, but that they not both be operational so that the bill, the building itself is flexible for future uses. So that if somebody wants to be encouraging foot traffic from the rail trail, or even, you know, let's say it is an auto mechanic shop so that your customers can leave and go onto the rail trail and take a walk. Um, you know, that we have them put in a door, but it can be, doesn't need to be operational at all times. Certainly can, but think about, I don't know what the, the zoning code says about things. Normally I think it's supposed to have two doors for safety purposes. And oftentimes a store or a retail establishment will have their store room at one of the doors. Right. And then the entrance at the other. Right. So, yeah, we can try, I hear what you're saying. I'm not sure that it will work in all cases. No, but it's something to at least look at in terms of, you know, if we want to require them to at least build the building so that there could be access to the rail trail, you know, in a future iteration of the business. But, you know, most of these buildings, if they're up against the rail trail, they're not going to have a delivery door on the, on the rail trail side of the building, but it's just, it's one of the goals is to solve that problem. Okay. Are there any other goals before we get into some more specifics? I thought whoever was going to help us would need to know that we do have some constraints. And one of them is the ability to deal with wastewater. There are limitations on septic and on the capacity of the wastewater management district commission system. Um, and that's a, an issue. Um, and then we need to also make sure that we have access for emergency services. So in some of the buildings or the lots, they're very close together and they're very small and they're narrow. Um, and if we are going to have doors in the rear as well, um, and we're parking in the rear, the emergency vehicles need to be able to access it for, um, fire and for, um, ambulance stuff. Yep. Yep. Can you think of any other constraints that we need to think about?
Snow removal? Snow removal? Yep. Or snow storage maybe? Yeah. Yep. Same deal with the size of the lots.
Okay. For zoning provisions, um, we've talked about the front setbacks, getting the buildings closer to the street. I think we talked about 20 to 30 foot setback and, uh, with taller buildings possible at the rear. Is that what we had in mind? I don't necessarily think it has to be limited to the rear, but for some of the larger lots, you could have the building step back and then have a taller portion. You know, so if the part that was right on route 20 was, you know, two stories tall or one and a half kind of thing, how many feet back would you allow it to then be taller to allow for a second floor with the housing in it or offices? Okay. So step back from route 20. Yep. And, um, step back from route 20 and possibly increased height. Is that? Yeah. Cause I think if you want to try and get housing in there, that's how you're going to have to do it without having a sheer face. Right. It's similar to the other zoning issue where if you don't give them enough height, it's not attractive to try to develop. Right. So we've got to figure that out. Yeah. And, uh, possibly increased height. Yeah. Moving to the rear. Okay. Um, combined parking areas for one or more lots. We talked about that, um, location of parking areas behind this was, I just wrote question marks. I know people have said they don't want them in the front, um, but in some places there's just not a lot of room behind. Um, so would it be behind the building or to the side of the building or both, or do we want to prohibit it in the front? Well, it would be interesting if there was, it would be, if there was a shared area in the back with like, you know, paths to some of these things. Right. I mean, you, what you would really need is somebody to buy up all that and develop it. Uh huh. Well, but you know, you do, but if you have the zoning bylaw in, it doesn't have to happen all at once. You know, when the guy who owns the, uh, the nail salon that has parking in the front, if, if somebody bought that building and then wanted to tear it down and rebuild it, they would just need to flip it so that the building came forward and the parking was in the back where it would match up with the parking for the music school and Whalen power equipment and all the other things that are on the backside. Right. So it doesn't have to happen all at once, but putting this in place means that if somebody wants to make a change, it's going to be a change. It's going to move us toward the goal of having the parking in the back. Okay. So I wouldn't allow parking on route to on the route 20 side. Okay. You know, if you have it now, fine, you can keep it, but if you're going to tear down your building, you've got to flop yourself around, spin it around. And that would encourage people to form these little parking partnerships. Okay. Right. Um, control the number and location of curb cuts. I'm not sure exactly how to do that, but that is also one of the other issues. Um, because the curb cut in general goes with your lot. And I think we're in better shape traffic wise, if we have fewer curb cuts along that area. So to me, it goes with the parking because you want to allow these parking partnerships and that would apply to the curb cuts as well. So then if I'm a property owner and I don't have to have a curb cut, my building can go side to side on my lot without needing a curb cut. If my building partner next door allows me to use their curb cut. So it would put it with the parking and kind of say curb cut partners and parking partners. Okay. Does that make sense? Yeah. Um, minimum side and rear yard setbacks. I don't think that we've settled on anything and I'm not sure we're ready to settle on anything. That's something that we would have to have. Uh, when we looked at this before, some of the districts didn't have setbacks at all. And some of them did. Um, but I think probably for what, what we're trying to accomplish here, you do need a minimum side and rear setback along with the front setback. Yeah. Okay. Um, height limitations, maximums, minimums. Again, that's something that we'll have to come up with. Um, if we're looking for the village feel, um, the rest of the town is 35 feet, except that the zoning for the town center, um, lets them go, um, lets them go. I think it's 42 feet because we didn't want it to be any higher because of the housing that was around there. Um, and if it were higher, it wouldn't be an issue for neighboring housing, but it would be an issue if we're looking to have a village feel. So, so like we talked back before that, I think that we're going to have, not that I know what the height's going to be, but you're going to have one height limitation within so many feet of route 20. And that's going to force them to push this, you know, the third story is going to have to be set back. Um, I don't know what that number of feet should be, but cause we want to allow that, you know, the upper floors for housing or offices, I guess, if they want to, but we want housing. And then on the rail trail side, that's where it would be higher, wouldn't it? On the rail trail side, are you talking about? No, so I'm talking, so the buildings that are on the route 20 side, we would want them to be at a certain height until they've gotten so many feet away from the roadway and then they can raise it up again. So there's a step back, right? Are you talking about the north side or the south side? South side. Okay. The side that's right on route 20. Okay. So within so many feet of route 20, you're capped, but then once you get, once you've stepped back, you can come up higher. But do we need to do that step back on the rail trail side or do we allow it to be taller back there? From visibility from the rail trail itself, if it's taller, you might feel closed in. Yeah. But as far as any impact on the town center itself, it wouldn't be really because the height differential from the rail trail up there is pretty big. Yeah. And how tall is Stop and Shop? Um, I think it's, we measured this before. I know Robert, we have it in, I don't remember off the top of my head, but we did measure it. So if the buildings were starting at grade level, which is below the grade level for the town center, you know, if the building was as tall as the side of Stop and Shop, is that okay? Is that too tall? It's as tall as the hot side of Stop and Shop from the ground to the, on the Stop and Shop building or? Yeah. Oh. On the, so from the ground. So, you know, so the roof heights were about the same. That allows the buildings that are in the wedge on the backside there of the, which district is at the light manufacturing district. They could be, you know, a little taller because they're coming from probably eight to 10 feet below grade of the Stop and Shop. But is that too tall? Is that make it, you know, you're coming through the tunnel or is it worth it to have housing back there?
Hey, Larry, what are your thoughts? Because you're Mr. Rail Trail and you have to, you're muted. You're muted. You know, I was out walking on the Natick Rail Trail. They plow it in the winter. And there's the areas where there's big buildings right next to it. And on the other side is a lake or woods. But I think what you appreciate most is the quiet and away from traffic. So, you know, it's a tight space right there. We need to let, what's the worst thing is to have an empty lot. So yeah, I'm not, I'm not too concerned about buildings being close. That's the brunt of the question. No, it's the height too. Well, even the height, some of the heights on the Natick Rail Trail are really high. So. There's no apartment buildings there, yeah. Yeah, I, you know, it's a small section. As soon as you get past Russell's, you're in, you know, a great wilderness and seeing the other way. So I don't have an issue with tall, you know, appropriately manicured buildings close by or tall. And in some ways, I mean, if it's assuming that what would end up there because of the size of the lots would be housing, you know, it's usually a face that's broken up by windows and has some interest as opposed to the stop and shop, which is just on that side, just a cinder block face. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've not been on the Sudbury Trail in a while, but don't those condos back right up to the rail trail? I have no idea. Where are the condos? Behind Whole Foods?
Yeah, the ones, they're like three stories tall. I think they do back up to the trail. I know their property line goes right here and there. I didn't realize that. Yeah. No, you're right, Larry. It's like very close. Yeah. So my thoughts are there's so many restrictions on septic, space, squeeze on both sides. I don't think we can add another constraint. Well, if you're cycling, you know, you're going to quickly go past it. If you're walking, yeah, you might. But, like, I don't know. It's, I mean, this is such a small detail, but, like, if you're going to bike past it, you're going to have to zoom by and you're not going to think about it. So, I don't know. I mean, I guess the best way it'd be to take pictures from the sub-eye piece of it and take a look at it. And that would be, you know, some visualization of what it could look like from the Wayland one. But when I think about building heights, it makes me think of shadows and shadow studies as that relates to kind of blocking neighbors and outdoor space. But at the same time, I know I welcome shadows on the bike path. It's nice to have, like, you know, a little bit of a shady area so it's not so hot. So, I think, in this case, I'm not really concerned with how close buildings are as long as it's not, you know, three stories, 10 feet away or something like that.
Good point. It does get hot out there in the summer. Yeah. It's likely that it could be three stories, 10 feet away. So, I think even under our existing bylaw, the rear setbacks are significantly less than the front and side. I think that would get, if it was on either side of the bike path, which might not happen, I think that would get pretty tight and pretty tunnel-like. But one side of the bike path, I don't really see a big deal with that. If you get a lot higher than three stories, I think that would be, that would definitely be a concern. Okay, so three stories in general is a little over 35 feet. I mean, that's what our zoning bylaw is already anyway, 10, 20, 30. I think there were, people have said, when we were talking to the people at the town center, when we were doing the MBTA stuff, they said they wanted 11-foot floors. So, that would be 33. You know, so that's still our existing bylaw numbers.
And the setback for light manufacturing is 15 feet. And the stop and shop is set way back because they have a driveway that comes, they've got a, you know, a delivery road that goes all the way around it. So, hopefully you're not feeling too tunneled in there to allow them to do three feet. You could only have buildings on one side because that would be the zone. The area on the other side is part of the town center. Right, but we're really not talking about that in terms of where this, you know, where we're trying to develop this. We're really talking about that light manufacturing zone and a little bit of the business district. What is it, A?
And actually, the light manufacturing district is way past. It's, yeah, it's not. Past stop and shop, most of it. Yeah. It's east of stop and shop.
Okay. So, we're somewhere around 35 plus feet, but we don't know yet because we should probably, as we do this, I saw a study done for Norwood, which I can download and send to you guys. And when they were doing the MBTA zoning for Norwood, Judy Barrett did an assessment of what you need in order to make it financially viable to build, just so that they would have a sense of when they were zoning, if they could actually get the buildings done. We didn't do that because we didn't. And that's kind of helpful because I think as we do the zoning, we want to have somebody in the real market who does market analysis, help us make sure that as we're zoning, we're zoning for something that is actually viable.
Okay. She's a Norwood townie. I think I went to high school with her siblings. Oh, I didn't know that. That's where I grew up. Oh, let's see. Minimum side height. Minimum frontage. And again, we talked about 20 to 30 feet setback, but for buildings. Yeah.
I mean, these are all such small lots. I don't know that we're going to be setting minimums here. They're going to be looking to, they're all stuck with what was they're stuck with there. Right. But if we don't have a minimum, then as people redevelop, they can be closer on the road. I mean, the question is, do you want them right on the road? We want to make sure that they do have the sidewalk and some green stuff. Yeah. But that that's frontage I thought was sideways and setback was the depth they are from the road. Yes. I'm sorry. Yes. Sorry. Okay.
Yep.
So you don't care about frontage, but okay. Some of them, again, some of our zones are zero. They don't have anything. Okay. Is that how everybody feels?
That you don't necessarily need frontage? I don't think we need a frontage minimum. Right. Yeah. Okay. Well, yeah. It's just that you wouldn't, that's the, in our zoning bylaw, those are the, I just picked up what kinds of standards we already have. So there wouldn't be anything for frontage. Yeah. But that they'd have to have frontage. Right. So, well. Well, but the ones in the back don't necessarily have frontage, although they must have their driveway. They must own the curb cut for their driveways. I think that they came in before the zoning. Okay. Because I tried to figure that out a while ago and I was having a really hard time. But the issue becomes, if you don't have frontage requirements, you could wind up with a major hodgepodge. That's right.
So can you have a minimum frontage with an asterisk that says, unless you have a curb cut partner? Yes, I think you could. So I think you have to have your minimum frontage for a curb cut, unless you have a curb cut partner with an agreement. Does that work for you, Ira? Yes.
So what are you, I'm sorry, what are you setting the minimum as 10 feet?
No, we didn't say what it was. No, whatever you need for a driveway, whatever that standard is.
It's more than 10 feet. Yeah.
Oh, this is such a pain. Okay. Well, but this is what the consultant's supposed to be. Yes. If we're getting some, they're going to look that up and figure that out, right? Yeah. I think that we're going to need to give up. That's the hope. Yeah. Are we using beta again? No. I didn't think so.
Basically, they were hired to do a landscape plan. Yeah. That's what it looks like. Yeah.
Which is not what we needed. Uh-uh. Okay. Okay. Then minimum lot area.
It's the same hodgepodge, Robin, and I understand. But it's the same thing. Because if you don't have, without, I don't even know how you cut up the land with, for buildings. I mean, if you don't have a minimum lot area, then the side yard and the rear setbacks don't make sense. Because you don't know what you can put on the site. Well, but if instead, if you have maximum lot coverage, that doesn't that solve that problem where you have all these little, I don't know. Well, if this is in the Aquifer Protection District. Yeah. And that, I think, is 20 or, I think it's 20% lot coverage. I can't remember. But there's a special one for that. But even if you had, well, yeah. It does. But if you, if you have one of those little lots, or if you want to make, do an A&R and take one of the little lots and make it smaller and a little kiosk on it. Yeah. You know, you, you, it's getting away from what zoning was designed to do because you don't know what you're going to wind up with. Yeah. So I think we need to know. I think we had, Robert, you had looked before at what all these lots were. I think if we get an idea about what's there and just make it so that nobody can divide anything smaller than what's already there. I don't know. Are each, do you know if each one of these lots per se is owned by individual people or one owner like owns a whole section of them? At one point, and I don't know if it's still the case. It's Ralph Wagner, who passed away and his wife, who just passed away, owned the dry cleaners. And I think the hair on the north side. The nail salon. The hairdresser. And then, yeah. And the nail salon.
Oh. I don't know if they own it any longer. But most of the other stuff, I think, is individual owners. Except, Robin, we looked at, what was it? Where? Wayland Autobody? Yeah. Where Wayland Autobody was. And there were several sort of businesses there. It was a weird lot. Yeah. Very big, but weird. Yeah. So, maybe sort of start by looking at what is there, and then what's the smallest of the ones that are there, and make sure nothing is smaller than that, I guess. Okay. And then for allowed principal uses, and whether it's as of right, site plan, special permit, that we can work out later. Rather than going through each of the definitions that we had worked on before, where we said hairdresser, dentist, bank, I just put down business, and then we'd have to have an expansive definition of what business is and what's included. I don't know how you all feel about the way that we list, for the rest of the zoning bylaw, that we list every single thing the way we list it, of what you can and can't put in. I think it's easier to have a list of the things that are just not allowed. Okay. Doesn't that seem... Well, the way that the bylaw, our other bylaw, we'll talk about this in a minute, because this might be a whole separate section all by itself, like the MBTA was, the way the rest of our bylaw reads is, if it's not written as allowed, then it's not allowed. So, it covers anything new and different that would come up. Well, maybe when we amend this, we amend that provision, too, to say that it's allowed and it's not excluded. But that invites creativity. Yeah, and the problem is, right, and also, if something new comes on the scene, you could wind up with it and you might not want it. Right, yeah. So, in any event, we did want to allow businesses, retail and banks and drugstores and just cleaners, all of those kinds of service things, I believe. Yeah, we have the list that we went through before. Yep, and then mixed-use residential dwellings in combination with business uses, that's what we've been talking about, medical and dental offices, trade shops. We talked about that before, and that's when you make something, restaurants, and other kinds of categories, if there are any other kinds of categories. Yeah, are there, I mean, we can go back, and I looked at the list, which I think I have here, too.
Yeah, here it is. We confirmed banks, medical, dental care centers, offices, personal and other service establishments, restaurant, retail store. We said recreation park, I don't know if we should think about that, since there's so little room there for anything. Educational, museum or library.
Daycare. Nursery, school or daycare, religious building or structure, which we wouldn't have anything that we could say about that anyway. Right. Town uses, assisted independent living, would we really want that in that area? There isn't any place that's big enough for that. I know. So I don't think it's a concern.
Well, if somebody did want to buy up that whole area and then do that. Yeah. So then maybe say no? I'm asking the board what you guys think. I don't think it's the type of business that the townspeople have in mind for that site. Okay. Larry, Jesse, Ira? Yeah. Agree.
Yeah. Okay. So we'll take that one off. We also had studio. I'm thinking that might be the same thing. I mean, if somebody is going to sell something, have an art gallery, that would be a business kind of thing. Right. I mean, I don't know if a studio would give us enough vibrancy.
I think if you, well, I don't, I don't have it handy. I don't remember if the definition of studio was specific that it was for, you know, retail also, or is it just someplace where you sit and paint? Hold on. But, you know, somebody might take one of the, you know, what would be an office, you know, unit and put an art studio in it. So, yeah. Studio, a place for art, music, dance, and similar activities or classes. Oh, so we already have a dance school, music school there. So we'd leave it. It's not always going to be the same. No, but it's. Okay. It's a business. People like to have those sorts of things around so their kids can take music and dance lessons. Okay. I don't know. People agree? Yeah. Jesse's not. Mm-hmm. Okay. And, you know, for the definitions, we'll have to decide, do we pick up the definitions that we already have and just refer to those. Right. Which might be just fine. We also had utilities facilities. We do have. Horizon. Yeah.
Jesse, in the solar stuff. Can they go anywhere under the state's requirements or can we limit them to certain areas? Yeah. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not certain if that's in the state requirements, like limiting where they can go. Because you wouldn't want to have like a BES, a BES facility, a storage facility right there. Yeah. And you really wouldn't want them to have a substation right there, if you could help it. I mean, the Verizon building kind of looks like one a little bit. Yeah. It does. But at least it's. It's not very attractive. But it's in a building. Yeah. At least. So do we, if, if we leave the utility thing in there, do we amend the definition of utility structure so that it excludes BES? And solar, ground mounted solar? Yeah, because they should be their own thing with their own definition. Maybe. I'll write a note. I don't think that's what anyone wants to see on the Route 20 corridor. No. Or a windmill. Yeah. Is this where I make my plug for an ice hockey rink? Not big enough. No, it's definitely not big enough. They're really expensive to keep up. Yeah. Yeah, that's a problem.
We struggled a little with those industrial uses. But I think we settled on, because right now in light utility, light manufacturing, like R&D labs and offices, you know, allowed or allowed by special permit. And we had struggled a little with all of that stuff. Right. Right. So offices, I don't necessarily think we, that we have a problem, do we? Yeah. And I know that's not what we're dying to have there, but there are some already. Yeah. Yeah. So should we leave that in for now, R&D labs and offices of all sizes? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Okay. Funeral homes we have allowed by special permit. Do we really want a funeral home there? I don't think there's parking for a funeral home there. I don't think you, I don't think anybody would put a funeral home there. But if they got permission from Terrain to park across the street. I don't think Terrain would do that. What if they agreed to put a lot there that all the businesses could share?
Except on funeral days. Yeah, I don't think it would work, but we can say no to it. How does it work? It could be from marriage to death. Yeah.
The other problem with having something like a funeral, though, funeral homes really mess the traffic up. No, they do. And you really wouldn't want that at the center of town, right at that traffic light, to have a funeral home right there. Okay, so we're going to take that out? Take it out. Okay. And then we had a boat and canoe rental. Well, maybe further down the route there, closer to the river, that could be cool. In that little wedge at the end across from Russell's, but that's already taken. But we can't, we can't specify. I know, like, you can't say within this little tiny area over there. I mean, I would leave it in. Okay. I would. Maybe something would happen. Yeah.
A little REI outpost. Yeah. Okay. Charles River Canoe.
Okay. So, non-motorized boats and seasonal sale of non-motorized boats. Right. What's there now? But the second sentence is, is what's in the bylaw now, our general bylaw. Yeah. So, it's not really big enough, any place there for motorized boat sales, really isn't. So, we might as well take it out. Well, there was, we used to have one. Yes. Right across the street. Okay. On the south side where, I guess it's where CBS is now. It used to be, after it was the boat thing, it was a delicatessen, whatever. Yeah. What was that called? Oh, my gosh. Caraways. Caraways.
But, I mean, they had big boats there. Because I represented them on something. Yeah. But I would take it out at this point. Take it out? Yeah, because nobody's ever going to do it. The second part or the whole thing? Are we, you leave in boat and canoe rental, non-motorized boats? Yeah. Yes. And take out the other part of it? Yes.
Okay. And then we have the list of things that we thought shouldn't be included. And I, I kind of think that's still the same. Yeah.
Just looking quickly. Anyway, we talked about some things that should be allowed with modifications. And that was automobile services. And the note was, be included if in the rear business area, it be included if it's in the rear business area, except for automobile sales, which should be street-facing. Gas and service would need to be street-facing. And we were going to return to automobile service and talk about it. Yeah.
Oh, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go. That's a prickly one. Yes, it is. Because it's one of those services that people need. Yes. But it's not like we want a giant car dealership there, or... We used to have a giant car dealership on the other side. How about motorcycle sales? Perfect. Perfect. And then you can test drive it on Route 20. Perfect. In traffic. Those can all stay in Sudbury.
Yeah, it's like the auto mile down there. Mm-hmm.
So, again, are we still going to keep thinking about weather, automobile service? I don't know how you... Robert, can you even say in a zoning bylaw where you're creating a whole zone that you can only put a certain use in a certain portion of that zone? You can say that two cannot be located within X amount of distance from a turner, but I don't think you can say it cannot be allowed in, unless you have another overlay within the... Oh, no. Too complex. Yeah. But you can say, if you only, like, if there's one and you only want to want, you could put some provisions in that there's, you can't have more than, you know, two car washes. Just not in the same way, but I've seen that before, but that's stretching it. I mean, a lot of these questions are people who, for someone who's going to be hopefully drafted in this, they can use other examples to kind of get what you want into the writing that's legal. So... Okay. And for, if it was an auto service garage sales or service station, could we set a maximum number of vehicles that are allowed to be stored on the lot? We did have, just so you know, in the south side of town on Route 30, we did have that, and then they went and got a variance, I believe. It's either a variance or a license from the select board, I can't remember now. And they have money more than was ever allowed. Yeah. Well, so we could do it, it just isn't necessarily meaningful. Right.
But I think, you know, the way that I see it here is sort of, there's a minimum lot requirement for the auto service, you know, the auto businesses, and some of those make it so that, like, a two-acre lot. I don't think there's a two-acre lot in that whole section. Is there? Actually, I think the one that has the auto repair is probably two acres, but it's a very funny configuration. Yeah. It might even be more than two acres. I remember when I looked at it, I thought, my gosh, that's bigger than I thought. Because if you tighten those up so that the minimum lot area was large, then it would mean that they couldn't necessarily get in there with, like, a big car dealership. I don't know. Thinking about gas stations, though, if you used, you wouldn't want to use the same number, I don't think, for a gas station and the car place. Yes. No. Well, and I think the sheet that I'm looking at, I don't know if this is what everybody has, but this one that we did, that Robert, I think, typed up after one of our earlier discussions. Yeah, I'm looking at the one Robert typed up. Yeah, you know, there is a difference, so it says minimum lot area, 30,000 square feet service garage, two acres sales, 40,000 square foot service station. So we sort of had it different requirements. And that might work. Square foot service station is a considerable size. Yeah. It's almost an acre. Almost, yeah. You know, and for a service station, you could have a maximum number of pumps.
Again, that's going to depend on the viability of even building one with a certain number of pumps. Sometimes if we limit it, it wouldn't even be viable. I don't know what the... Yeah, they won't come. Right. Do you even want to put... I mean, they all took their pumps out, with the exception of the one at the very end. Like, Cook's is not there anymore. The one up from Cook's never had a pump. Oh, Cook's isn't there anymore? That means they don't have gas. Cook's are not there anymore. Oh, okay. It's only Shep's that has gas. That's right. And people go to Shep's. Yeah. Because if you're low on gas and you're in the center of town, it's your only choice. That's right. If you can't make it to Sudbury or Cachituit, you're stuck. So, and honestly, that's a reason why we want to be able to keep a gas station in town. So, well, again, some more thought. Okay. I honestly have been Shep's made once in my life. I usually drive down to Sudbury. Do you? Yeah. Because it's so much easier for me to just drive to Sudbury and get gas down to the place. Just because they, I'm pretty sure, does Shep pump it for you? Yes. Yes. That's exactly why. I like my own gas. I just, so I know how much I put in there. Yeah. When I have, when I, when my kids were little and they were in the back of the car, sometimes it was nice to have somebody else pump the gas. Yeah. Anyway, we have to do a little more work on that one. Okay.
Okay. And then we went through the accessory use table. Yeah. And we said, well, let me go back to where we were before allowed accessory uses.
We said that ADUs, well, we were saying ADUs aren't allowed in business A or business B. But we do know that as the thing is written, they're sort of allowed in the roadside business. But I don't know how you could put them there because they wouldn't be a primary dwelling unit. But the attorney general's comment that we had to have that and couldn't take it out. Um, we also said that barns and tool sheds would be excluded, uh, and the cafeterias, banks, daycare and recreational facilities for employees would be excluded in the accessory use table.
Um, that home occupation would be excluded as an accessory use. That family daycare would be excluded as an accessory use. That garage and carport would be excluded as an accessory use. And I don't know. I think we'll have to think about it as we go through. Uh, because in many cases, if you're going to put the garage underneath, it wouldn't be accessory. Really? It would be part of the building.
Yep. Uh, non-commercial greenhouses would be excluded. Kennels would be excluded. Leading, renting of rooms would be excluded. Roadside stands would be excluded. Swimming pools will be included. That'll be interesting. And tennis courts would be excluded.
Who's going to build a swimming pool there? I'm just thinking. Well, if you had, like, a spa go in, they could put in, like, a, a lap pool. Right? Yep. That would be weird. Or a, you know, or a hot tub. But that's not a pool. But somebody could put in a stationary lap pool. Okay. That's a good thought. So we'll be working on this more. And I hope that you guys will think about it more. Um, and then we wanted sidewalks on the lot. It's already provided in other sections of the bylaws for the business. Um, and, uh, we also have to decide whether we want to make it a base zone or an overlay. I think our discussions before with it, we already have too many overlays that we wanted to try to do a base zone. Right. I mean, that's what I think. But I want to make sure that everybody else is there, too. Yes. I am. Which is easier to get approved. Is that an issue?
No, because whatever is, I don't think, whatever, and we'd have to explain it, whatever is there now is grandfathered. No, I understand that. It's a pre-existing use. Um, and if everybody in town has been clamoring to fix up the area, the only way you can fix it is starting with zoning.
Yeah.
Um, and we have to think about if it's a base zone, what we incorporate, um, by reference from other sections of the bylaw and what we specifically include in this new section. When we were doing the MBTA thing, it just got to be too confusing to be referring back and forth. It was just death. So we just created everything into the new zone. And if we have help drafting this, then that should be easier to have a professional be doing that rather than our motley crew. So, so are there any other thoughts that you guys have currently? Do you think that we need to do any more description of the feeling that we want to get? I mean, we can certainly show them the, uh, the diagrams that were done by beta. And that that was what we're aiming for. Where I assume we're meeting with whoever is selected to do this, right? I hope so. We don't know that we're getting anybody yet, but we think that we might be able to.
Yeah. A lot of wasted time if we can't.
Yeah. Well, Robert could always just sit down and knock it out. Yeah.
Absolutely. Yeah. So, Robert, do you have more thoughts on this? Not at this point. I, it's just curious to see what comes out of this, but I guess I gotta sit down and think about it a little more. Okay.
At our next meeting, we'll do, um, hopefully the minutes of 225 and the minutes of this evening, Robert, both of those. Yep. And then, um, we have the Carroll School at 730 by Zoom. All the whole thing is by Zoom. And maybe if we have a little time and you guys have time to think in between, uh, we can do a little more thought on this, um, just to flesh it out a little more. Because if we are going to have the help of somebody, we need to give them enough pith that they can do something with it rather than just floating around. Yep. Um, if we're having somebody, you know, help us draft these bylaws, we're going to, are we going to include design guidelines? Sort of not include them? Um, the question is, um, with the MBTA thing, we didn't include them really. We put them, we, we, we alluded to them and then we put them in a separate document. And the reason we did that was we just didn't want to be screwing around with the state dealing with all of that. Um, and the question is, do you want to be more flexible with design guidelines so that, because if you put them in the bylaw, that's it. Stuck, right.
But we can come up with them at the same time. Yeah. If that would be helpful. I mean, but we could put them in the bylaw. I just, it's up to the board what you all think. I mean, I think the, the whole gist of the, the master plan for this area was to have it kind of end up looking a certain way. A certain look and feel. Yeah. You know, it makes me think, Robert, of those pictures that I sent you that were from Wisconsin. Hmm. Um, you know, and, and that's what we've actually been working on those with design review in terms of. Kind of looking at ways to encourage that sort of development where you end up with that village field that we're all going for. Right. Um, can, can Robert share those with us too, the pictures? And can you tell us through design review where you are? Because then we could, we could pick up that and put them in bylaws. If that's what people want to do. Um, we have been working on it in design review, but now we haven't had a meeting in a while. Um, so I'm not sure where we are and I'm looking for my pictures. Robert, do you have the pictures handy? Uh, no, I'll go over my emails if I, I thought I had them saved here, but yeah, I can find them on my emails probably quickly. Well, what, what are the pictures like downtown Concord or something like that? Well, we started with downtown Concord, but it was sort of, downtown Concord is a very different feel. Um, these were, let me just sort my, ew, you can't sort by attachment. That's weird. All right. Um, this was after I came back. The town center was supposed to be downtown. Yeah, that was supposed to be, have a great one. Didn't that sound great? I have something that's loading in trust. There it is.
Um, I should be able to share it from here. Yeah. I'm sure. Nick, do you have any comments on anything we've been talking about? Because you've been pretty quiet. No, I've, I've got nothing to add. All makes sense to me. Is this one from, is this one from Middleton, Wisconsin? Yeah. And Mustard Museum? Yes, that's one of them. So this is one. Um, and this has parking here, but this is actually around the backside anyway. So, um, and then where's the Mustard Museum? That was pretty funny. That's pretty stark. Um, it doesn't look stark in person. Why can't I get this to open there? I don't see how the businesses that are there now would fit into facades that you're showing here.
Um, I think what happens is, is they, you know, as one goes and the next one joins up with it.
Yeah, this is a long-term journey. Yeah, this is a long-term journey. But that's, if you're doing design guidelines, that's what you're doing. I'm saying, this is where we want to end up. Um, let's see. Just because you have to see the Mustard Museum. This is, and it's not just the Mustard Museum. It's the National Mustard Museum. Okay, then. Um, so, and this is a little different. This is where it's on the street side. But there's parking behind all these, and there's housing and offices up above. Some of them are taller than others. Um, so. What was here beforehand? Or was this renovated? So this, these are all built up from what was there originally? Um, it was, the whole area was, was raised, and this was all new. Okay. So, do you, it's interesting to look at. Is this something that you would even want in Wayland? I, I don't know, though. It's, it's really what the, what the, the plan came up with was to have sort of a, if you remember the beta, I don't know, drawings, they had, you know, basically a, a, an area that faced the street that looked like this. Um. This looks more industrial to me than what I thought they were. So it, it, it, when you're there, it's not industrial at all. It has, it has a very sort of town center feel. It's just that in the upper floors, it's a little bit more, there's housing and offices up there. And some of them have bigger buildings that are stepped back, um, with, you know, big apartment buildings on top of them. But I mean, this is a bigger scale than what we're talking about anyway. This is a, a pretty large area of town. Um, but when comparing it to our new town center, this is, this is very nice. I think this is more than not what we were looking for different, you know, different feel to the buildings, you know, kind of the, kind of like the concrete feeling. It's more villagey. Yeah. They were, they were, each one was built at a different time as opposed to laid out. Yeah. So, but these all look different. Each building has a different look to it, but they were all built at the same time. But the design guideline aspect comes into saying, you know, you can't have, uh, you know, um, an unbroken face of the building that's wider than this. And the sign boards will be uniform and the lighting will be, you know, have some uniformity to it. And, um, anyway, there you go.
You know, when they did that, what the, the licensing process was, the permitting process, I don't. Cause I'm just thinking, you know, lighting will be, those are all the same lights, but if you're doing this over time, you might not be able to get the same lights. Right. Not all the buildings have all the same lights, um, but they are all at the same height and they're all sort of gooseneck style lights. But like in the first picture that I shared, the lights are completely different and they show different buildings with different lights and some have awnings and some have, you know, different things. So it's, um, it's, it's, it's at least something to look at. We had trouble finding anything that we really like to look at in terms of trying to develop some sort of a design guideline. Um, cause Concord wasn't quite right. Um, I think everyone mentions Concord too. Yeah. You know, and the same, you know, we'd always, a lot of people go back to Linden Square and Wellesley, but that's not right either. That's very, um, that doesn't have a village feel at all. If we're looking for a village feel, this seemed like more villagey. No, I think you're right. Did they, did the town buy that portion of land or? No. It was already town owned. Wow. That's a lucky situation.
So anyway, I happened upon it going out to dinner with my daughter and I took some pictures and then I downloaded some.
So, um, as we start on this, I mean, that's a fine thing to do if we want to put design guidelines into the Bible. Hmm. Um, so that's just a question whether we do or don't something to think about. Well, if we do, then if, if you guys are already working on it in design review, you could just start from there. Yeah. And, and some of that is already in the existing design review guidelines that they're, you know, you're not supposed to have an unbroken face and all that kind of stuff. So. And we did that with the MBTA. Yeah. And tried not to be too restrictive. Yeah.
Okay. Um, so again, for our next meeting, it will be, uh, the Carroll school and minutes and a little more route 20. Um, and is there anything else that you people want to have on an agenda?
I think that is enough for one meeting though. Yeah. What's our next meeting? The, um, it's a week. March. Yeah. Two weeks. Yeah. March the 25th.
Um, we were talking about Robert and I went to schedule the, um, select men's zoning article. Um, and because he needs, we need to have two weeks advance notice, and then we also have to get it into the newspaper. Um, earliest that we thought we could do it would be April the 15th. Currently on April the 15th, what we have is, uh, voting on the Carroll school decision, which will have been drafted before, hopefully, as long as we stick to this schedule. Um, and, uh, then the decision has to be filed. We will be filed on April the 17th so that we will be running again, flat out. Uh, so we don't have to have the hearing for the, uh, select words article. Then we could even do it later than that. Uh, and it just depends on what you guys want to do in an evening. I was reluctant to have an extra meeting for it because we've been doing that all year. Yeah.
And I mean, do we think that there's going to be a lot of public interest or comment in this article? I have no idea. Um, it's being proposed because there were people who asked for it. Right. The, uh, what's the name? Uh, the school, the first school. Yeah. Veritas. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Um, and if we did do it, I would probably do that first and then do the Carroll school afterwards, or we could do it on the 29th town meeting begins on May the 4th in order to, for anyone to vote on it, we have to, uh, the requirements are within 65 days of receiving the proposal. We have to have a hearing and then within 25 days or 21 days after the hearing, we have to have a report. Otherwise you can't vote on it at town meeting. So that's a lot to do over the next few meetings. What is the date of a town meeting? May the 4th. May the 4th? Yeah. Okay. And supposedly, uh, all final articles have to be to the select board by March the 11th. So we're going to be beyond that anyway. So I don't know what the program is.
Any thoughts? Whatever you want to do. It's fine with me. Oh, thanks a lot. Okay. Well, Robert and I'll think about what to do.
I'm concerned that the Carroll school might get pushed out and, uh, that we would then be stuck with the Carroll school on the 29th. And at the same time, we would have to, wouldn't have to, but we could, uh, draft our report to town meeting. Um, I know. I mean, it's really a shame. We tried to do everything early this year so that we'd be way ahead of the curve. Yeah.
Um, I just wonder, can, you know, I assume we could start working on our report, at least the part that is our kind of opinion about EE. And then just sort of add to it after the public hearing, but what comes in from the public? We won't even really, well, we could, it would be guessing what we think the thing says. Yeah. Well, but that's all we have. All we can do is guess what it says, because it's not like anybody's got, what we have is what we have to have a public hearing on, right? Yep. Yeah, that's true. So we might as well start drafting our opinion of the, you know, of this article now, and then we can tweak it after we've had a public hearing to add that information. Okay. Well, so that means we're not quite as much up against a wire if we have it later, I guess. Is that true? You agree?
Not leave all the drafting for the end. Yeah. Uh, well, again, if we did it on the 15th, then we'd have to, oh God, what a mess. The report would be on the 29th. If we had the hearing on the 29th, the report would be after town meeting. And like we had called a special meeting at town meeting or something.
Okay. Well, we'll work it out. Okay.
I haven't looked, Robert, at what you had sent us, I think, before you went on vacation. It was the new, um, report from the Carroll School. Have you looked at that at all? Uh, briefly. Is there anything that we need to be focused on in particular? I have to look at it again. Okay. Did anybody else read it yet? No, because I didn't either. Okay. Um, if there's nothing else that anybody wants to talk about or do, uh... Before we adjourn, does it help if I take a stab at drafting that report on EE now, just to rough it out now? Yeah, you can. And I can send you some of the stuff that I've found. Okay. Helpful. If that helps you, I'm willing to do that. That would be great. Okay. Is there anything else anyone wants to speak about?
Oh, the only thing I was going to mention to you guys is I've been having meetings with the new town center owners, and they will likely be coming back to the planning board. And then probably first in the next, like, few months to introduce them, to introduce themself and who they are and what their goals are. And then the future is to potentially, they need to meet to amend either some bylaws or the decision to kind of complete their goals or what they want to do with the town center. So, um, to be determined, but they would like to come to the planning board just to introduce themself. Great. And then they might set up a meeting with them, with Annette first before they do that, just so that Annette can meet with them. But they have some, they have a vision of what they like to accomplish short-term, long-term, in the town center to make it more of a destination of people to go to. So, yeah, we did go, when we were doing the, um, community center council on aging, we did go through the decision and the bylaws because of the kinds of things they wanted to do. So I think I have a pretty good handle on what areas might need to be changed, depending on what they've got in mind. So, yeah, that's all. Have fun with that. I'm curious if they plan to do anything with the MBTA, so.
Robert? Yeah. Yes. So they do plan to do something? Uh, not that I'm aware of that. That's not come up. They know they're aware of it. They know it's on the books.
That's, that I've talked to them about. Do you have bigger issues with Raytheon on connecting to the rail trail or bigger issues with Raytheon on other things? The multifamily, the MBTA overlay. Oh, the multifamily, yeah. I, we, I've not, I've not brought it up because I, but they do know about it. I mean, I brought it up, but they know about, they know about the past history, about the issue, but we've not discussed it. With the MB, with Raytheon and the MBTA. I don't think they try, I don't think that's the, they're trying to buy that, that Apple right now. I think they're trying to, how do they short-term, like, play more of a library community in there. In a long term, maybe a little bit of the MBTA, but that's not their focus right now. As far as I know. Funny, because putting housing in would certainly help. Norma. Help. Yeah.
Oh, well. Would you like a motion to adjourn? I would love one. I move to adjourn. Second. Third. Thank you, Larry. All in favor, Robin Borgestedt. Yes. Larry Kiernan. Yes. Ira Montague. Yes. Jesse Newberry. Yes. Annette Lewis. Yes. Thank you, everyone. Good night, everybody. Bye, everyone. Good night.