Category Archives: Development

Lot 3 on Ice House Road

Posted on May 1, 2014 | 4 comments

Lot 3 on Ice House Road –

TAX RELIEF –
Everyone likes the idea of reducing property taxes, as they should, but I fear that goal may sell  the opportunities at lot 3 short, just because someone has put one particular opportunity so directly in front of the town.  At the moment it an easy path of least resistance to follow up on what has been put so directly in front of the town, and it also mimics what we already did with the Kingsbury Club.  The Economic Development Committee may well feel a mandate now to issue an RFP for uses of lot 3, but to me that is putting the cart before the horse.

MASTER PLAN –
I think a town wide master plan is essential before the town go off in any particular direction on any one piece of land.  We want to first know how lot 3 fits into the town’s overall needs and plans, before we irrevocably commit to any one use of lot 3.

Historically, the town had a narrow focus when it pursued the development of the Kingsbury Club, responding to that owner’s request to site something on that land, rather than first deciding by planning what would be the town’s best use.  The town even gave the Kingsbury Club more land when Kingsbury Club asked for it, apparently without considering what that extra land did to lot 3.  Now Lot 3 is therefore sized such that the current proposal needs to lease land back from the Kingsbury Club to make the project work.  This is due lot 3 having a combination of the 200′ setbacks from the stream on the west side per the Rivers Act, the wetlands, the 150′ setback from the residential zoned lands, and the detention pond. Mike Sullivan told me that there are really only 2-3 usable acres on lot 3.

The problem the Town of Medfield has historically had with doing a master plan is that the town administration has not much believed in its need.  However, that master planning project is on top of my agenda of things to start on now that the annual town meeting (ATM) is behind us.   I fear that it will get delayed because we did not fund the needed consultants at the ATM to do a town wide master plan.  Perhaps we can start with the master plan for the Medfield State Hospital site, and move town wide in a year’s time.

LOT 3’S SITUATION NOW DIFFERS FROM LOT 2 THEN –
Please consider that Lot 3 is also in a much different posture now that the other two adjoining lots have been built out with the Kingsbury Club and The Center, so it is not the same as when the Kingsbury Club was proposing to locate on what was then an undeveloped, roadless gravel pit.

PROPOSED SPORTS COMPLEX –
LARGE BUILDING – With the current iteration of the sports complex proposal for lot 3, I was first struck by it being 50% bigger than Forekicks.

LOTS OF PARKING – Then I noticed the project had 307 parking spaces (about double the existing spaces at the Kingsbury Club and The Center combined) and that struck me as a lot.  I then assumed that was what was probably sized to provide for each shift of users.

VEHICLE TRIPS – In the past I found the traffic at Forekicks in Norfolk both a mad house and a big deal when I used to take Kristen there (and we were always rushing because I was the coach and like almost everyone else we were cutting it close).  I then realized that each parking space really represents two vehicle trips per hour at the turn over time because there is one trip in for people arriving and one trip out for the people who just finished.  So, for the currently proposed  sports complex there are really 600+ vehicle trips on the hour.  By contrast, the traffic study done for the Kingsbury Club, when it was proposed, expected 1200 trips per day, and at times the Kingsbury Club’s traffic seems busy to me.   600 vehicles at each shift change is a lot of traffic to inflict on any neighborhood, and the town needs to seriously factor that adverse neighborhood effect every hour of the day into its decision.

DIRECT ACCESS TO MAIN ROAD – My other random thought about a sports facility in town, now that I appreciate the large number of vehicle trips better, is that if the town were to endorse that use in town, that such a complex would be best located where it had direct access from a major road, such as Rte 27 or Rte 109.

ALTERNATIVES –
The town needs to do something to make lot 3 productive, or at least decide how it fits in with its master plan (perhaps that decision would be to hold the land in reserve for a future school or  town need).  The decision on what to do with lot 3 will now be made initially by the Economic Development Committee, and then by the Board of Selectmen, as will any decision on whether to hold off on doing anything with lot 3 while a master plan is done.

HOUSING – If an RFP is to be pursued before getting a master plan, perhaps if the RFP is broad enough to include all uses, including housing, then perhaps we could at least get some interesting housing concepts to examine from developers.  The land is zoned industrial, but the town can change the zoning if it likes the housing proposals.

Where Ralph Costello has built the paradigm of housing that generates profits to the Town of Medfield, I would hope that Ralph would be interested in sharing with the Economic Development Committee how replicating his development elsewhere in town could be an engine for property tax relief.  I think Ralph told me that he copyrighted the designs they created, just so that they can build it all again.

When the Board of Selectmen wrote the mandate to the Economic Development Committee, it included housing as part of what should be considered.

I have personally concluded, after years of trying to attract businesses to Medfield and hearing that no one wants to locate businesses in town, that housing can and should be the business of Medfield, because people do want to live in Medfield.  We just need to build the right type of housing, like Ralph Costello did at Old Medfield Square that has only one school child in the then twenty-seven occupied units the last time Ralph gave me the figures.  Ralph said the town will be getting $600,000 in property taxes when his Old Medfield Square is fully built out, and if the ratios hold there may be two or three school children at a cost of $12,000 per year each.  Medfield can make lots of money from building the right form of housing.

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Posted in Development

People needed to plan MSH uses

Posted on April 11, 2014 | Comments Off on People needed to plan MSH uses

Now that the town voted to buy the Medfield State Hospital site, the town needs to plan what to do with the land.  The Board of Selectmen will soon be creating a committee to do that planning work for the MSH site.  If anyone has an interest in working on that committee, they should submit their interest and relevant credentials to the Board of Selectmen as soon as possible.

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Posted in Development, Medfield State Hospital, Planning

MAPC housing study

Posted on January 17, 2014 | Comments Off on MAPC housing study

The Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) is our regional planning agency, and the MAPC has released a study about our area’s expected changes over the next several decades.  Medfield is not projected to add much in the way of housing units.  What did interest me most was

  • Medfield is not expected to add housing units, and may even lose some, despite the region needing to add 400,000 units;
  • Medfield was rated in the highest category for household size, but even we are expected to drop in size to 2040; and
  • generally the sort of units needed will change with more units needed for smaller households.

The need for all those new housing units may indicate an opportunity for the Medfield State Hospital site.  The following is from the introduction to the study –

New projections describe the challenges facing Metro Boston

To help the region and its communities plan for a changing and uncertain future, MAPC has prepared projections of population change, household growth, and housing demand for Metro Boston and its municipalities. The projections confirm that the aging and retirement of the Baby Boomers will have profound implications for the region, and that our economic future depends on attracting more young workers. More than 400,000 new housing units–mostly multifamily, and mostly in urban areas–will be needed by the year 2040 if the region is to keep growing its economic base.

LINK TO THE STUDY

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Posted in Development, Medfield State Hospital, Planning

MSH visioning

Posted on January 15, 2014 | Comments Off on MSH visioning

Last Saturday the State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) held a visioning session to engage residents in a discussion about the future of the Medfield State Hospital.  Attached is the Agenda and Handout from that session.  The session was spectacularly successful, far exceeding my expectations.  There were many, many ideas floated and discussed, and the final report should make for fascinating reading.  These were my favorite take aways  –

  • per DCAMM, demolishing the building would run the town $11-14 per sq. ft. (all in) and there are about 658,000 sq. ft. of building, so $724K to $921K for the town to demolish all the buildings, including all costs.  Demolition would be cheaper if as planned it was done by the developer, who does not pay prevailing wages.  Everyone agrees the Lee Building should be saved.  The rest could be saved, but probably only at such high costs that Medfield residents will be unlikely to want to pay to save them, as residents would have to do via property tax increases
  • housing for older residents was a common theme
  • much open green space was a common theme, especially the square in the midst of the campus development.
  • include an outdoor public amphitheater – I suggest we locate the gazebo in Medfield at the back of the property so that the guests would actually be seated in the Dover on land that will not otherwise be used
  • Tom Sweeney’s idea to relocate Hospital Road to where it was formerly located (the current access road to McCarthy Park), so as to enlarge the grass expanse and vista at the front of the site

Below is the preliminary report on Saturday from SHAC visioning subcommittee member Ros Smythe, one of the primary planners of the event –

=======================

Visioning Session write up

 

Over 100 residents, including Medfield Selectmen and the Town Manager, and State Senator James Timilty, attended a Visioning Session hosted by the State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) on Saturday, January 11 from 10 AM to 3 PM.   The purpose of the meeting was to educate townspeople on the issues and opportunities surrounding the potential $3.1 million purchase of approximately 137 acres of the hospital property, and to hear what the participants envision for the use of the land, if purchased.  Professional consultants, Ted Brovitz of Howard/Stein-Hudson Associates and Peter Flinker of Dodson and Flinker ran the session.

 

The morning was comprised of many presentations about different aspects of the history of the property, the condition of the land and buildings, and current considerations regarding the possible purchase of the property.  Participants formed into break-out groups in which they voiced the issues and opportunities they saw regarding the possible purchase of the land.  The overriding and major opportunity identified was the Town’s ability to control the re-use of the property.

The major issue was the uncertainty over additional costs to the Town beyond the purchase price.  The main expenses identified were: renovation or demolition of the structures; asbestos and lead paint removal; and maintenance and security costs until disposition.

 

The afternoon was devoted to scenario-building and at the end of the session each group presented a “vision” for the property, if purchased by the Town.  Although every plan was different. some common ideas were apparent. Consistent themes were: a Park and Recreation building on the approximately 37 acre sledding hill parcel; a desire to keep the view across the sledding hill as open space; height limitations of any reuse to allow the continued appreciation of the natural setting; the use of legislation to guarantee that the parcels adjacent to the core campus, which are to be retained by the State, remain as open space in perpetuity; paths and walkways throughout the whole parcel allowing connectivity between the various parcels of land and to adjacent open space properties;  maintaining the core campus village square feel; the development of a community space, utilizing the Chapel Building if suitable, for cultural activities; development of some commercial/professional space; and, fulfillment of 40B housing requirements and construction of “empty nester” homes through a mixed use development.

 

The SHAC would like to thank all the participants who attended the session.  We are grateful for your time and thoughtful comments.

 

For more information regarding the Medfield State Hospital, please go to mshvision.net or www.facebook.com/MSHVision.

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Posted in Development, Medfield State Hospital, Open space, Planning

POCKET PARK NAMING CONTEST

Posted on January 15, 2014 | 3 comments
This from Jean Mineo –
POCKET PARK NAMING CONTEST
Deadline: Thursday Jan. 23, 2014 at 5 pm
The Town of Medfield owns a small 5,352 square foot parcel of land between Zebra’s and Starbuck’s that has affectionately been called the Pocket Park for lack of an official name. The Pocket Park Steering Committee was appointed in Oct. 2013 to initiate a public planning process to both propose a design for the park and establish its name.
Naming Contest
Medfield residents are invited to vote on, or propose, a name for the Pocket Park by completing an on-line survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/PocketPark
History of the site is included in the short survey.
As an added incentive, Woodland Theater has generously donated two tickets to a Jan. 24 – 26 performance of Spelling Bee, one of Broadway’s most buzzed about Tony award winning musicals. The winner for the tickets will be selected at random from among all entries. The performance takes place in the Lowell Mason Theatre at the Medfield High School and additional tickets may be purchased at www.Woodland-Theatre.com.
The Pocket Park Steering Committee will select the name from among the entries and forward for approval at Town Meeting. Thank you for participating in this exciting opportunity to name our Pocket Park!
For questions or more information, please email JeanMineo@aol.com

3 Comments

Posted in Cultural, Development, Downtown, Open space

MSH visioning this Sat.

Posted on January 8, 2014 | Comments Off on MSH visioning this Sat.

The town’s State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) is holding a public visioning session this coming Saturday from 10 AM to 3 PM at The Center, to get input from all residents about what to do with the Medfield State Hospital site.  There will be a special town meeting (STM) in February or March for the town to decide whether to buy the MSH site for the $3.1 m. price the selectmen recently struck with DCAMM, so all residents are encouraged to attend to learn more and to give the town the benefit of their thoughts.

Buying the MSH site allows the town to control the ultimate uses of the site, and DCAMM has offered easy financial terms – they will finance the purchase over ten years, so that we only need to pay $310,000 per year.  In a worse case situation, the town would have to pay about $10 m. to demolish all the buildings, but it would be preferable to develop the core campus and have the developer do the demolitions, where they can do it less expensively since they do not have to follow prevailing wage law requirements so they can do it cheaper.

The scenario and time constraints are such that the town will need to first make the decision to buy, before the town can decide upon the ultimate uses of the land.  This inverted process results because:

  • the town would like to respond to the pending purchase opportunity before Governor Patrick and his administration leave office in a year (when that opportunity may disappear),
  • the required special legislation will need to be crafted and passed by July when the legislative session ends.
  • Semator Timilty opines that the legislation will need to be submitted by April to have any chance at passage in the legislature by July, and
  • the town has to have made the decision to buy the MSH site at the special town meeting (in February or March) before the legislature will even consider that needed legislation.

Hence the need to have a special town meeting (STM) in the next two months.

POSSIBLE USES

The SHAC recently circulated a survey to the residents, and got 258 responses.  The most popular suggested uses were for open spaces, trails, recreation, farming, and housing, more or less in that order.  The good news is that the site is sufficiently large that all of those uses can be accommodated along with the development that will provide the appropriate economic returns to the town.

OPEN SPACES & TRAILS – The town would be buying 134 acres that is surrounded by hundreds of other acres of land that is currently open space and will continue to be open space.  Those other lands that the town will not purchase contain many fields and trails that will continue to be open to the public to use, just as they are now.  All the lands along the river and the large fields to the east and west of the MSH buildings will continue to be public lands, open to all, just as now.

The 134 acres being bought by the town consists of two parcels, the 40 acres that surround the sledding hill and the 94 acres where the buildings are currently located.  While there are 40 acres around the sledding hill, only twelve of those acres on that side of Hospital Road will be able to be developed, due to state restrictions against development of lands containing agricultural soils.  Hence, 28 acres on that side of Hospital Road will not be developed and will remain open land.

I can today go out the door of my house (adjoining the MSH area) and jog or cross country ski for miles and hours, without ever being on roads, except to cross them, and there is so much open spaces in the area that fact will not change.

FARM – DCAMM has indicated that the town can discuss with the state’s Dept. of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), the state entity that will acquire ownership and control of the fields to the east and west of the MSH buildings, about farm and/or CSA use of those lands.  I personally like exploring having a farm and/or a CSA operation in town, and I think the DCR lands at the MSH could be an excellent location, just as the town’s Holmquist lands would be as well.

RECREATION – As noted above, there will always be much open space available for passive recreation uses in that general vicinity.  The town can also opt to have any of the rest of the lands it buys made available for recreational uses.  One of the suggestions for development at the site is as a regional recreational facility.

HOUSING – There should be plenty of land on which to develop housing of the sort that is lacking and therefore needed in town, housing that which will not entail large municipal costs, such as housing for the elderly, housing for empty nesters, and/or dense developments such as Olde Medfield Square which has only one school child in its first 27 occupied units.

I have suggested that the town should develop a master plan to look at all our options for locating affordable housing and other town needs throughout the town, and I hope that we can integrate the MSH site into a town-wide plan that addresses all our future needs in a well thought out and integrated manner.  Planning the development at the MSH could then become part of our plan for the development of all the rest of the town.

Bill Massaro has been a close follower of and participant in the MSH clean up and development process.  His email this week does a nice job of summarizing our current situation –

=======================================
Sent: Saturday, January 4, 2014 7:15:34 PM
Subject: State Hospital Property Reuse Visioning Workshop 1-11-14 : What Would You Like To See There?

 Hi Everyone,

Because of your continuing  concern and support,  after 5 years of struggles we were able to reach agreement with DCAMM on the cleanup and restoration  of  the 100-year old hazardous landfill  alongside and in the Charles River at the former State Hospital.

So 2013 will be remembered as the year we not only protected the Town’s main well, but  left another  priceless gift to the future generations who will  take advantage of the safe recreational opportunities you have made possible, and who will forever appreciate the restored beauty on this stretch of the Charles.

The next few months present us with the opportunity to decide what gift we will leave for future generations on the rest of the Hospital  property .

After the Hospital closed  in 2003, DCAMM’s refusal to sell any of the property to the Town led to the 2008 Legislation authorizing  2 parcels for Developer sale and their reuse for 440 housing units.

As part of the new cooperative relationship, the current administration at DCAMM has offered to sell these 2 parcels to the Town.  The Board of Selectmen have accepted DCAMM’s offer and have begun defining a detailed purchase and sale agreement, and sometime within the next few months a Special Town meeting will be called to give residents the opportunity to approve or reject the purchase.

On Saturday January 11 at 10:00 a.m. at the Center on Ice House Road, the State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) will hold a Visioning Workshop to get your views for potential uses of the property.  SHAC members will first present background information on the parcels  being offered,  provide details on the proposed terms of sale, and provide a summary of recent resident surveys and consultant studies on potential reuse of the property.

You will then have the opportunity in small break-out groups to discuss issues and opportunities.  Lunch will be provided and afterwards you can join in developing  scenarios for alternative future use of the property.

The attached invitation  provides additional information on the meeting time and a link for further information.

This meeting will give you the opportunity to have your voice heard in deciding how 2014 will be remembered by future Medfield generations.

I hope you can  attend.

The RSVP address is sraposa@medfield.net

Thanks

Bill

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Development, Medfield State Hospital, Nature, Open space, Planning, Select Board matters, Sports, Town Meeting

Survey on MSH

Posted on October 28, 2013 | Comments Off on Survey on MSH

The State Hospital Advisory Committee’s subcommittee on the visioning process has a robust website and has also created and circulated a survey of residents’ desires with respect to the Medfield State Hospital site.

Alec Stevens says that the subcommittee wants people to answer the survey, and have them sign up on facebook or on the mailing list that is on the website so that the subcommittee can get a good contact list established to keep people informed as to the subcommittee’s progress, which they feel will be especially important as they soon get the word out about their visioning session.

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Posted in Development, Medfield State Hospital, Open space, Planning

Election Monday 10/21

Posted on October 17, 2013 | Comments Off on Election Monday 10/21

Medfield has an election this coming Monday, October 21, 2013 to determine  whether to purchase the 31 acre Red Gate Farm property for the price of $1.4 m. that was negotiated by developers with the owner, Robin Kenny.  The purchase passed at the special town meeting (STM) last week, but the purchase only happens if it also has passed at the election ballot on Monday.

I support the town’s purchase, and wanted to explain why.

The town has a right of first refusal to buy the property because of the fact that the property for years paid little real estate taxes because the Kenny family had placed it in G. L. c. 61 designation as forest lands – the state encourages forest holdings by providing for lower real estate taxes.  Then, in exchange for the lower real estate taxes, the town gets a right of first refusal when the property comes out of forestry designation, and that is what is happening now.

The developers have fully permitted a seven lot subdivision on the property.  I find it to be a nicely crafted and a sensitive development, but I have decided that the town will be better served by buying the property for the following reasons:

  • town residents will get greater rights of access to the whole 31 acres if the town owns the land, than if we only have the right of way across the land.
  • it is more important to me that the town own and control this land where it is adjacent to the 25 acres scout lands to the South.
  • the price seems remarkably reasonable to me, for what the town will get.

However, town ownership does come at a cost, and voters will have to determine for themselves whether they are so interested in the town ownership that they are willing to personally pay, albeit at a great price, to acquire the land.  For me, the benefits outweigh the costs.

I hope that everyone will vote on Monday.

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Posted in Development, Elections, Environmental, Open space

Demo delay on 9 Causeway

Posted on September 20, 2013 | Comments Off on Demo delay on 9 Causeway

From Medfield Historical Commission –

Medfield Historical Commission

Town Hall

Medfield, MA 02052

 

 

 

 

September 18, 2013

 

Mr. John Naff, Building Commissioner

Town Hall

Medfield, MA 02052

 

Dear John:

 

After last night’s hearing and due process, the Medfield Historical Commission is invoking the demolition delay bylaw on a Techbuilt house at 9 Causeway Street owned by Greg Whelan.  The commission finds the house to be a “preferably preserved and historically significant structure.”  Therefore, no demolition permit may be issued for the house, for a period of 18 months, without the commission’s express permission.

 

The house, built about 1958, is one of the few surviving Midcentury Modern houses in Medfield, and it contributes significantly to the small Causeway Lane neighborhood of houses in that general style. Six area residents came to the hearing, and all those who spoke encouraged its preservation.

 

At the hearing, Greg Whelan said he had changed his mind and only wanted to demolish the garage; he’d keep the house and make improvements.  However, the application was to demolish the house, and we adhered to it and invoked the delay.   He said he’d come back with a counter proposal that he hoped we’d view favorably.  There is some chance that the garage was originally a carport (most Techbuilt houses came with carports to keep costs down), but if so, fuzzy or nonexistent records will make it hard to tell when it was enclosed as a garage.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

David F. Temple

 

David F. Temple, Co-Chair

cc: Board of Selectmen

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Posted in Development, History

Roche Bros at Downtown Study Committee

Posted on September 20, 2013 | 2 comments

Roche Bros presented last night to the Downtown Study Committee and immediately following to the Historic District Commission.

I was quite impressed with the answers that I heard at the Downtown Study Committee to the questions that were posed.  There was a combination of real neighborliness, combined with a realism about making a busy store work in their downtown Main Street storefront location.

The facades will look so good, both front and back.  The building renovations will dress up the downtown substantially.  The living wall is still undergoing consideration for the types of plants, the bright green Main Street color scheme is not finalized, and they were open to my suggestion to somehow include a community notice element along the South Street wall, where banners were hung announcing all manner of town events when Lord’s was there.

The best news for me was how respectful and accommodating the real estate facilities person was in trying to both address all concerns and provide logical solutions – refreshing for a developer.

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Posted in Development, Downtown