The Town has tweeted good news for readers who missed a comment deadline on Park Central. And once again, reader asked me to share upcoming meetings related to the development.
This month, I shared a deadline for comments on the Environmental Impact Report for Park Central. Unfortunately, it was with a day’s notice. Fortunately, the deadline was extended to August 5th. The Town’s tweet directs commenters to email personnel@southboroughma.com.
In related news, Southborough Wicked Local posted developer Bill Depietri’s reaction to a petition to remove the Zoning Board of Appeals Chair Leo Bartolini. Depietri claimed it’s a stall tactic. He said the project is moving at the right pace. And he continues to defend it as not posing safety problems on Flagg and Deerfoot roads.
As Depietri points out, traffic study experts have consistently reported that safety issues are pre-existing and the project won’t make any significant difference. Traffic studies add only two cars per minute in a peak hour. (You can read the story here.)
Multiple engineers have defended that determining traffic patterns based on an extensive database is accurate. Many residents have argued that projecting most traffic to turn towards Route 9 defies their common sense knowledge about how drivers make decisions on those roads.
And some who accept expectations that most drivers from the project will head to the Route 9 side worry that the backup for egress to Route 9 will be much bigger than projected. (After all, two cars per minute = 120 cars in one hour.)
Now, here’s a heads up on the meeting schedule for Park Central. With some agendas yet to be posted, I’m including committee meetings that may/may not touch on the topic:
Board of Selectmen
The board plans to meet August 2nd & 16th. No agendas are posted yet, so Park Central may not be discussed. But the board has been discussing how to handle safety on Flagg & Deerfoot Road. They have also yet to publicly comment on the petition. It’s likely for one of those topics to come up at at least one of these meetings.
[Update – The agenda has been posted for August 2nd and includes an update on Park Central/Flagg Road safety.]
Zoning Board of Appeals – Wednesday, August 17, 7:00 pm @ Town House Hearing Room (The ZBA announced this afternoon that the August 3rd meeting is postponed to August 17th per applicant’s request.)
Conversation Commission – Thursday, August 4, 8:00 pm @ Town House 2nd floor Meeting Room (agenda)
Planning Board – Thursday, August 11 at 7:00 pm and Monday, August 15 @ Town House Hearing Room
The August 11th meeting agenda includes a discussion of the project’s Draft Environmental Impact Report and legal opinion. And at the last hearing on Park Central’s Site Plan Review, the board voted to continue it to August 15th. That agenda is yet to be posted.
Southborough Access Media will most likely broadcast live and post all of these meetings except for the Conservation Commission’s.
As usual, I’ll post next week’s scheduled meetings with agendas on Monday. And you can always check for the official updated meeting schedule on the Town’s website.
Updated (7/28/16 3:30 pm): The August 3rd ZBA meeting has been postponed to August 17th.
Updated (7/31/16 3:45 pm): I updated information on the August 11th Planning Board meeting now that the agenda is posted.
Updated (7/31/16 3:54 pm): Update of Tuesday’s BOS meeting agenda.
