There’s a public meeting at the Newton Senior Center in Newtonville this Thursday June 27 at 7:30 p.m. to discuss the proposed development at Austin Street.
Kathleen Kouril Grieser shares some mighty strong views about this in a letter on Wicked Local. But then again, so does David Ball.
What’s your view?
I think the lot is effectively wasted now for its location and a good development can bring a lot to the area. A good development or should I say developer… Anyway I imagine it will be a bit contentious and that is partly the fault of the public planning process, it could be done better with less anger and heat but we need the state laws to change to encourage use of mediators and consensus builders as a fourth party to residents, developers, and the city.
Should be good though! I plan to advocate for either a deposit to be set aside for a Hubway station or depending on the timeline an actual install of one (not holding my breath on either but one never knows until one asks!)
A Hubway station would be great! Newton needs them.
@John & Matt
Any new Hubway station needs to link to the existing network for the system to work. The closest existing station to Austin St. is the New Balance station on Guest St in Brighton. There would need to be at least one, and probably two, additional stations in between. Candidate sites could include nonantum rd. @ Galen St., Oak Square in Brighton, and Whole Foods in Newtonville.
Hubway would work well with sites in each village, City Hall/Library, perhaps the high schools.
Anyone go to the Austin Street meeting, now that it had no competition with the Engine 6 meeting?
I just went to the Austin St. meeting tonight. It seems that the city has already decided what it will do with the site. I do not support the rush to get this done. I have lived in Newtonville for 16 years, and have seen the heart of Newtonville turn into a national chain and big bank storefront. I think the city including the mayor needs to meet with the residents of Newtonville to hear what we have to say. Is the city more concerned about the revenue than what is best for the neighborhood? What about nonprofit space for music, Newton cultural organizations which are leaving Nevada St.? What about making it all subsidized senior housing? What about a community room/center like the Highlands has? Our community needs more than just green space to come together, especially during winter months. Has anyone considered Co-Housing? This is city land and we should have a say in what goes in there? Is there an organized group of residents trying to get more input into this process? If so, I would like to join it.
Ann, I would suggest you consider a run for Neighborhood counsel or contact Beautiful Newtonville. The latter has been very active in the process I think.
I could only make a small portion of the meeting. It looked packed, and folks seemed mostly focused on the parking aspects. Senior Housing sounds like a great idea, especially since the Senior Center IS RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET IN THE BACK. With a grocery store, commuter line next door, express bus next door, that would seem like an obvious use, especially affordable senior housing. How about a 100% affordable senior housing project? Great for our schools, great location, not high stress on parking.
I think this topic needs a new thread up top consideirng the packed house at the meeting last night.
Ann Duvall, I agree with you on the perception that the city is rushing the process. I was not in favor of the process used, which involves deliberations behind closed doors evaluating each of the proposals and making recommendations to the Mayor. One of the things that did not come out last night was that at least two and perhaps three of the proposals do not even comply with the zoning regulations which the Board of Aldermen adopted specifically for this site. Having chosen to follow a public bidding process, the Mayor will be hard pressed to award the property to any of those bidders.
More importantly, as Chairman of the Land Use Committee, I have overseen public hearings and working sessions on special permits for some of the largest projects in Newton, including Chestnut Hill Square, Chestnut Hill Mall, The Street, and of course Riverside Station. The developer of Austin Street will need a special permit to build a mixed use project on that site. I spent literally hundreds of hours meeting with city, state and federal officials, neighbors, the developers, peer reviewers and others preparing for both the Chestnut Hill Square and Riverside deliberations. CHSq passed unanimously. While I wish I could take the credit, the reason it passed without dissent was because the developer took the time to meet with neighbors, neighborhood organizations, aldermen and city staff to develop and refine the proposal over a period of years based on feedback from the community as well as city and state officials.
The same has been true with Riverside, which began almost 5 years ago with community meetings in Auburndale and Lower Falls. Both proposals went through many iterations before arriving at a final plan which was submitted to the Board of Aldermen for approval. At my insistence, the Board of Aldermen adopted zoning requiring that Riverside’s developers go through a conceptual review and a public hearing prior to filing for a special permit, which resulted in further refinement and improvement of the plans. that conceptual review took place in June of last year. After many months, I believe it is likely that the Board will take a final vote on the Riverside project in early September.
The public needs to know that once a special permit application is filed with the Board of Aldermen, there is only a limited opportunity to further shape the project. As I frequently remind my colleagues, our job is to vote on the project before us, not the one we would have liked to have seen. So I urge Newtonville residents and merchants to advocate for themselves and ask for a process that will give you the opportunity to shape the final proposal before it goes before the Board of Aldermen for a special permit.
As an aside to Ann and fignewtonville, fair housing laws prohibit discrimination based on age or family status and the housing at Austin Street would have to meet certain strict criteria to restrict rentals or ownership to seniors. It is also much harder to successfully market a residential development just for seniors. Several of the developers have targeted younger single people and couples without families as well as as “empty-nesters” who will have more disposable income to spend on local businesses and restaurants, by designing residences that are mostly 1 or 2 bedrooms.
Thanks Ted and others for the input. Can you tell us specifically what the steps are for residents to advocate for changes? I know nothing about this process so I would like to know who, when and where we should contact, so we can have our concerns heard. I understand the developers want to market the rentals to young single people and couples but I know that people with kids will move there because it is such a desired location for schools, services etc. What about housing some Newton nonprofits there who have no place to go due to the renovation of Carr? Can we get a public hearing before this special permit is issued? Last night’s meeting was just a simple presentation with very little public input. People need to get involved! I have written to the mayor and the planning department already.
Ann, I believe that Newtonville will elect its very first area neighborhood council this nexxt village day. You might want to get involved or take your concerns to the area council and have them advocate on behalf of the neighborhood. Obviously, you can always talk to your aldermen from Ward 2, who I know are very responsive.
Ted, senior affordable housing projects happen all the time. The strict criteria you mention are not too steep a climb. Obviously it you don’t meet them, you can’t restrict to senior housing.
Look, it seems like this process has been going on for a LONG time. Ted, the RFP was public and the folks who replied are all public and now even the folks making the advisory decisions to the mayor are public. I was upset that the advisory committee wasn’t public sooner, but at some point I do think that having a development there is a GOOD thing.
That parking lot is underutilized. It would be great to get Newtonville a boost in conjunction with the Walnut Street redo. and the Parking situation can be worked out both during and after construction.
I’m in favor of some of the smaller projects especially. Can you give your opinions of the proposals in front of us.
fignewtonville, if I have learned anything (and I have) in the last 10 years of being an alderman–8 years on the Land Use Committee and 4 years chairing it–it is that until there is an actual development proposal, people tend not to focus on it. The same is true for Austin Street. The fact that redevelopment has been discussed in the abstract for 1 year, 5 years or 10 years doesn’t usually make a difference. By way of example, the T has talked about developing Riverside since 1983 (I saw a law department memo from 1986 saying a development of that parcel was imminent). The current developer inked the lease several years ago, and has gone through a series of proposals until it settled on something far less ambitious–but far more likely to be approved for a special permit–than it had originally planned.
I absolutely want to see something good happen at Austin Street. Talking to people at the Senior Center the other night, most of whom are either residents or merchants in Newtonville, there was a wide disparity in opinions. Some people really wanted the densest proposal which includes 98 housing units. Others wanted to see the bare minimum. Some wanted more parking than any of the proposals included (a minimum number of 85 spaces was part of the RFP) and still others said leave the parking lot alone and talk to Star Market about developing something over the Pike that includes additional parking.
The proposals only recently went on the city website so I have had little time to review them all. And I hesitate to take a position on any of them since one of them may come before the Land Use committee, and the aldermen are supposed to be unbiased, fair and objective and withhold their judgment until after the public hearing, when the public has had a chance to weigh in. That said, there is nothing wrong with an alderman who advises the developer on ways to improve the proposal and mitigate its impact prior to filing for a special permit and holding a public hearing on it.
With respect to senior housing, even if the criteria are met, there is still the issue of whether the developer wants to limit its market to seniors. I have talked to a lot of developers over time who do both affordable and market rate housing and 40Bs and they will tell you that they prefer something more flexible, particularly in the current market for residential development which is still unstable and has not come all the way back to prior levels. They would much prefer a mix.
Hi Everyone,
Please go to this URL… http://tinyurl.com/rejectaustin
I would be very grateful if you would take a look at, and consider signing the Newtonville Trust’s petition against the 6 current development proposals for the Austin St. lot. Many, including some of our alderman, in Newtonville and in Newton generally, believe that the process of declaring this public property surplus and offering it to developers was done without transparency and without sufficient public input. The petition calls for Mayor Warren to reject the current proposals and require the creation of a new RFP designed with public input.
The petition is different from the Newtonville Area Council’s survey (which I urge you to complete as well). The AC’s survey asks the residents of only Newtonville to give their views on the 6 current proposals, and doesn’t include any questions that would allow a respondent to answer that they want to reject all the proposals or that they think the process to date has been flawed.
The survey also includes a biased characterization of renters that could skew results toward a preference for condos, which indicates a lack of understanding of the way Chapter 40B works and impacts communities. Rental units “count” 9 times more than condos in getting to Chapter 40B compliance, so a community that wants to satisfy the state’s 40B affordable housing requirement with the least possible adverse effects in terms of adding density, school overcrowding and taxes, would encourage the creation of Chapter 40B rental units, not condos.
Please send a link to the petition to all your Newton friends, neighbors and networks.
Thank you so much,
Kathleen Kouril Grieser
Newtonville