At the end of May the City’s Planning Department launched an extended engagement effort as part of the larger Zoning Redesign project focusing in on Newton’s village centers. Outreach will remain open through the end of September with many ways the Newton community can “share their experiences of and their future visions for their village centers. Your input will help the City of Newton identify areas of research for how to update the zoning for village centers.”
If you are looking for ways to engage, and to read about how things are going so far, check out the Zoning Redesign June Newsletter.
This effort asks us to get out and explore our village centers and support local businesses while having your voice heard. But if you can’t get out, all the materials can be accessed and completed from your home as well. Here are the high-level bullets on ways to engage:
- Fill Out the Online Interactive Forum – Spend as little as a minute to as long as an hour on this onlineinteractive forum – weigh in on others’ statements or submit your own!
- Complete a Vision Kit By Yourself or With Others – Tell us what values should guide village center zoning updates through pictures and stories – either through the mobile or print Vision Kit. And the Vision Kit is now available in Spanish, Russian, and Chinese!
- Participate in Focus Groups for Equitable Engagement – Sign up for the remaining Focus Groups that you may identify with!
- Participate in Economic Development Engagement – Focus groups, in partnership with the Economic Development Commission (EDC), for village center business and property owners
- Explore the History of Newton’s Village Center Development – A panel of Historic Newton and other community members will participate in an open Q & A webinar on August 10th, 2021 at 7:00pm. Register here!
Lastly, the Planning Department has brought on four Newton high schoolers for the summer through the City’s internship program. They will be out and about in and around village centers to speak directly with village center users (shoppers, commuters, employees, business owners, passersby, etc.). So, keep an eye out and be generous with your time as you are going about your day. See some of their recent ideas collected through the Vision Kit on the City’s Instagram, Facebook, or Flickr pages.
Have any questions? You can check the FAQ page or reach out to Planning staff at [email protected].
This is really good and worthwhile and should produce some helpful ideas. I’ve found, though, that it can sometimes be hard for many people not trained in architecture or city planning to conceptualize what they would like or dislike for their village centers beyond generalities. So it might be useful to offer visual representations of straw man proposals on which to comment. For example, imagine presenting one where the Newton Centre parking lot were transformed into 3-4 story housing above with store fronts below, with Langley Road between Centre and Beacon turned into a pedestrian mall. (I’m not advocating here, just giving an example.) In other words, visually test 2 or 3 things out for each village and get reactions.
I submitted a couple vision kits with visuals and commentary but they aren’t there.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cSveXWrtj9pu4f3dqPBfqp3Z1CIBLTwzlxtGBhgEqjM/edit?usp=sharing
Is it my imagination or does the Focus Group Interest form does not include one for white, straight, homeowners ages 36-64? Wonder how much of our population fits that demographic?
Took the Interactive Forum… found the statements leading… but did a bunch anyway.
Ultimately when it comes to Rezoning, I’m standing by the point of view that if we eliminate even one street or home from Single Family Zoning, we should eliminate it throughout all of Newton. It’s all about equity after all, right?
Didn’t we already do this with the Principal group? That was 500000.00 just for Washington Street. Something tells me not to waste my time on this!
One issue is that as of 7/2 only 250 people had responded to the POLIS survey and 100 vision kit were submittaled. I know I submitted two (but it was after 7/2) so that doesn’t reflect 100 unique submitters.
This just doesn’t seem like a very efficient nor representative approach to gaining resident input.
I did attend a meeting where there was tremendous support for putting on a series of “debates” where our City Councilors could debate/advocate for various zoning redesign concepts. These could be done via Zoom to maximize participation. And these need to be done in advance of the Nov elections so people can make informed choices.
How do we make that happen?
Whatever came of Hello Washington Street? Is this part of that??
Rather than having residents respond to random thoughts proposed by participants, why aren’t we having residents react to concepts proposed by the Newton Planning Department?
For example:
1) Should multi-family be allowed across all of Newton? (NOT the same as eliminating Single Family zoning)
2) How do we define a Village Center for zoning purposes? Is it within a 1/2 or 1/4 mile of the Village Center
3) How do we define “Transit-Oriented Development”? Is it within a specific distance of a Commuter Rail, T or Bus Station.? Does it impose restrictions on parking?
So many more questions but we should be directly asking residents
I agree with MaryLee. I’m not so sure how they take these random thoughts and turn it into something meaningful. It seems like a process like this should start listening to people’s thoughts and then turning what is being heard into broad objectives which are then presented to be once again validated vs public support. This mid step would be asking questions like MaryLee is mentioning above. Then they can go further to create specific implementable regulations based on the further understanding of what the people of this a city are actually in support of.
I went through answering these questions and it was not what I expected. I’m also not sure every responder sees the same set of statements. Will the end result truly reflect what people are trying to express?
I think the councilors should fill out the forms. The we elect the councilors we support based on what their vision is. Isn’t that what leadership is? Isn’t that how democracy works?
Forgive me, and I acknowledge that cynicism is cheap, but these extended efforts to solicit residents’ input rarely lead to productive results. Usually, after filling out a questionaire or sticking post-its to discussion boards, I discover in the end that the supposed consensus looks tendentious and one-sided. It might be better to cut to the chase: the powers-that-be could issue their proposals (they probably already exist) and then solicit our feedback. We may not like what they’ve come up with, but at least we haven’t wasted time on a faux open process.
MaryLee, I think the city is in a tough place. Ask for open-ended opinions and get dinged. Ask specific questions, get called on not asking the right ones, or asking leading ones.
Existing mechanisms like surveys aren’t typically great at getting actionable guidance either. Not to pick on you, but I would say your proposed questions are fairly poor ones to ask regular people without context, education and discussion. The definition of a village center is arbitrary unless people know what impact the answer has. “Transit-oriented development” is the same way. Even your “multi-family zoning” question needed to be clarified. And these questions don’t even address the “now and me” vs. “the future, my family, and the next generation of residents” aspect that’s essential to planning.
The vision kit may be an imperfect/incomplete solution to the challenge of soliciting input, but it’s at least a fresh take on it.
We don’t need the “powers that be” to fill out forms or post sticky notes on a board. The city’s Planning Department has come up with revised draft Zoning Ordinance so their vision/proposals is on paper. What we haven’t had is a robust debate and discussion within the City Council who ultimately is the decider.
When the details of the proposals related to “Residential” zoning started to be discussed it was so contentious that it was tabled until next year (conveniently after the Nov election)
It was asserted that they would turn their attention this summer to the proposals for the Village Centers, but there has been no robust debate on that. There was an outreach earlier this year that include three Zoom sessions that seemed to be well attended. A strong theme out of those was we, Newton Residents want a robust debated among those who will ultimately decide (the City Councilors) and that just isn’t happening
I agree with you completely Mike when you say “Not to pick on you, but I would say your proposed questions are fairly poor ones to ask regular people without context, education and discussion.” But that is what was happening earlier this year when people were reacting. My point is that we need the context , education and discussion and that just isn’t happening.
I’m sorry but Village Centers is a distraction… shifting focus away from rezoning overall… and the effort to keep some well heeled neighborhoods single family zoned, while adding more density to neighborhoods that are already dense. But there is hope….
Councilors Lucas and Oliver won by health margins in last Spring’s special election as more moderate voices on the Council. Despite a quiet Spring, lots of new names will be popping up for the Mayoral and Council seats for November. Even Voters for a Vibrant Newton sent out an appeal for donations today in support of “their candidates”. https://www.vibrantnewton.org/about-us.html
Things should get interesting between now and November.
Matt said: “I’m sorry but Village Centers is a distraction… shifting focus away from rezoning overall…”
Village centers are a pivotal piece of rezoning. They represent to commercial and civic cores of our city – past, present, and future. They have the highest population densities in the city. They typically represent the highest concentration of transit nodes. They typically face the greatest parking and congestion issues.
Under Newton’s village model, each village represents a mini main street, bringing the benefits and familiarity of that model closer to many more residents than a single monolithic main street. As such villages are tied widely to identity, sense of place, favorite establishments, and local conveniences.
The vibrancy, appeal, and density of villages are inextricably entwined, and have been as long as there’s been a Newton. Villages are where we are most likely to build some sort of consensus on mixed use development and higher densities.
Why on earth wouldn’t we start with them, or at least make a concerted effort to understand our different views on them? If by “distraction”, you mean “breaking down a contentious issue into smaller pieces so that we might possibly make some progress and engage more people in the discussion”, then well, maybe….
Anybody else get the feeling that this survey and vision kit idea is a way to appease the masses so the Mayor, other city officials, City Councilors and especially developers get to keep on doing whatever they want ?
@Mike “They have the highest population densities in the city”
That really depends upon how you define a Village Center which is the elephant in the room that needs to be debated, defined and resolved. Take Newton Centre. I have always defined it as bordered by the T tracks to the south, the commercial strip along Beacon to the east, the bridge across Centre Street over the tracks to the west and the Pelham and Pleasant Street parking lots to the north.
Based upon that definition, there is very little residential density which I think can and should be addressed by building some housing over retail and perhaps a few small apartment buildings.
However if the definition is expanded to include properties within 1/2 mile of the T station, which is what the state and some City Councilors have advocated, we really need a robust discussion on that.
MaryLee, I agree with you. My statement about “highest population densities in the city” isn’t accurate, at least uniformly. The relationship between villages, density, and proximity is complex.
I wrote a web application that helps visualize the density of different types of addresses in Newton. It’s not perfect (it’s quite sensitive to zooming), and it’s not yet mobile friendly, but it’s interesting:
https://addresses.newtonmoves.org/
Mike the map have the potential to be cool but it renders very blurry on my screen. I use Chrome and IE.Do you recommending viewing it on a different browser?
I’m am also wondering how you are distinguishing between “Residential” and “Apartments” because in my mind apartments are residential, but maybe I am being too literal
This research study by North eastern University is interesting. They claim increase in airbnb rentals can be correlated to violent crime. I believe Newton have pretty tight airbnb restrictions (for now)?
http://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2021/07/23/increases-in-airbnb-listings-linked-to-more-violent-crime-in-boston-neighborhoods-study-suggests
MaryLee, I use the labels for addresses straight from the city’s GIS. Apartments are residential, so that’s why I select them, residential, and mixed addresses together as the default.
The blurriness is from the visualization technique called a heatmap. I will experiment with other techniques as well.
I believe we can thank Councilor Baker for the tight airbnb restrictions – which after that report, I’m glad we have!