I took a ride on Monday this week, this time in my car, to pick up supplies at Volante Farms in Needham for this year’s sukkah. Sukkot, the Jewish harvest festival, begins Sunday night, and my family always assembles a sukkah on our back deck. Ancient Israelite farmers lived in such temporary shelters, outside their villages and near their fields, during the fall harvest to help them reap their crops before the advent of the rainy season. Lots of rules govern this structure, but during Covid we have violated a basic one: to put walls on three of four sides. To allow our sukkah to breathe, we have instead left the sides relatively open, with corn stalks forming a symbolic barrier.
Covid Sukkah 2022
Volante Farms, located off Central Avenue a few miles south of Newton, sells corn stalks for our roof (stars must be visible through it), gourds, little pumpkins, colorful peppers, Indian corn, and chrysanthemums: perfect decorations for our New England sukkah. Our frame is already assembled. Once Yom Kippur has passed, we will complete the job.
En route I suffered a moment of sadness. About a half mile from Volante used to stand Owens Poultry, a family farm and store . We often visited it with our kids, now in their thirties, to watch the hens in the coops clucking and poking. We admired the large turkeys nearby, fattening up for Thanksgiving ,and the peacocks strutting about with their fantastic feathers in full display. About a decade ago the farm closed, to be replaced by a large, apparently needed elementary school. “Too bad,” I thought. “My young grandkids would have loved the old poultry farm.”
That afternoon I took another ride, this time on bicycle, down Winchester Street, across the Charles River on Nahanton Street, and back to Upper Falls via Fourth Street, Oak Street, and the Greenway. I had to bike briefly down Highland Avenue/Needham Street before crossing at the light onto Oak Street. Needless to say, the traffic mid-afternoon was intense, two dozen cars or so backing up to the light in both directions. As I waited for the green, I recalled a recent newsletter from the mayor announcing a new housing project on Christina Street near Needham Street, more or less across from the still vacant lot soon to become the Northland project (work seems finally to have started there).
Recall that Northland will contain over 800 units; add to that the 400-plus units of the Christina Street development, and we are looking at loads of automobiles. I know, Needham Street will eventually be redesigned with wonderful bike lanes and, perhaps, a shuttle bus to convey residents to the nearest T-stop. I wholeheartedly support all such efforts, and I also hope that the city will construct a paved path through the Public Works lot on Elliot Street for pedestrians and cyclists to pass between lower Needham Street and the Eliot t-stop (that’s right, different spelling for different historical figures). Still, such an enormous increase in residential units in a small geographical area must inevitably lead to worsening traffic on Needham Street. Here’s hoping that someone in city government has a plan!
A final note: unless I am imagining it, it seems that of late I am passing more and more tear-downs around town, in almost every village. The new structures arising in place of the Capes and Ranches tend to be those “Saint -Tropez” homes with flat roofs and lots of glass. A friend recently offered a reason why these new houses, which often peer over nothing more interesting than the street in front and the neighbors, favor extensive glass doors and windows: glass is cheaper than traditional siding. In any event, these replacement homes will probably cost their new owners twice or three times as much as what they replace. Housing slump or no, the price for living in the Garden City will continue to climb.
As for potential traffic at the foot of Needham Street, one councilor sent the following response, paraphrased here:
Parking spots at those projects will be rented separately from the housing units, i.e. no guaranteed parking spot for residents. Therefore, people who move there will be those who, like the residents of Trio and Austin Street, prefer walking, biking, or taking a shuttle bus.
Just as most of us try to avoid traffic, those who drive will choose off-hours.
From her lips to God’s ears…If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.
I remember when many aldermen said not to worry about the impact of a newly approved Avalon on Needham Street. Next thing you know the student population at Countryside spiked, and the school committee stuck large boxes to the the building that they called “modular classrooms.” That’s what crappy planning will get ya!
Now we’re about to see crappy planning on steroids, with the much larger Northland project. It’s not that I was ever opposed to the redevelopment of the site. I was always very much in favor it. Unfortunately the City Council negotiated a really poor deal for the Special Permit. They got practically nothing from the developer to mitigate the project’s impact on schools. They really settled for pennies on the dollar. They also fell far short on the percentage of affordable housing units that a project of Northland’s magnitude should offer.
More dense development on the horizon in another Newton neighborhood. Neighbors abutting a proposed 244 unit Toll Brothers apartment project, on land around and including the current Sam White & Sons lot, heard tonight via zoom webinar from the law firm representing the builder about proposed plans to rezone the area and build a 6-story apartment building (with 25% of units considered affordable housing.) This proposed project could alter or take out nearly 5 acres of existing conservation land, animal habitat and flood plains between Hagen and Dudley Roads. The proposed project includes an exit directly on to Rt. 9 Eastbound with the potential to create additional traffic at the Hammond Park turnaround, which residents expressed concerns about. Developers indicated they did not have plans to connect Hagen Rd. to the development other than potentially via a pedestrian footpath. With 244 additional housing units, neighbors on the call were concerned that schools in the area may be impacted, though the developers indicated they did not have any studies on those impacts yet. Developers promised to be mindful of the nearby residents whose property lines would be just feet from the proposed development. Many residents shared concerns that such a development taking place essentially in the backyard of a long existing neighborhood community would be disruptive with the potential for ongoing noise and light pollution. One resident expressed concerns that the developer had in the week prior sent crews to photograph individual homes on Olde Field Rd. without notice to the residents creating alarm for families living on the street, even prompting them to call Newton Police. While most neighboring residents expressed concern about potential impacts to quality of life in the tight-knit neighborhood, one resident on the call cheered the proposal for more dense housing units in Newton to alleviate what he and others describe as a local housing shortage. If approved by the city, the project is expected to break ground early next year and be completed in less than 24 months.
Wow! I believe that you are referring to the sand and gravel company fronting Route 9 just beyond the eastbound entry ramp from Parker Street. Many years ago I walked the trail from Brandeis Road, across from Newton South’s main office, through the woods to that spot (and others). Though it was not pristine forest land, it provided a bit of nature between South and the highway.
Too bad that some conservation group didn’t snatch up this land to preserve it in the midst of the current surge in local development. The Vineyard has several nonprofits who do just that- the Martha’s Vineyard Landbank (https://www.mvlandbank.com/) and Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation (https://sheriffsmeadow.org/), to name a few- and by law all new property sales contain a fee or set-aside for preservation. If we don’t take similar steps, then every single inch of open space in the city will soon be paved or occupied, save for parks and the few wetlands remaining. That would be a sad day for me.
The city government needs more money to feed it’s voracious appetite. New construction like these above are the easiest way to feed the beast. I would expect a few crumbs to be spread among the schools and infrastructure. Good luck fighting city hall (and the developers).
The only thing the city cares about is reaping hige tax revenues from these densely overdeveloped projects.