40Bs

[Tom]

The Sharon Zoning Board of Appeals will open a public hearing at 8 p.m. Wednesday Dec. 6 on a proposal to build 180 apartments in that town on the west side of Route 1 alongside that highway's interchange with Route 95.

Filed under the state's Chapter 40B, the complex would consist of 15 four-story buildings and a clubhouse. It would abut Old Post Road in Walpole and the Walpole Country Club.

Forty five of the units would be subsidized and reserved for households with incomes of 80 percent or less of the metropolitan average. Chapter 40B, the state's anti-snob-zoning law, allows developers to bypass local zoning, most reviews and regulations if they commit that at least 25 percent of their units will be subsidized.

The complex would be built by Simpson Housing of Denver, developer of major housing complexes in cities across the nation. The filer of the application is Sharon-Walpole LLC.

The wooded 19-acre site is bordered by the Herb Chambers Lexus dealership under construction on its north. It's adjacent to land in Sharon on Old Post Road at the Walpole line where a 66-unit 40B complex is planned.

The Simpson filing indicates that there would be a single combined entrance and exit to the 180-unit complex on Route 1 southbound after the loop ramp from Route 1 north and before the off-ramp from I-95 south.

A traffic consultant for Simpson estimates that there would be 86 vehicle trips in and out of the complex at peak hour. Based on records for the past three years, the accident rate is below the state average for similar roadways, according to the consultant.

Several years ago, Mass Highway planned a major rebuild of the interchange to address what its consultant saw as a dangerous weaving situation on Route 1 south created by the I-95 off and on ramps. The project stalled for lack of funds.

The filing says the developer intends to connect to Walpole water and sewer systems.

Because the complex would be entirely rental, all of its 180 units would count toward meeting Sharon's 10 percent subsidized housing goal under Chapter 40B.


-- Tom Glynn

[Tom]

May Town Meeting will be asked by the owners to rezone property to a less restrictive residential category at 156 Baker St., the site of a proposed Chapter 40B complex.

As is standard, the petition by Paul Thurston et al does not indicate whether Town Meeting approval would mean the end of the proposal from Thurston and James Brady for 16 to 20 townhouse units on the seven acres adjacent to the Walpole Country Club.

The property is now zoned Rural, which requires a lot of at least 40,000 square feet for a home. The petition calls for placing the site in Residence B, which requires 20,000-square-foot lots.

Sharon 40B on Route 1
The Sharon Advocate has reported that a 40B proposal for Route 1 at the Route 95 interchange just south of the new Lexus dealership has grown to 204 units.

[Tom]

The planning board voted Feb. 14 to recommend that the May Town Meeting reject an article by the owner of the property at 156 Baker St. to rezone it. The rezoning would mean an end of the effort to build a 40B complex on the lot adjacent to the Walpole Country Club, a lawyer for the owner told the board before the 3-0 vote.

The article submitted by petition of Paul Thurston and others would change the zoning from Rural to Residence B: Rural requires for 40,000 square feet for a building lot; Residence B, 20,000. A single house now occupies the narrow seven-acre lot.

More than 20 neighbors appeared in opposition at the planning board's hearing; speakers said the proposed change would amount to spot zoning, undermine the rural character of the neighborhood, increase an already high danger of accidents on a narrow, winding road and cause water problems.

Ken Fettig and Mark Dalton recalled how in designing the country club and house lots in the 1970s, care was taken to honor the wishes of the Baker family that what had been their farmland retain its rural character.

According to neighbors, a court is to hear next contention by the country club that it owns by adverse possession a strip of property on the site along the fifth fairway that it has maintained it for decades.

Representing the owners, Atty. Richard Gellerman said his client is willing to discuss issues privately with the neighbors. Talks could lead to perhaps no more than two or three more houses than allowed under existing zoning, he said. Neighbors told the board that previous talks, including discussion of a possible purchase, went nowhere.

After hearing neighbor after neighbor maintain that the rezoning is all about private gain, planning board Chairman Jack Conroy asked Gellerman to state what benefit the town would realize if the lot is rezoned.

The attorney said he was reluctant to respond because it would appear threatening, but the benefit, he said, would be a less dense development.

Pressed by Conroy, Gellerman said that if the rezoning is not approved, the effort for a 40B complex will continue.

Sharon 40B
On the other side of the country club, Old Post Road in Sharon, a dispute between the developer of a proposed 66-unit, two-building 40B complex and the town is scheduled for a court hearing in March. At issue is the developer's intent that the buildings not be age-restricted as was originally proposed.

[Tom]

A request by the owners to rezone 156 Baker St. to allow more house lots has been withdrawn by the petitioners, leaving Town Meeting with 11 articles to consider tonight in its second and likely final session.

Among the remaining articles: a petition by Paul Verderber to revise the zoning bylaw to allow an age qualified village in a Rural zone adjacent toa Highway Business zone. The revision would allow an AQV off Pine Street on the east side of Route 1.