The Medford Community Development Board received an update on the Wellington Transformation Study, approved a site plan for a mixed-use building at 360 Salem Street, approved a site plan modification for 10 and 20 Revere Beach Parkway, voted to adopt updated linkage fee rates, and reviewed draft zoning updates for Medford Square.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Good evening, everyone. Welcome to tonight's meeting of the Medford Community Development Board. It's Wednesday, March 18th, 2026, approximately 6.34 PM. My name is Doug Carr. I will call the meeting to order. Let's begin with some obligatory procedural matters. Please know that project materials for all projects before the board can be viewed on the City's website, medfordmass.org. and you go by clicking on the CD board filings under boards, commissions, community development, CD boards filings. For those on Zoom, you can also find the link in the chat. Okay, I'll call the roll call. John Anderson. I think you're muted, John.
Show me. I'm present. Page Buldini.
[Page Buldini]: Present.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina Calagaro.
[John Anderson]: Present. Thank you, John.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Is Ari Goffman Fishman here? Seeing not, uh, and Doug Carr, myself present. Uh, Danielle, can you please introduce any staff at the meeting or on the call?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, I'm here, Danielle Evans, senior planner, along with the director of planning and development sustainability, Alicia Hunt. our graduate student intern, Christian Zepeda-Lepofsky, and we also have our economic development planner, Kayla Meros.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Danielle. I'm just going to briefly outline what we're going to be covering tonight. We're going to start with the Wellington Transformation Study update. Then we'll continue the public hearing for 360 Salem Street. And then we're going to move on. That's the second item. The third item is the modification to site plan approval for 10 and 20 River Beach Parkway, which has a redesign. Then we'll talk about linkage fee rates. And we'll also talk about a working session with the Medford Square District proposed zoning. That is not a public hearing. That's just an internal conversation to follow up on the latest and greatest, and then we'll do minutes in adjournment. So let's go straight to the Wellington Transformation Study Update. The project team, agency, landscape, and planning previously presented this to this board on October 15th of last year. We're excited to hear the updates on the study thus far. Alicia or Danielle, would you like to give any introductory comments before we move into the presentation?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So this was a study. Just to be clear, we got funding from the Massachusetts Gaming Commission to fund the study. So if you notice comments about relationship to the casino at all, it's because that's part of the requirement of the funder. But this study was to look at this area, this part of Medford, and to make recommendations, to analyze it, and agency landscape can better present it than I can. But a lot of this was around providing some background on economic development and background on zoning for the city.
So I think unless Kayla, I've also made Kayla our economic development planner. She's been the project manager on this. I've made her a co-host. Kayla, if you do want to make any comments, you're welcome to raise your hand or unmute. But otherwise, Rihanna and Justina, I'll turn it over to you. Tell me who's going to share your screen. Kayla? I'm all set. Thanks for the introduction. I'm happy to turn it over to agency. Okay, great.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Go ahead, Rihanna. Can you?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: All right, is Justina's going to share, then I'm going to make her a co-host. We can't just allow, when people request ability to share, it actually gives everybody in the call the ability to share. Sorry about that. I love that security.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I've learned that, so. I can go ahead and get started. Doug Community Development Board really greatly appreciate you all taking the time to have this conversation together with us. about the Wellington Transformation Study. So we're just going to dive right into it. We've tried to summarize a lot of deeper dives that we've been doing over the past few months into the slide deck. So if any questions come up, please just let us know if anything's unclear and we'll try to answer it. This slide should be familiar as the kind of like the impetus or the scope of the work that we want to do. So the Medford Comprehensive Plan articulated a desire to make recommendations for the future of the Wellington neighborhood, and we'll show you what the Wellington neighborhood is in a moment. But first, the purpose of the study is going to be to guide the future of the neighborhood, especially as communities change, as development interest varies, and as regional trends evolve. We have been working together with the community, with key stakeholders, in focused interviews, in public workshops as well as with you all and with city leadership to understand those needs and then also to to start to craft what we think are some initial strategies. And then last but certainly not least, and the majority of what we're actually going to talk about today, is how we're starting to integrate land use considerations, economic development considerations, fiscal impact understanding, as well as mobility into a unified plan for a connected and thriving neighborhood.
So we won't spend too much time on this slide, but we are at the tail end of the study where we have essentially kind of a draft of where we're headed and a couple scenarios that we want to put past you all to help guide us towards one future approach. And we'll be assembling that into a document, into a final report, hopefully before end of May, beginning of the summer. But we'll be meeting with city council in a few weeks as well, just to share a lot of what we're sharing here today.
Also, I think as you all already know, our team is made up of a variety of technical experts. Our office, Agency Landscape and Planning, led the Medford Comprehensive Plan in collaboration with Alicia's team. We're joined by Innes Associates, who's been doing a lot of, they actually worked with us on the Medford Comprehensive Plan and have been doing a lot of zoning and land use work together with the city, throughout the city. We also are working together with Bowman on transportation planning. They've done work regionally and also within Medford to craft mobility strategies, as well as RKG. So RKG has been digging into fiscal impact and economic development.
Tonight, where we want your eyes and where we want your heads are in three places. First, we want you to remind yourselves of your experience in the Wellington neighborhood. Wear the hats that you wear as board leaders. Second, we really want to get your thoughts on what we're starting to craft around these future land use scenarios. You'll see that they are very much at opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of what can happen. And it's not a conversation about one versus another. It's really a conversation about the merits of each that will help us to get to one scenario, one map, and one mix of uses and experiences. And then third, we'd like for your thoughts on some initial ideas around design guidance. So how do we make sure that what it is that we are articulating from a land use perspective is also something that we can share with developers, with property owners to ensure that the character of the neighborhood matches and is informed by community aspirations.
So with that, Justyna and I are going to present in two parts. Justyna is going to kick us off with understanding today. Just briefly bring you all up to speed to what we've been doing since October. And then I'm going to talk more about planning for tomorrow. So what does that mean? What does our analysis, what do our conversations with community, with you all mean for our next steps?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Great, thanks Rhi. And so understanding today we're going to start off with a map, of course we love maps at agency. And this is a map of the study area, so the Wellington neighborhood, which I'm sure most of you are familiar with has this funny kind of dumbbell shape with the Wellington circle at the center of it on the West side, yep, the west side are these large lots, a lot of strip malls, a lot of grocery stores, your Stop and Shop, your Wegmans. And then on the right side, on the east side, we have Station Landing and Wellington Station, of course, as well as the office campus up here. So the current state of the, oops, sorry about that, So as you know, a lot of this is commercial right now. A lot of it is industrial. There's a wide range of land use types. But there's also these edges where there is interaction with residential neighborhoods. So around Harris Park to the west also are primarily residential. And so we're really thinking about how do these areas interact with one another? What are those transitions like? And how can we plan for the future of this area?
So, in order to do that, we want to understand first Medford-Ed Declarence. And if these slides seem familiar to you, it's because it's a very brief recap of the presentation that we did for you all in October. Just want to make sure everyone's at the level playing field so we all have the same set of information going into the rest of this. So at a glance, Medford, one out of three residents identifies as people of color. There has been a surge of 25 to 34-year-old young professionals in recent years, especially since 2020. With that, there's also a decrease in household size and an increase in higher earning households. And so these are the rough demographics of folks that we're seeing in the city, but also in the neighborhood.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Justina, can I interrupt you for one quick question? Yeah, of course. For some reason, the screen is jumping for me. Is it jumping for others? It is. OK. Do you mind unsharing and then resharing again? Oh, no. I'm sorry about that. OK. Let me try again. It's a fun experience to try to read the text on the slide while also having it jump around. So I apologize, everyone. How's that?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Looks solid. Yeah. Okay. Oh, weird. Sorry. It's okay. Okay, so these are the demographics. And now we're going to move on to, we did an existing conditions analysis back in the fall and shared that with you. And these are the high level takeaways for key opportunities in four different topic areas. And so you'll see that these topic areas kind of flow throughout. The first is economic development. There is a need to encourage growth of industry sectors that are unique to Medford and that Wellington is uniquely positioned to support. On the land use front, there's a lot of opportunity to partner to support a balance of housing and jobs that creates a more complete neighborhood. On the mobility front, making every method of movement around the neighborhood as safe and accessible is one of the key priorities. And you'll see that when I go into engagement takeaways as well in the next section. And on the topic of vibrancy and comfort, we are really seeking to leverage Wellington's proximity to Mystic River, surrounding nature experiences, the Orange Line, and new retail and housing development.
So we shared that all with the community back in November and had an open house and asked folks for their priorities on these four different topic areas. And so if you're there, you'll remember that there was a little game board with that map and around the edges, we asked for you to put either marbles or pom poms in 16 across 16 different topics, elements, so to speak, and and tell us what your priorities were. And so, across the board, we saw that vibrancy and comfort was highly prioritized by Metro investments.
And mobility was close in second place. People really want to make it easier to get to, from, and around Wellington. When you dive deeper into the numbers, you'll see that safe routes for walking and biking was ranked number one overall. So 37 people voted for this one. In second place was access to green space. And in third was connection to the Mystic and Malden River. So there's really a desire for Connections, not just how to connect, but where to connect. And then ranked fifth was housing, including market and affordable. So it's not just about the place that you live. It's not just about the environment that you're living in, but also where you're living and making sure that people can afford that.
And so from then, this is new content now, we dive into a market analysis. And this section, I'll go through three different slides. And we're really thinking about the current realities of the market, what has been happening and what's currently happening, how that impacts near term opportunities for the market and for land use, and then long term opportunities. And so all of this was fed into the scenarios and you'll see that reflected later on when Rhiannon goes through that.
So currently. Home prices are really high. There are fewer homes available for sale, high interest rates and reduced turnover. And in general, Medford home prices are higher than regional averages. There's also strong job access. Medford has really strong job sectors in educational services and healthcare and social assistance. And so these have proven to be really stable. But life sciences market has cooled. The market expanded too quickly regionally, and there is not really a desire for that anymore, except in a few key areas.
And so what that means for near-term possibilities, what can happen more more immediately in the future is multifamily rental. There is a strong demand and limited supply of homes and so those are now unattainable for young households, but there's a lot of housing rental supply coming online and units and multifamily rentals are being rented very quickly. And we're expecting to see about 1,000 new units in Wellington alone in 2025 and 2026. On the office market front, there are many limits to that. There's more space than tenants currently need. So tenants have the advantage in lease negotiations. It's not really a desirable place to build. But strong incomes are helping retain helping retail remain stable despite economic uncertainty. But it really depends on the kind of retail. We're not really looking at traditional storefronts, but services and experiences are at the forefront. And that was also reflected in some of that engagement as well.
So then finally, in the long term, we know that rental demand will stay high. Because of limited access to home ownership, it's really sustaining that long-term rental demand in multifamily developments. And you can see in this chart down here where green is owners and blue is renters, there are a lot more renters in recent times than in before 2010. On the industrial, in the industrial market, industrial space remains in demand despite higher than normal vacancies. And so we're looking at specialized and well-located industrial spaces commanding higher rents. And some of that might be for tough tech, where tough tech is defined as companies and industries that make complex physical products like advanced manufacturing, robotics, aerospace. This is a potential long-term growth opportunity, but not a near term driver. of large scale demand. So this is something that we might see more into the future, but not immediately.
Lastly, in the section for understanding today, we have done a transportation study that builds off of the existing conditions analysis, where we're really considering building on top of what those transportation opportunities are. And so currently in Wellington, we're seeing a lot of unbroken arteries, unbroken arterial roads. So there's really strong access for cars, but it poses challenges for navigating within the neighborhood and for other modes like biking and walking. And so a possible future is to break up those big blocks into smaller blocks with additional connection points that can significantly increase mobility and access within the neighborhood. And we're also thinking about connections to those residential areas along the edges of the study area.
One of the benefits of more intersections. So with more intersections, you get more options for getting around. You get lower volume inner streets that are more comfortable and convenient, and there's more opportunities for public life to happen. So not only are you getting places more easily, but it's also a more enjoyable experience. And there are just some examples on the right of what those experiences might look like. And so we have Assembly Row down here in Somerville, which Station Landing also looks very similar to some of that's already happening in Wellington and Mortgage Street in Cambridge.
And what we're really trying to get out here is targeting a mode share shift. And so currently, west of Wellington Circle, 19% of users, of road users, are in non-vehicular modes, meaning that almost four out of five people who get around this area are driving. But east of Langton Circle, we're seeing that 40% of the mode share is for non-vehicular. So about two out of five people are biking or walking or rolling or using public transit east of Langton Circle. And so really trying to up that number across the study area.
And with that, with all that information that I've just thrown at you, I'm going to pass it over to Rhiannon to talk about how we took that information and funneled it into some design guidance and a few training scenarios for your review.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, Justyna. And if it's OK with you, I'll go ahead and share because you're bouncing again. So hopefully I can resolve it. Oh, no, I'm sorry. OK. Go for it. Let's see. OK. All right. Justina, you can see my screen? All right, so I'm going to jump into design guidance. So with all of that information in mind, we want to actually quite quickly jump into some of what this means for what the future of Wellington can be. Justine has shared a little bit of what we're thinking about. But what we would like to do is start to talk about how it comes together. So the first piece that we want to talk about is this idea of design guidance. So what is design guidance? the desired look, feel, and quality of a neighborhood or a district. It is meant to be responsive to not only community engagement and to the needs, wants, and desires by the so many stakeholders that we talk to, but also should be reflective of what zoning supports. It's not required by zoning, But it is meant to provide places that people want to see, that make them feel safe and welcome, while simultaneously also ensuring that it fits within the community fabric, is transformative for the neighborhood, but also is allowed by zoning code.
So we, through a lot of the conversations together with community, some of the guidance that you all provided to us back in October, as well as our work to understand what the possibilities could be, we have five different design guidance buckets that we're starting to assemble design guidance around. The first is to transition building form to relate to the neighborhood. For each of these, we have a slide, we're gonna walk through each one. So that's all about how do we think about all of the development and change that could happen here while simultaneously considering the relationship of the character of the places surrounding it. The second is to really ensure that walkable and rollable connectivity are the priority and that they are the default. I think cars are an important way to get around, but as Justyna shared, there are many folks within this neighborhood that do get around in forms other than by car.
Third, tied to number two, is to manage any vehicular access and conflicts. That is going to have a lot to do with the different types of uses that are allowed here, whether or not it includes industrial, commercial, mixed use, and housing. So all of those different uses need to be able to work together. And we need to ensure that what the design guidance can do is help to manage where those conflicts would otherwise occur. Fourth, it is a moment to really lean into neighborhood wide resilience. As we know, this is a place that does flood, that can continue to see more frequent flooding, especially with larger rain events and storm events. And so want to be thoughtful about making recommendations to developers and to property owners about how to best respond and adapt. And then fifth, as was noted as the priority amongst the public, is this idea of prioritizing vibrancy and comfort, especially as it relates to connectivity to the public realm and to public spaces.
So first transitions, this is where, you know, we think that a lot of investment can happen with regards to, you know, making sure that we are thoughtful about where building heights can step up versus where building heights want to stay the same. And what's actually quite helpful about much of the Wellington neighborhood are the places that do have development capacity, is that they are surrounded by very wide streets. And so it enables us to be thoughtful about stepping building heights up and massing up from residential areas in such a way that it does not create a drawing experience. It does not create significant shadows. Rather, it really leans into a more thoughtful and slower approach to that massing step up. Also, it's a really great way to protect views to the Mystic River, especially along the properties that do generally front on the Mystic. Last, this bucket about transitions can help us to locate taller buildings closest to the Wellington Station where, as Justyna shared with you, you have a lot of folks that do want to live in that space or that otherwise live in that space and take advantage of the station, as well as next to regional roadways that are going to be less impactful in the surrounding neighborhood.
The second design guidance bucket is walkability. There, we think that this is a really nice chance to lean into some of the successes that Medford has had in other recent developments. And those are to create or make continuous accessible sidewalks and protected crossings along key arterials, as shown in this diagram here. It's a moment to provide traffic calming measures, whether those be these kind of curb extension experiences, pedestrian tables like you have close to Wellington, as well as street trees and other things that give you a lot of visuals and keep speeds of traffic down.
The third design guidance bucket is to manage vehicular access. And so this is a nice moment to talk about the curbside space as flexible frontage, prioritizing safe connections, ensuring that we provide clear delineation for public transportation, clear moments and protected moments for bicyclists, as well as curbside management that involves pickup and drop-off zones. And that we do that in such a way that we are prioritizing movement and flexibility over long-term parking along critical streets that want to see that movement.
It also means that we can clearly define where it is that we're expecting people to walk, bike, park, or load in some of our travels and observations and field work in the neighborhood. You know, seeing some of those moments where the sidewalks do literally end, providing those very thoughtful and intentional places to ensure that people know where they're walking, they know where they're not meant to walk, and it provides that clarity and reduces conflict. And then also reducing curb cuts, reducing any turning conflicts along those primary walking routes.
When we talk about resilience there, we're thinking about especially the role of places like the wetland condition that exists on the backside of the various shopping center stores in the Wellington neighborhood now. It's a moment to lean into that as a place that can be a bowl, that can be a a space for providing that really, really critical soft, spongy green infrastructure while also protecting from flooding. So that can happen in places like wetlands and rain gardens. It can happen through street tree infrastructure, permeable surfaces, appropriate stormwater infrastructure as well. And then also in places that you typically think of as being impervious, like parking areas and plazas and streets. Those can be really great ways to help manage stormwater and manage urban heat.
We also, for neighborhood resilience, we think not only about all of the ways that the public realm can support this, but also ways that buildings and site design can anticipate climate risk by putting key pieces of infrastructure, HVAC systems on the tops of buildings, making sure that buildings are above specific flood heights, design flood heights, a lot of that work is already being done along the Boston, within the Boston Harbor. A lot of buildings are being, places like, you know, really important cultural institutions on the Boston Harbor are being redesigned to move their that first floor up. So doing something in advance and being proactive about that investment will be critical here as well. And then also using investments in art and in lighting to both to build social cohesion, but also to create a space that neighbors are better connected and can support one another in times of stress or change, because community is a really critical part of being responsive to climate change.
And then, as the community noted, is really, really critical. We want to prioritize vibrancy in any design guidelines that we share. And so a few strategies that rise to the surface for us include this idea of clustering ground floor uses, clustering plazas along key walking routes, as well as breaking down large blocks. As Justyna shared previously, it's really jarring to see just how little porosity and how little connectivity there exists in the Wellington neighborhood today. It came out in a lot of conversations and focus groups with residents and with neighbors to the neighborhood as being barriers to them being able to, you know, get from one place to another. And so increasing, you know, mid-block crossings, increasing passageways and pedestrian connections to their destinations is one really great way to help make places more vibrant, make them more connected. And then when we think about view corridors and when we think about how we design streets to really relate to these really important and critical parks and other infrastructure in the neighborhood, we can design streets to be more of those social spaces, that they have those clear, safe connections to important park spaces, that they're well-lit, that they're comfortable. And we can also really look to the Mystic River edge as a front porch rather than as this back of house space, as I think it's been treated as for a long time. And so we can treat Mystic River as an important edge, really think about connecting onto it, relating to it, and taking advantage of new corridors there.
So when we think about design guidance, we also ask the question of how do we, this is great, but how do we implement it? Design guidance is, it is exactly what it says it is. It is not policy, but it can relate to policy. And so, I think first, one really critical way of thinking about implementation is to consider how any standards or how design guidance can be applied. across a neighborhood or across the city, as well as as it relates to different land uses. And so you might in a mixed use neighborhood porosity might be a good thing and having smaller block sizes can be really beneficial in more industrial land use considerations. We actually Want to have those bigger blocks and so making other investments that reduce the kind of scale of their buildings with you know things like murals lighting trees also being really really thoughtful about those few corridors to ensure that trucks have a very clear. VISTA, so that there aren't pedestrian conflicts, I think is another really critical thing to think about. And so those standards could be umbrella, but then you also might want to think about standards that are, or guidance that is more specific to different uses. Second, when we think about implementation, We want to make sure that we confirm whether or not this guidance can be applied across the city, or if it might happen in a specific area. And then third, it is absolutely vital that any guidance aligns with community aspirations and city policy, especially the zoning code. Much of what we've shared in the slides previous to this do relate to the zoning code or supported by the zoning code, but just something that we have to make sure that we do before these guidance are shared with property owners I think will be critical. All right, so we're going to talk a little bit more about how the market analysis is informing our understanding of fiscal impact. So first I want to just start by talking about money, which is my least favorite thing to talk about in my household. But if we think about the city as a household, the city, just like a household, brings in money and it has costs, it spends money. And so cities, just like Medford, they bring in money through things like local taxes, fees, and other payments. So revenue sources in Medford include various taxes, like hotel taxes, key taxes. They include things like excise taxes, like you pay excise taxes for your car, for example. And the largest portion of where the city gets its revenues from are property taxes. And property taxes are not just residential property taxes, but also commercial, industrial, and other types of property.
Cities spend that money by providing municipal services for residents like public safety, police, education, our schools, public works and governance. And so some of the costs that we know of from Medford and the general breakdown of those costs, about 50% are for education, about a quarter are for benefits and to insurance, and then a quarter is for other city services. So the reason that I'm sharing that with you is because those two pieces of information go into what's called a fiscal impact analysis. And so we worked with RKG to assemble that fiscal impact analysis to share with you all. The fiscal impact analysis is essentially, it takes what the city makes and subtracts the costs to the city. And that final number is the fiscal impact of any development.
when a new development comes online, there will be money that the city makes off of that new development. It could be, you know, it could be impact fees. It's property taxes when that building goes online. And then depending on what that building is used for, it relates to city services in different ways. And so if you're developing housing, there's an impact or a cost to the schools. If you are developing things like industrial or offices, they are still just like housing. They are taking advantage of city services like police, like various administrative offices. And so the revenues to the city minus the cost to the city are what the impact, the fiscal impact of any type of development will be.
So what we did was we looked at all of the different types of land uses or all of the different types of development that could occur in Medford. We looked at the revenue in green. We looked at the costs of each of those different types in red. And then importantly, we subtracted the costs from the revenue to get what's called the net impact. You definitely want a positive, right, because you want to be making money from the various different types of development that do occur. But there are different levels of money that is made and different costs and revenues that impact based on what development you are going about. So importantly, this is only looking at estimated, these are looking at, they're assuming full occupancy and use. So what's critical to know is that currently Medford does have office vacancy and has industrial vacancy and life science vacancy, some retail vacancy. And so that drives down some of this, but philosophically, On its face, this is what you can understand is the relationship of any one of these different types of land uses as a fiscal impact to the city. And Dina, you have your hand up.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes, I didn't notice educational because educational was one of the big buckets that you had for land use.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes, that educational is not listed in this list.
[Dina Caloggero]: What were you looking for? Sorry. Because if you consider the educational use, there wouldn't be much revenue for educational use because of the lack of property taxes paid. Is that correct? Yes, that is correct.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: So that should be included in here. OK, that sounds good. We can definitely include that. I'll note that we did not include it because we did not include education uses as potential land uses for the Wellington land use scenarios. But we can definitely include it, especially if that's something you all want to consider as part of the future of the area. But you're right, it does, it effectively has, the net impact is a loss for education.
John, do you have a question?
[John Anderson]: Yes. Can you hear me? Yes. We can. Oh, good. I really appreciate the fact that you're doing a fiscal analysis That's something that's really quite useful. When you show the overall budget and expenses, how does state aid factor into that? For example, when you show education as being 50%, is that include state aid? How is state aid figured into that?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes, that is a good question. So Justina, you can tell me if this is incorrect, but I think we didn't include state aid because for the, at least for the purposes of this study, we were trying to understand kind of like what are the kind of like long-term continuous sustainable forms of funding that the city of Medford takes on. We looked purely at revenue from a like, what, if you think about Medford almost as a business, like what is it bringing in from that perspective, less so as like from a perspective of grants, but Justina, would you add anything to that?
[John Anderson]: Okay, if I can sharpen my question just a little bit. So for example, sources for Medford income, there's no state aid in there at all, right? Correct. That's okay, okay. And then the costs for Medford, that does not, Does that include or not include the state aid that's, for example, directed to education? Do you follow me?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's a great question. We can circle back to RKG in terms of whether or not that was included. There is, so for the fiscal impact, and I think we can, as part of the study, we'll be sharing a memorandum of what that includes. Alicia, do you have something to add?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah. I have a suspicion, but I'd like you to clarify this with RKG, that when they look at the orange one, they are looking at the city's general fund, and that is things paid for by the general fund, because the green is the things that go into the general fund. So this is going to be not including, and right now it's my assumption, but you can just check this, that this is not including capital sources. Like this doesn't include any grants. that pay for grant funding projects. For example, this project wouldn't show up on the left or the right because the funding is outside of this and the spending is outside of this. So this is the income that comes in that funds our general fund and the money that goes out from the general fund.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: That is my understanding, too. We can double check with RKG, and I'll note, too, that behind these very simple pie charts will be the fiscal impact memorandum, and it includes far more detail than this. We just wanted to make sure we were sharing something that didn't take four hours to get through. But it's a great question and something that we'll follow up on with you all.
[John Anderson]: Well, thank you, Alicia, for bringing that up. Because there are different kinds of grants that are specifically allocated to a specific purpose, which is sort of an extra benefit for Medford, such as this project. But then there are grants, for example, what do they call them, the cherry sheets, the educational aid. If the state didn't provide that, we would have to come up with it. It's not an optional thing. And one other question. When you get down to the slide that shows what kind of buildings contribute to, it would appear that we make money on everything.
That's correct. Everything is net impact. Correct. But if the city of Medford suddenly doubled,
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: That is a great, yeah.
[John Anderson]: Yes. Wouldn't there be a tremendous sort of more streets, all sorts of capital investment that would be required, sewage, everything?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Mm-hmm. Yes, so there are, I think the kind of caveat to this is that it's purely looking at by adding one unit of a single family home, what is the value that that unit of a single family home contributes? But John, to your point about impact on infrastructure, if you bring on a certain number of single family homes or a certain number of condos or multifamily rentals or even offices or industrial spaces, there is a threshold with which you reach that then you would need to build a new building to expand the services that are needed for that particular audience, yes.
[John Anderson]: And the only other comment I would make is that, for example, with condos and multifamily rental, it would also seem to be very important to consider the size of the units. So for example, well, obviously, one bedroom and four Studios have a way different impact than a four-bedroom.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Right, right. And you're pointing to the idea of the relationship to the schools. Yeah. And I'll note, too, that the purpose of this diagram isn't necessarily to just say you will always have a net positive impact. What it's really meant to talk about is what is the scale of impact that it will have on the city, both revenue costs, but also what is the, I think that what we've heard in the October meeting was that housing doesn't contribute to the city of Medford in the same way that office industrial and retail do. And I think that it's a little bit more nuanced than that, that there is value in providing some of these types of uses because they can contribute, it's just what scale do they contribute.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina, you have a question again?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, that's why I would include educational because the title of the slide says fiscally in Medford. It doesn't actually say that specific to the Wellington area because I think this could be applied across Medford. And if you And I'm thinking about educational, and especially in the South Medford Hillside area, about educational purposes. It doesn't produce a lot of revenue that comes into the city based on property taxes, which is a major source of revenue for the city of Medford.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's a great point.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Just a couple of quick questions. To build on something that John Anderson has said in the past, he's been asking almost every time a project comes before us for a fiscal analysis, something along those lines maybe. But per the conversations we've had and the approvals we've had, we rarely get it. It's on our checklist, but we don't actually see it with most applications that come before us. So, I'm just curious if you think that this is a rule of thumb, something that we might be able to use to understand things. Because when I see a single family home in a townhome condo, I get what that is. When I see office, well, what is that? Is that 10,000 square feet? Is that 50,000? I mean, there's a whole scale thing here that for the right side of the bars is unclear. I don't know if it's, again, retail could be 10,000 or 1,000 square feet. The project we have coming up has 500 and change square feet. How does that relate to something versus a Wegmans, for example? I think a little refinement may help us understand this better and make it more useful as a tool to understand.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely. That's great. I think it's a good question for us to have a conversation with RKG about. And then also, Doug, as much as we can support you all in making sure that you can be responsive to any developments that do come online and provide that rule of thumb, I think we'd love to be able to do that.
[Chair Doug Carr]: John, you have another question?
[John Anderson]: Not about this. OK. I'll have some questions at the, another couple of questions at the end. Okay. Keep going. Thank you. Great.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I will keep going.
[John Anderson]: Amazing.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Okay. I'll keep going. All right. So all of that to say that, you know, part of the reason that we brought that up was because what we want to talk about now is how do we think about, um, you know, a, a good mix of, um, of what can happen in Wellington. What we, you know, what we shared is that the, the, the net impact, while it might be greater in, in things like office, life sciences, industrial, there is still opportunity to think about, you know, growing housing to support what we know is a very big housing affordability and housing production need across the state, as well as in Medford. And so What we're gonna share with you are a couple of different responses to the fiscal impact piece through some land use maps. And so this first map is what exists today. Generally, you have about 25% industrial. In Wellington, you have about 37% residential, and you have about 38% commercial.
So the scenarios that we've crafted are really leaning into one versus another thing. So the first really leans into crafting the type of commercial experiences that a lot of your neighbors shared that they'd like to see, as well as responding to what we understand from the market analysis were articulated as destination retail. It still means that there will be a need or a demand for housing and a need or a demand for some industrial spaces. But this is a nice moment to think about what does it mean to really lean into commercial here. The second scenario is to lean into industrial. So you'll see that housing does get bigger, and that's in part because there is, I talk about thresholds, there is only so much industrial that we can build in Wellington based on what we know the market can support. The market can generally support more things like tough tech distribution, the like, less so things like life sciences. And so that is very much captured here. So repurposing a lot of commercial use for more light industrial use, as well as supporting mixed-use housing. And then the third is, what if we go all in on housing? So what does it mean to reduce the amount of commercial that is largely in this area? Again, it's largely that both the strip mall within the neighborhood, as well as a lot of the office spaces that exist just across the street from the Wellington station. And so a really nice moment to think about all three. And so what it will mean for the commercial instance is that we can lean into this idea of, my cursor does not wanna work.
We can lean into the idea of creating more commercial instances within the spaces where the MBTA is considering its fleet management facilities. It means that we can, really respond with more types of ground floor retail, types of destination retail along Fellsway, as well as to preserve a lot of the office uses, but maybe consider ways to maximize and optimize that space for future use. as well as preserving a lot of what exists kind of on the more western side of the Wellington neighborhood with the Wegmans and many of the other spaces in that facility. This is a transformation plan, and so this is looking 10, 20 years into the future. And zoning looks 20, 50 years into the future. And so for the industrial hub, it is a wholesale rethinking of what does it mean to really lean into housing and doing away with some of the commercial there, preserving the industrial that already exists while also shifting a lot of those office spaces that are currently along the river into more industrial types of uses.
And then last but certainly not least, you have the housing hub. So they're really thinking about the long-term use of a lot of the currently industrial spaces in the center of the neighborhood and shifting those into far more housing, as well as shifting office uses into far more housing, too, to relate to and create more transit-oriented development in support of the Wellington Station. So with each of these, we're looking at different scales of how much industrial, commercial, and residential might happen in any given point. And in all of these instances, we preserve the Wellington Station District as it is.
And so a couple of precedents come to mind, a couple of examples of each of these when we think about going all in on commercial and housing. So this is that moment of really leaning into a commercial hub with a lot of destination retail, a lot of restaurants and things that are both community serving but bring folks from outside of the city to the city. We can think of places like Arsenal Yards in Watertown, Massachusetts. I think many of you have likely been there. It both included some adaptive reuse of some larger buildings and more of those industrial spaces, but also included a lot of mixed-use new residential development that does complement a lot of what's already there and ties into the existing neighborhood fabric, which is across the street.
When we think of the idea of having a housing hub, that to us is very much represented by a place like the Airwife district in Cambridge, which is, it surrounds the Airwife station. It's quite public transportation oriented. It's climate resilience focused. It has a wetland anchor at the center of it with boardwalks that surround it that connect into the Minuteman Trail, as well as what otherwise would feel like quite hefty, tall buildings because of just the impact of Route 2 and many roadways that surround it. They don't feel quite as large in scale.
And then this last one is looking into this idea of an industry hub. There we look to a place like what's called Summer Nova and Greentown Labs in Somerville, Massachusetts. There, the city of Somerville has taken You know, many separate property owners have taken a lot of previous industrial spaces distribution stations and buildings and done a really nice job of adaptively reusing those into in dust industrial maker spaces places from employment. food distribution and food incubators, like Aeronaut Brewery, Wild Green Bakehouse, as well as creating innovation spaces that support startups, and doing so in a way that's fun and friendly and doesn't require a ton of investment.
So that would be more of the industrial look. So with that, I know we've gotten through quite a lot of information in a short period of time, but our next steps are to share a lot of this together with the community to get some of their sense of what is really striking to them, what they think is most relatable. We want to solidify the draft design guidance, as well as to propose recommendations about how we should think about zoning and land use.
So I apologize. We were hoping to get through that in 20 minutes. It took us far longer. So thank you for bearing with us as we got through it.
[Chair Doug Carr]: We had some questions. John, we're at the end now. Do you want to chime in with your question now at the end?
[John Anderson]: OK. Thank you. First question is, when you did the visioning session, who were the stakeholders who participated in that? Because, you know, I noticed it's mostly commercial and industrial.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes. So for the visioning sessions, Justyna, do you want to talk a little bit more about? So Justyna can go into the details. We had a public workshop that we called a science fair. It was tied to other plans that were ongoing at the time. So we had a public workshop that engaged a variety of folks, mostly residents. We also had a series of focus group conversations, which included a variety of different audiences and perspectives, including residents. as well as the developer community, various industries and property owners and business owners in the Wellington neighborhood. And then Justina, are there others that I'm missing?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we also had focus group conversations with city staff. So we talked to the traffic and engineering side. We talked to the schools to understand what are constraints on their ends or opportunities.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And I just did want to, you kind of mentioned this, but I wanted to flag, we actually did a targeted reach out and robocall to all the people who live in that Wellington area between Fellsway and the river, basically, all the like house owners. I don't honestly can't remember off the top of my head if we included all the condos, probably we did, because we wanted the people who live while their neighborhood was not part of what was actually studied for change, they're the direct abutters to it. So those people got targeted robocalls inviting them to participate in a focus group with you all, as opposed to a general call to the general public to come to the focus group.
[John Anderson]: It's really great that you did that, Alicia. That was my next question. Did it include, you know, neighborhoods? It obviously did. How many people participated in the sort of charrette visioning?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: That's a great question. Justina, do you know offhand?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, I would say it wasn't so much of a visioning charrette as it was understanding people's hopes for the area, their expectations, and what they thought was possible, given their different perspectives, and also what they really wanted from the neighborhood folks. And so I think, all in all, I don't remember off the top of my head, but I think we've talked probably 25 to 40-ish folks from the neighborhood and maybe like 15, 20 other stakeholders, including city staff.
[John Anderson]: Okay. Thank you. When you talk about worrying about flood heights, what maps were you using? What data were you using? There's the 100-year flood and there's this, there's all sorts of different. Yes.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I think we're using the 1% annual flood chance, so 100-year flood.
[John Anderson]: OK.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: These are all great questions, John. Thank you for asking.
[John Anderson]: Now, the three wonderful projects which you've showed there, am I correct in saying that those were implemented kind of as a big area all at once that the, I guess what I'm saying is, I believe the municipalities were able to somehow pull together a very large parcel.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes. Yep, John, that's correct for the first two. So the Arsenal Yards was, it was already previously a mall, and so it was reconverted in very much the same way that you have the strip mall property that could be converted. Airwife District, I am not exactly positive because I know it was a many, many year process. Right. But we can look into that. And then Supernova is actually, I think it was a unique and very different one in that there was a lot of, the city was much more heavy handed and worked together with many property owners. And so this was a different example that feels a little bit more like the area north of the Wegmans, the kind of like many, the distribution centers and food, making spaces that feels like this instance, whereas the shopping center feels like more like the arsenal yards.
[John Anderson]: Because what I'm getting at is how this would all work. I perhaps I'm wrong. I'd be happy to be corrected. But the parcels you identified at the very beginning for redevelopment along these lines, aren't they considerably smaller? parcels that we identified. Well, you mentioned at the beginning, the very beginning, there was some specific areas that you were you were interested in that you were trying to address.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I think we well. So am I correct?
[John Anderson]: Maybe I misunderstood your slides.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I don't remember that particular statement. Go back to the top, if you would. The very top?
[John Anderson]: Yes. One second. OK. And just a second here. I'm sorry. That's OK.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: For some reason, maybe it's the map where you showed like what's currently existing.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: That's what I was wondering.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: This was just to highlight some of the the kind of like key anchors that exist there today. Some of the different retail spaces. Yes, that was not intended to suggest that we would redevelop these. I apologize. That's not the intent.
[John Anderson]: Oh, and one other sort of geeky question. When you were dividing up, I believe it was Somewhere along the line, you had residential and exempt. What is exempt in that context?
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes. Justina, do you have the answer to that? That was. It's next slide. I think you just went past it. Did I?
[John Anderson]: Where did I see that? Was it current usage? I don't remember.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I know what slide you're talking about. This is my slide deck is being.
[Dina Caloggero]: Challenging. One second.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: I know what you're talking about. There's a slide that we say we have residential, and then we have a comma, and then it says exempt.
[John Anderson]: Exactly.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: What's that slide? It's in the scenarios section.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think we need to, we've been on this for almost an hour. I think we've got a few more people on the board who need to... No more questions from me.
[John Anderson]: Okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, John. I'm going to go to Dina and then I'm going to ask Sean and Paige if you have any questions as well.
[Dina Caloggero]: Just quickly, I was looking for one of the possible constraints and one of the things I go to the area often is you can't walk across the street. If I went from where the new residential housing will be at Cappy's and I wanted to either walk to Wellington Station or walk to Stationland and maybe go to some of the restaurants there or the shops, it is extremely difficult to get over the the major routes, which are Route 60, Route 16, and 28. And I think that's what creates the islands. And I didn't see any slides on how to overcome that major problem. Just a comment. You don't have to say anything, but I just wanted to bring the call to the elephant in the room.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: No, Dina, it's a great question. It's partly why. We haven't landed. So that's partly why we shared the design guidance is because we want to make those connections. We haven't, we're working with Bowman to identify the where, but it really needs to be defined by, you know, what, where we land in terms of what the land use mix ends up being.
[Dina Caloggero]: Right. And when you look at OwlWife, and I've been down OwlWife too, they have created a way to walk across the Whole Foods across the street from the Owl Life station and those areas. And we haven't come up with how to figure that out yet in Medford and how to do that at that point. Just a comment. I want to move on to this. I just threw it out there.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, and I don't want to dwell on that either, but there is a MassDOT study for that whole intersection that's been going on for a couple of years that is going to try to improve things, but we can't. I don't think we should go down that rabbit hole now, but it's a separate study, obviously not under Justina O'Brien. So, let me switch gears. Paige, any comments or questions?
[Page Buldini]: Yes, super quick. I was actually at the science fair with my daughter, and that was awesome. So it was good to see it. And I really appreciate that opportunity because she got to kind of see what we get to do. So one thing I think is very exciting is we currently are looking at, obviously, a site for tonight in this neighborhood. And we had another one that's on the opposite side on Riverside Ave, and that is an industrial use. that will be hopefully turned into a maker space. So I am excited to see the statistic about industrial and tough tech because we already have Mystic Ave that is primed for some of that with the zoning. So thank you for sharing that because the three real life examples you shared were helpful for me to see the different alternatives. And I'm hopeful that when we go to other areas in the city, I know Boston Ave is currently doing kind of their own study up there. I'm hopeful that we can continue to show the community, because it's just really helpful to see where it's working and what the opportunity is. So thank you for really showcasing that. I appreciate it.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, of course. We tried to find places that you could go to if you haven't been there already, too.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thanks, Paige.
[Sean Beagan]: Sean, anything to add? Just a couple comments. Thank you, first of all, very much for this presentation. It's a lot to think about and I think a lot to help guide us in some of the future projects that come before us. I guess my takeaway, one of my big takeaways from this is, fiscally, it seems like what we're receiving for projects and what we've been approving lately are some of the lowest revenue generating projects on your scale. In other words, we've been approving a lot of apartment buildings. And although it seems like they provide a positive net impact, it's kind of on the lower end of the spectrum. And perhaps we need to do something to encourage some more commercial building in Bedford, particularly probably in this area as well. Uh, because I think we've approved maybe 600 close to 600 apartments and I know there's more on mystic valley that we didn't approve, but that are coming. Um, yeah, so, um, and that is, uh, multifamily rental is. It's kind of one of the lowest returns per acre.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Yes. And I just want to caveat that with, you know, it really depends on the market condition. And right now, the market condition is such that there is a deep demand for housing and developers are responding to that deep demand. the demand for things like retail or office, while they do have a really positive impact, if a developer were to build office today and no one moves in, they are not going to be paying property taxes in the same way that you will be getting property taxes from multifamily rental. So that's just an important caveat to this, which is that philosophically, if everything is in high demand, then this is what it would look like. But it really depends on you know, what is the current vacancy rate of each of these, and how do we make sure that we're not creating a space where you have too much supply?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: We actually have a newly built life science building that this board approved a couple of years ago. It got built, and it's been sitting vacant for two years now. They've been unable to tenant it.
[Sean Beagan]: Where is that one located, Alicia?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I'm blanking on the name of the road, but where that 400 Riverside is, the road that it is on there, that little dead end, it's on there.
[Sean Beagan]: Okay.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: It's on Sycamore Street. Sycamore. Thank you, Kayla.
[Sean Beagan]: So we need to encourage the right type of commercial development. I guess that goes to your tough tech example.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.
[Sean Beagan]: And what you're saying is if they build commercial and it sits empty, they're going to get their taxes are going to be low because of the vacancy rate.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Exactly.
[Sean Beagan]: OK.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: One of the things we specifically asked as part of this project was to look at what kind of office industrial commercial we should be going after, which is why the mention of tough tech.
[Sean Beagan]: I think it makes a lot of sense. I hope we can. Reach out to, there's gotta, I mean, given the area we live in, there's gotta be companies in that business that are looking for some land to build, if not now, in the very near future, I would imagine. Yes. Paige.
[Page Buldini]: Really super fast too. Thank you. And I know there's federal funding that's going towards manufacturing. So there is the opportunity. So I'm grateful for Kayla and Alicia and Danielle and everybody on the economic development side because yes, we can definitely find support to tough tech and manufacturing.
[Chair Doug Carr]: And just one last question for me, I really think this diagram is critically important, but to Sean's earlier point, you know, we approved 500 units in Wellington in the area you're talking about. That has to be well north of 100 million dollars of construction, and it feels like that bar would be substantially higher than if I built perhaps 500 single family houses, which can't build in Medford because there's no place left to build them, to be honest. So I think, again, a little bit here of refinement just so we can understand scale and units.
Square feet or acres, whatever the measurement stick wants to be would help us a lot.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I think we can do that. And you do see that this is dollars per acre per year. Right? So this is on the same footprint. a condo footprint, how many single family houses would go on that condo, that same footprint office or lifestyle.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Right. That's true. It's not one single family home. It's however many single family homes you might fit in an acre.
[Chair Doug Carr]: All right. Thank you. Appreciate that. Well, you've got to call this one and move on, but this has been really helpful, but I want to get a long agenda and we got, I think, a couple hours more here, but thank you. Appreciate the time. Thank you. We look forward to seeing the next step on this one and the zoning impact ultimately would be interesting.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you. All right. There's no action items going to move on to the continued public hearing. This is for 360 Salem Street. Um, this is our 5th public hearing for this project opened originally on December 3rd, 2025. The Hopkins 360 Salem LLC is here to present revised new information from 2 weeks ago in response to city staff and board member questions. Alicia, Danielle, do you have anything you want to add before we turn it over to Guy? Um,
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: All I have to say is I just want to thank Guy for being responsive to the needs of the abutters and changing the design. I know this pushed out, you know, multiple public hearings further than you thought. I have some prepared conditions of approval. None of those should be surprises or primarily what the, various city departments required. Um, and we'll can discuss those later when we get into the deliberation portion. But, um, that's all I have, Mr. Chair.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm going to turn it over to you. I know you have a presentation. I think a lot of us has seen a lot of these slides before. So obviously just the new ones, it should be the focus, but why don't you go ahead and share your screen or your team?
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Sure. Thank you. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, while I, share the presentation. I'm going to unmute Marina McIntosh-Morgan, who is our team's architect. One moment. Marina, are you there?
[CAS00002540_SPEAKER_10]: I am. Thanks, Gary.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Wonderful. Okay, I'm going to share the presentation for you here now. There we are. Great. And I'll skip right to The proposed changes Marina.
[CAS00002540_SPEAKER_10]: Awesome. Yeah, so we have our site plan here newly updated with some minor changes based on feedback that we received both at the board meeting 2 weeks ago and over the course of this week. Notably, when we get into the interior plans, you'll see that we now have our bike parking is located in the rear of the building in an enclosed shed area. This was just due to switching up, so we have an ADA space now within our garage area, and the bike parking is now in an enclosed area in the rear. Yeah, Guy, if you want to stay on this, that'd be great. Space number 14 now at the bottom of the parking screen is now an accessible space with that drive aisle as needed. Same number of parking spaces as our previous proposal. Two of them are EV ready. We also, this wasn't necessarily a board comment, but we just adjusted the angle of our garage door to make turning into that garage a little bit easier as well. As far as the layouts for the units go, those have remained the same. We added a couple of windows along the side of the front unit per board member feedback as well. Next slide, please.
Same thing with these levels above. Minimal changes to the units themselves, but a couple of windows have been added as well in response to comment. Next slide. Roof plan, again, the same with that solar ready area. And our enlarged bike parking plan here, just for clarity. Again, space for six bikes. This was an enclosed shed proposal for the rear, just to protect the bikes from weather, rain, et cetera. Same type of bike parking that we were proposing inside the building itself, but now with that ADA space, it's in the rear of the building.
Next slide. Our elevation is largely similar to what we had previously shown. We've added glazing on both sides of our commercial doors. So it's, again, reads a little bit more commercial, stands out a little bit more, glass doors as well for the commercial front. The next slide here should show an enlarged version of those elevations. Yep, so we've added the glazing on the sides. The rear elevation at the bottom here is similar with that small bike shed in the back.
And along the sides here, that front brick facade that wraps around the corners, we added windows as well, again, in response to a board member comment. The garage door is now along the side. And we do have a couple of notes as well on our civil plan. I don't know if that's included in this set, but it just notes snow storage and those other things that we had talked about previously in our proposal. We're showing the transformer in the back along the side yard. We've got the bushes up as well, wrapping along the side of the property. Yep.
And our calculations have been updated accordingly. That was the quick version, given that we've gone through it several times now. But happy to answer any questions to feedback.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Rina. Thank you. I'm going to open it up. We'll start with Paige. Go ahead, Paige.
[Page Buldini]: Thank you so much and I really appreciate all of the feedback that y'all have been taking from us because it's so important in the neighbors. There was public comment from a neighbor about covering the bikes. So that's awesome. Is there opportunity to make that bike shed a little bit bigger instead of six with the 14 units? I don't know if that's possible. And is there a safe way for the bike, the bicyclists to go from the bike path around? I noticed, I think there's a small.
[CAS00002540_SPEAKER_10]: We have that four foot path running clear along the side that we have with permeable pavers. So that should be enough to be able to get a bike from the front and the back. We can certainly look at adding an additional space if needed for the storage, but yeah, it's enclosed right now as requested.
[Page Buldini]: Wonderful. So yes, I think the opportunity to potentially fit more bikes would be great, but I really appreciate you taking all the time in the comments and the front facade looks beautiful. So thank you.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Paige. Any other board member have some questions or comments? Go ahead, Dina.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, I just want to thank you for working with the neighbors. I think the project looks great and I'm happy we really got to this point. Nice job.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you.
[Sean Beagan]: Go ahead, Sean. So in regards to the 14 spaces, one is now handicap accessible, is that correct? And if so, will that space be available to one of the condominium unit owners, even if that person does not need a handicap accessible space or does it have to be left empty in the event that there is someone who needs a handicap space? Do we know that ruling on that?
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: It's a great question, Sean. So, initially, I had opted not to include it as a nominated accessible space for that exact purpose, allowing the future HOA the flexibility to make an exception if needed for potential resident of the building. I think that leaves the most flexibility knowing that that space is sized accordingly and can always be conditioned as such as we won't be deeding the parking spots to the individual units.
[Sean Beagan]: So it'll be exclusive use, not a deeded right? Correct. Okay.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: So, you know, like, with that said, um, you know, it remains to be seen as we, as we walk through the governance of the building. But, uh, for the time being, you know, I prefer that to be my intent. Um, I know that, uh, the building commissioner may feel differently about it and we're willing to work with, uh, the town staff, uh, accordingly to, to come to an appropriate resolution on how to manage it and handle it.
[Sean Beagan]: Yeah, I think that it would be, as a member of this board, it would be my preference that it be available as a 14th space, and then one, each unit could have its space, especially since it's condo and it's ownership as opposed to rentals. I think that makes a lot of sense. And perhaps we can recommend that to the building commissioner if necessary.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: To note, there may be some differing opinions on what is to code and not to code. So, you know, we may have code constraints there, but in any regard, we'll ensure that once we go through our code compliance check at the building permit phase, that it's addressed and decision appropriately. Okay. Thank you, Guy. Thank you.
[Chair Doug Carr]: John Anderson, do you have any comments? Everyone else has spoken so far, I think. Go ahead, John. You're muted, John.
[John Anderson]: Go ahead. Believe it or not, no questions.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, John. All right. So, hold on a second. Let's see, so now I'm going to open the, if there's no other questions from the board, I'm going to open the public comment period. Those who wish to provide comments, please use raise the hand feature, which may be under your reactions on the Zoom, or if you're dialed in on the phone, you can use star nine. You can also message Lisa in the chat if you're having technical difficulties before providing your comments, please state your name and address for the record. I remind all meeting participants to please refrain from using the chat function to message any comments to city staff or board members as it's not part of the public record. If you're having any issues, audio or technical, you message staff accordingly. Each participant will have two minutes to speak, and I see Ralph Klein. I'll give you your name and address for the record, Mr. Klein.
[Ralph Klein]: Yeah, Ralph Klein, 172 Park Street, Medford. This still doesn't address the parking issue. You need one space per unit. 11 with 14. It still doesn't work. It puts parking out into the neighborhood, as did the Sink Building. This is a ridiculous proposal. Parking is essential for the neighborhoods. You're pushing the parking lot into all the streets. Yeah, you addressed a few minor issues, but this isn't a minor issue. You need one parking space per unit at least. It's 1.5.
Saying this is rapid transit or whatever is a joke. It's not there. Stop saying you can walk an additional mile, half mile. People can do this. People can do that. The people who are saying this aren't walking. They're not doing it. They have a car. They move to work. The sink building, you say, oh, this empty space is out in back. Yeah, during the day. At night, it's full. I've gone by there and looked myself. During the day, all the people, the businesses there are parking on the side streets, especially on Park Street, which is a block and a half away.
I mean, let's get real here. You have a business going in there with no, Medford has For commercial business, there's no parking required. You have a business that's going to be in there that's going to be taking up space in front of the building. You're taking away all the stuff in the neighborhoods and letting this person put this building in. It's absolutely ridiculous. Everywhere else, they've done it according to what you need. The units, parking spaces over on High Street, Main Street, The other one on Salem Street down at the corner of Park and Salem has enough parking for everyone who's going to be there. I mean, you're blowing past it all.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Mr. Coyne. We hear you. All right. Anyone else who would like to raise their hand and speak in favor against the project? Go ahead, Danielle.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I just wanted to clarify that Mr. Klein, that they do have 14 spaces now. They're not only having 11. I just wanted to correct that. And there also will be a condition that residents won't have, they won't be able to get off-street permit parking stickers, or they're not stickers, just permits to avoid the overflow.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Danielle. Anyone else from the public who would like to speak about the project? Leslie Hunter, your name and address for the record, please.
[Jean Nuzzo]: Hi, I'm Leslie Hunter. I'm on Cherry Street, right behind the project. And the only thing that I'm worried about, I love the idea of more housing, but the only thing that I worry about are spotlights. If they have spotlights in the back of the building, then it shines into the resident yards in the back of it. So.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: So the business that's right there.
[Jean Nuzzo]: Yeah. So we have a business right behind us that has spotlights and the light shine right in the yard. So that's the only thing that concerns me.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think we can address that in the conditions, because I know that lighting and not impinging lighting onto adjacent properties is a fundamental thing that's in every project that we approve. We'll make sure it's in this one too, because that's not a light fixture that goes out, it goes down, and it should not cross the property line. That is the intent, Ms. Hunter. I hope we should be able to achieve that. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you.
Anyone else would like to speak? I'm not seeing anything else. If that's the case, I will close the public hearing and I'll ask the board just generally if they are looking towards moving towards a motion with conditions. And Danielle has drafted something, but we all need to look at it and evaluate it. Go ahead, Danielle.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I just wanted to raise the issue of the bike shed. Is that attached? We just saw this today, so I haven't had a chance to really look at it. I want to make sure that we're not running afoul of the rear yard setback. Accessory structures only need to be set back three feet, but if the building commissioner determines that this is part of the principal structure, then you wouldn't be able to have that there if it encroaches into that required 10 foot, because this board, I don't think is empowered to waive that. So I had intended to just have a condition that you all work with staff on a solution for a covered parking scenario with the other plan set.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: We're more than okay with conditioning it as such. And working towards it, and we can certainly build that closer to the lot line, 3 feet away and offset it from the structure itself. It's completely feasible.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, I think I agree. I think that's there's a solution there. The details may not be perfectly worked out here, but I do believe I agree with guy that this that's. That is a solvable problem and something we can, we can work out as the design develops. Back to the board. just looking for a sense, are people comfortable with the design as it stands now? My sense is yes, but I want to give people one more, one last chance to chime if they have any concerns. I think most of the butters and the neighbors, I think from the last meeting are clearly satisfied. The number of people actually commenting has actually dropped dramatically.
[Dina Caloggero]: So I just want to ask the question, Danielle, have all the conditions been met that we discussed at the last meeting other than the bike rack?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: You'd have to let me know which ones you were thinking about. Mr. Chair, did we talk about the front facade that the the windows you had requested more?
[Chair Doug Carr]: No, I'm satisfied with what they have. Yeah, they have added enough glass. I'm satisfied with that. I think it's an improvement. I think it's enough. It can always be more, but I see there's some technical needs and some functional needs for the front elevation. And I think what we have is acceptable, so I am good with that.
[Page Buldini]: I feel comfortable moving on and looking at the conditions.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Paige. Daniel, why don't you, why don't we stop sharing and do you have the document with the conditions you can put on screen?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah.
[Chair Doug Carr]: And again, normally we would put, we would send you this in advance, but, you know, some of these documents, you know, just came in in the last 24, 48 hours that there's a lot of back and forth that goes right up to the meeting time sometimes. So it's a luxury we don't always have. But I think we were close last time. I think the accessible parking has been addressed, the bikes we are gonna have, Danielle's language.
[Dina Caloggero]: Here we go. And I think the beginning part is just standard language, right? I remember you saying this.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, like the renters can't have parking on the streets, that kind of thing is our boilerplate.
[Unidentified]: Right.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, so these are the recommended conditions that were in the memos and common letters from the department heads, and they're standard. So the engineering, Division conditions, so the engineering directive 3, they perform roadway restoration, resetting of the granite curbing along the entire frontage, pavement restoration limit shall be curb to curb milling and pavement of 2 inches. There was this 1 condition that I think is flexible enough. So the existing tree well should be widened to accommodate the standard, the city standard of 8 feet by 3 feet. And that the engineering division had recommended that the applicant work with the tree warden to consider additional tree well along the project frontage and identify a species suitable for that location. It was the green score.
[Dina Caloggero]: I remember this.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, this was before we knew that they were going to have a reduced green score, but this is. All with this is like recommended language work with the tree warden, because I'm not sure if there is room for another street tree. Right. That was in the. Let's hold on and the city engineers common letter. But then there's an additional 1. I can maybe we should group it together, but this was. So this is the one about not hitting the green score. So I wrote, as mitigation for waiving the required green score, the development shall make a payment to the tree planting account. I wasn't sure where we landed on for the number of trees.
But we have the cost of tree materials installation, watering by contractor, and a warranty for one year is $840 per tree. That's what Aggie had given us for the Main Street project. And then times how many trees payable to the city of Medford, to the tree planting account. Payment is due prior to issuance of billing permit. And then I stipulate that street trees shall be planted to the greatest extent feasible along Salem Street. So I think it's up to the board what you think is appropriate and proportional to the green score of what they're not hitting.
I'm not sure what the number is right now. I think it was a 23. Yeah, I'm not sure.
[Chair Doug Carr]: You talk about the green score from a few weeks ago, a few meetings ago versus what it is now, Danielle?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Right.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Paige, did you have something?
[Page Buldini]: Thank you. Just real quick. Does the bike shed limit the green score? Does that?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I think it might.
[Page Buldini]: Okay.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I don't know what it is adjusted for now, but we don't know what the final, what the shed will look like at the end of the day. It's kind of like we have to balance You know, the different kind of wants for this. I mean, yeah, so it.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Do we have to do that from the meeting minutes from from a few weeks ago about the number of trees in the anywhere in those minutes? Do we? I didn't think so. Okay. I mean, I think we could just choose a number here. I mean, I think Salem Street was high because they were replacing two trees. That was 10, I think. I think we're, I don't know, I feel like in the four to six range feels reasonable to me all across Salem Street.
At 800 bucks a pop plus change is, you know, that's about three or four grand. I don't know if anyone has admin. Who is that?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I don't know.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm not sure who that is.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I don't know.
[Chair Doug Carr]: It's not Danielle and it's not Alicia, so I'm not sure.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, we already closed the public comment.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, so let's ignore that. So I guess, does anyone on the board have a preference on the number of trees?
[Sean Beagan]: I'd be comfortable with six, Doug. That would be a $5,000 cost. You get 840 a tree.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. Um, I think that's a good number. Is there any, any, any, any, anyone, six total.
[Page Buldini]: I agree with six. And I think if there's the ability, we had talked about making the back area, any type of usable space. I know we will have a bike storage area, but being mindful of that, I think is great too.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: Yeah.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: All right. Can I make a call? That makes sense.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Six is the number, so let's put that into the conditions for the trees.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I see Guy has his hand raised.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Go ahead, Guy. We, if I could just for a moment show you, we only have swapped out one chair, sorry, one chair, one tree. But one tree was removed in order to accommodate the setback of the building from our original to meet our green score calculation. So while I appreciate the board sentiment of creating a larger greenscape, it might be a bit egregious on that end from our perspective, seeing as we're only offsetting one with six.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think the last project we had, they took out two and they got 10. I think it had to do with the caliper, right, Danielle? Is this right?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, they were removing two mature street trees. So they had to replace street trees. And they also weren't subject to a green score. So it was a little bit of a different scenario where we actually have rules in place about if you remove street trees then you have to replace them, and it's based on the caliper size. And because we plant three-inch caliper trees, that's how you get, I guess, get to the 10, unless, I think it was, was it 10 that Agni required? Yeah, so somehow, the two mature trees equated to 10 three-inch calipers, so that's how it was arrived at.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, it was a geometry problem.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Whereas this project isn't removing any street trees, there's one that's going to be retained. And one of the conditions from the city engineer is that that tree will be increased, I think, which will help that tree hopefully stick around for many more years to come. So, Guy, do you have an idea of what the green score, what green score you think You're going to hit? I think it was close.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, depending on how the shed comes out. I mean, we're in the low 20s right now, and depending on how we end up moving forward with the shed, that would be the one variable that I can't transparently account for at this moment, because we don't have a final design. It's not that much area, but all that said,
[John Anderson]: I'm fine with two or three. Two or three trees, John? Yeah. But that's just a personal opinion.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina, go ahead.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, Daniel, what would it take to get Guy over the green score threshold? One tree, two trees? I know he has shrubs on the side.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So there's a menu of things that you can do, and some of that is actual. square footage of the green area, which, you know, he doesn't have a lot of yeah. And then there's the types of trees, the types of shrubs, you know, all affect that calculator.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: But there is a spreadsheet and one there is plug into our trees. So Guy, if you have the spreadsheet, we could just, how many trees do you need to put in there to get to 25 points? And if not, could we condition it literally on that, on whatever his final number is on the spreadsheet, what would it, like what, and I'm trying to find my copy of it.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: We just got an updated one. I think that's a brilliant solution, Alicia. I love that this is tied. to an actual metric, and it's not what feels right.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: It can be tied to the calculator. Because he literally cannot put the trees on his property, rather than, because he can't, then we would just ask for the payment into the tree fund, and we'll put them somewhere else nearby. That sounds like a good plan.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Uh, 11 tree pushes me to 0.266. So for 20 score 0.266. Um, as it stands. Um, there is no accounting in there for the preserve tree. Uh, so, you know, because there is a. a slot for that, but they're not on our lot per se. So we're not accounting for that in this calculation, but I am using your calculator and it does with one large tree of a native species, it moves it to a score of 0.266.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So that's 26 points. Sorry. At some point I had asked them to get rid of the points and just make them whole numbers, like move the decimal point. Right.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: But that's working on the assumption that the, The, the area of the of the landscaping unchanged.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: No. So what we're saying is just tie it to it. And at the final area of the landscaping. Will dictate what how many trees are needed to bring the green score to 25 and that will be. The staff will check your math and say that that's the right number.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, and just for the board's edification, even if I were to make the bike storage 120 gross square feet, I've accounted for that in the calculation, and it only drops me to 0.257. So that's it. You have a question.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes, thank you, Doug.
[Sean Beagan]: Guy, we're accounting here for a large tree. Does that bring us back to the issue that our tree warden has in regards to replacing large trees with smaller trees? Was that a calculation the tree warden was using on the other project in terms of we're getting rid of a mature tree and we need a suitable number of smaller caliper trees to make up The difference is that what I was checking?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, I was just checking the math on that because I was looking for the definition of small, medium and large. Um, and I do want to check with what this is because it says one tree, two trees, three tree for small and four tree for four minutes, small, medium, large. And I wasn't sure if that was supposed to be inches. I'm going to have to go back to our definitions of small, medium, and large, unless Christian knows. I think I have that here.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Talking about CalPERS numbers?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Well, I was trying to understand what small, medium, and large were and where they, in fact, how they were, where they were.
[Christian Zepeda-Lipovsky]: They're defined in the ordinance as canopy size. Small trees are 8 feet to 16 feet, small and medium trees are 16 feet to 21 feet, medium large trees are 21 feet to 26 feet, and large trees have a canopy size of 26 or more feet.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Thank you for finding that we're going to have to reassess that because that could be for preserved. You can measure that, but if it's not preserved, if it's being planted, then you have to measure and it's the city standard to measure the. The tree trunk, so we're going to have to revisit that and also street trees.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: are limited and what kind of canopy size they can have to not obstruct electrical wires and stuff like that. So I don't think it'll be just an even swap. You might need more than one street tree to equal what you could do on a private property just because of what a public street tree
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I still think we can work this out, and that we're going to be talking about one or two trees to bring him up to 25, and that we can just take that, because it's super duper technical, and we can just make the condition, and then we can work this out behind the scenes.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: If possible, because we would like to have some type of concrete understanding from a costing standpoint, right? Because what if you came back and told me I needed to plant 30 trees? Would the board be amenable to saying, you know, let's split the difference. You said six. I said one. Let's call it three. And plant them where you'd like.
[Sean Beagan]: I'd be fine with a solution like that. Just instead of trees, put a dollar figure on it. Yeah, I would appreciate I think that's what guys saying he wants a dollar figure, please. Thank you. So I agree.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: I agree.
[Sean Beagan]: All right.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: But to do that, we have to.
[Chair Doug Carr]: He can come up with something. He can price that. And obviously, the condition of getting the green score is going to be somewhat overrun that. Paige, did you still have a question? Nope. That was what Sean said was what I was going to say to you. Very good. All right. So Daniel, are you revising the language of the condition? You put down three, lots of three.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Do you see it on the screen? I do. Yes. So I just changed it to three.
[Chair Doug Carr]: and dollars. Okay.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, it's three. It's three trees. So, because we're going to split the difference.
[Unidentified]: Yep.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: And yeah.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, payable to City of Medford. It's all there.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Because we do three caliper trees and they all cost $840. So, I think this is the easiest way. We might be getting more by doing this, or we might be getting less, but I think this is a good way to just get disposed of it. I think we're balancing the different interests better this way.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Danielle, are there any other conditions here we need to discuss beyond the boilerplate ones, which we kind of glazed over in the beginning, but we've all seen those before.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: These are some of direct-to-blades standard.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yep.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Conditions that were all applied to the 255 main about the, you know, the audible warning. We're exiting vehicles, installing public. Bike racks, this is for the for the sidewalks. I'm not on the site. So, because there'll be a retail use, so we need to have bike parking that someone can just. You pop into the retail use or whatever use that is. You're providing 2 in street pedestrian warning signs. Those are those things that you have in the middle that if you hit them, they bounce back. Eventually they get destroyed and that's why we have. Todd likes to have some in our stock, so he's requesting to these for back stock. All right. I think daylighting. the posts for daylighting, and then our standard condition of not allowing residents to get parking permits.
Because this board is granting a waiver for the required number of parking spaces, then we don't want to see overflow into the neighborhoods that If this is right sizing the parking for the development, then they don't need them. So let's make sure that that's in there. Um, this is the condition I put in there for, to deal with the covered bike parking. Uh, I put the applicant shall work with city staff to incorporate covered and secure bicycle parking storage, suitable and convenient for year round daily bicycle commuters. The applicant shall submit a revised site plan detailing and approved covered and secure bicycle parking solution prior to applying for a building permit.
If this board is comfortable with delegating this to staff, that's what this condition would do.
[Ralph Klein]: I believe we are.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Okay. And then condition 12 is regarding the affordable housing. 10% of them should be affordable. 14, that rounds up to 2. This is basically just reminding them that they need to talk to our housing planner and make sure they're applying to the local initiative program to get these designated as local action units so they can get on the subsidized housing inventory. 13 is the one we just went over for the green score mitigation. Reminder that there's linkage fees and then The condition that the development team meet with economic development planner to discuss potential tenants for the retail space, not that they have any decision, but there could be someone that's looking for a space and just making those connections. It's more of a recommendation kind of advisory conversation. So that's what we have. I think if I numbered these correctly, there should be 15.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think that's correct. Go ahead, Sean.
[Sean Beagan]: Yeah. On the last condo project that we approved on Main Street, I think there was some discussion or some conditions in regards to trash removal. How is trash removal going to be handled at this project? Is it private or is it by waste management?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: It will be private because they won't be eligible for the curbside trash from the city. OK. I think it's four units is the limit.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, I think it's like four or six units is a limit.
[Sean Beagan]: And is that going to be once a week guy pick up?
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: We typically discuss it with the trash called subcontractor, discuss the unit size, the residents. They typically have some calculator where they give us an assessment on the frequency of pickups. Then there's some adjustment period there where there's an understanding there may need to be an updated frequency, one more, one less per week, but typically it is once per week.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, Guy. Depending on the retail space, if it's food, Uh, it'll be a separate pickup service for the retail space, correct?
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Yes, they do break those out because there may be more frequent pickups.
[Sean Beagan]: Can we put in a condition that it would be a once a week pickup? I think that's fair. Okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: So Danielle, could you add 16 for trash pickup once per week? Private.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Having trouble, let's see. Here we go. Let's see. How did you want me to word this, Sean? Should I? I know we had language from the other one.
[Sean Beagan]: Yeah, I think we just have to put in language there that the condo association will incorporate into their condominium documents. The trash pickup will be at least once per week for the residential and commercial spaces.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Just write trash and recycling because that is actually the law in Massachusetts. I just don't want people to think that it's not.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: I can suggest, Danielle, if you'd like, the condo association shall arrange for regular, this is just off what we used before. Regular trash collection services, such services shall be performed at a minimum frequency of one time per week to ensure proper waste management for the property.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Okay, the Condominium Association shall arrange for, was it regular trash and recycling? Yes. Was it pickup or? Collection.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Collection.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Collection.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: Services. Period. Such services.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Gosh, I can't type and people are watching me.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: We'll shut our cameras off. Such services. Shall be performed. at a minimum frequency of one, and then the numerical one after you spell it, time per week to ensure proper waste management for the property.
[Unidentified]: Oops. That's good.
[Sean Beagan]: And did we address the butter who had the concern about the lights onto her property or shining into her property? Is that, does that need to be, I'm looking to Danielle or Alicia, does that need to be addressed here or is that going to be part of, is that already incorporated into the design?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Guy, did you show lights on the back of the building? I don't,
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: We'll need something for the bike storage, but if they're downcast with full cutoffs.
[MCM00001497_SPEAKER_08]: We do show some lights on the side, on the front.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think a general comment in the spirit of literally, Danielle, I think we can cut and paste from the actual language of the checklist because that's exactly what it says. It says that the applicant will choose light such that it does not cast any light beyond the property. the property lines on any side.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: That's standard with LEDs to have directional that don't.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Right. It's kind of a leftover. I mean.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And if there's another business that's shining their lights into the neighbors, you can reach out to the city. I'm pretty sure code enforcement can make them not do that.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah. We have a few different lighting Requirements, and I'm looking through the checklist.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Our standard performance stuff does have lighting standards around light trespass and lights overspill and glare, including direct light from light sources to be confined within the property. The property boundaries lighting shall also comply with international dark sky standards when feasible.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And it's pretty standard these days for new installations. Yeah.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: And the Sound Street, I think this is development, is this a development standard? Salem Street 1 that says light level shall meet or exceed the minimum design guidelines defined by the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America and shall provide the illumination necessary for safety and convenience while preventing glare and overspill onto adjoining properties and reducing the amount of sky glow.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So that is a requirement.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, I don't know that it needs to be a separate condition because it's already part of our requirements.
[Sean Beagan]: I'm fine with that as long as it's a requirement already.
[Dina Caloggero]: Okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, so we don't need 17, it sounds like, because it's already built in. So that being said, I want to obtain a motion to approve site plan review for 360 Salem Street with the conditions noted.
[Sean Beagan]: So, excuse me, Mr. chair motion to wait. We haven't addressed the parking. Right. We need to do a motion to waive the parking requirements because and waive the green score. Yeah. So, uh, okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: So, is that 1 motion or 2, Sean, you think.
[Sean Beagan]: Probably 2, it's probably 2 separate motions.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, so we'll make a motion to waive the parking requirement from 1.5 to 1, right?
[Sean Beagan]: Right. 1 per residential unit. So moved.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Second. All right. I'll roll call. John Anderson? Yes. John Began? Yes. Page Buldini? Yes. Dina Calagara?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Ari Goffman Fishman is absent and Doug Carr myself, yes. The motion passes five to zero. Now the, Sean, why don't you make the second motion?
[Sean Beagan]: I would move to waive the strict compliance with the green score requirement for this development.
[Page Buldini]: I second that.
[Sean Beagan]: Very good.
[Chair Doug Carr]: John Anderson. Yes. Sean Began. Yes. Yes.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: And myself done car. Yes. Motion passes five to zero.
[Sean Beagan]: We all set Sean for that. I think so. I don't think they've needed any other relief. Okay. Danielle, you agree?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yes. So now you just need to approve the site plan with the 16 conditions.
[Sean Beagan]: All right. Motion to approve the site plan subject to the conditions set forth.
[Dina Caloggero]: I second.
[Sean Beagan]: Very good. John Anderson?
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes. Sean Began? Yes. Page Buldini?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina Calguero?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Arigatou Fishman, absent, and myself, Dakar, yes. Congratulations. Thank you, Guy, for all the work you did. Appreciate it. Thank you, Board. Thank you. Great addition to the city. Thank you. Thank you. Do we need a five-minute break, folks? It's been a while. Why don't we do that, and then we'll come back here, and we'll move on to the linkage fees, and then we'll talk, if we have any energy left, about Medford Square.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: You still have another applicant on here. Let's do the applicant. 10 Revere Beach Parkway.
[Chair Doug Carr]: That's true. I still think we need a five-minute break first.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, let's take the five-minute break.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Let's do that. Then we'll go to Revere Beach, 1020 Revere Beach, then linkage fees, then Manfred Square, if anybody's still awake. We'll see you at five. All right, folks. Waiting on a few people. Let's dive back in if we can. Let's see. We don't have a quorum yet.
[Unidentified]: No.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina, Paige, John, are you still with us? I'm impressed. You're doing yeoman's work tonight.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: I'm here.
[John Anderson]: I'm here.
[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, we have a quorum and I think I see Paige there as well who are coming. All right, moving on agenda item number four, modification to site plan approval. This is for 10 and 20 Revere Beach Parkway. The board approved this project on October 29th. 2025, and now the applicant, Transom Real Estate, is seeking a modification to the site plan to increase the number of residential dwelling units and to decrease the number of parking spots with the overall footprint and volume of the building remaining unchanged. Alicia, Danielle, do you have any introductory comments before we move the presentation to Transom?
Nope? Okay. All right, so let's make Peter Spilios or Valerie Moore to run the presentation and update us on the redesign.
[Valerie Moore]: Thank you and good evening members of the board. My name is Valerie Moore. I'm an attorney with Nodder McLennan & Fish and I'm here on behalf of the applicant, Transom Real Estate. As the chair indicated, we were last in front of you in October when you approved this project. And since then, the applicant and its team have been diligently advancing their project plans. And as part of that and assessing the marketability of the development, they've made a couple of changes. to the proposed plans for your consideration. I'm going to share my screen so that I can walk you through them.
You should be able to see the previously approved site plan at the ground floor level, just to refresh your recollection. This is what the floor looked like, the first floor looked like previously. You can see, I'll call your attention to certain areas so that you know what you're looking for on the next page, but this was the originally approved entryway configuration. And the other changes will be to these two amenity areas at both the top and bottom of the plan.
So the first set of modifications you see the entranceway has been slightly adjusted just to better align with pedestrian connections. And there have been some changes to the amenity spaces as we indicated in our filings in order to increase the number of units that are proposed. We did just reduce the size of the amenity spaces. But as you'll notice between the plans, they now show a lot more detail as to what's included there further along than when the board approved the site plan initially. That total interior amenity space has been reduced overall by about 20%.
Moving to the 2nd floor, I want to call your attention to the parking that you see along 9th street. This is probably the most significant change as you can see that parking has been changed to be additional units. The increase in the number of units was accomplished by both converting the parking along Ninth Street into additional units on the second floor, and also by in some places throughout the building, modifying some of the larger units to be slightly smaller, either one-bedroom junior units or studio units, rather than some of the larger units that were originally proposed. So because that was how the number of units were increased, the building itself from the outside, if you think about the box that sits on the plan, is not changing. The footprint itself, the height of the building, all will stay the same. That means there's no change to the shadow impacts, to abutting properties, and really what's visible outside of the building stays the same.
I'm going to switch what I'm showing you, one second here. And I will bring up, we submitted for you a traffic comparison memo from GPI that goes through the changes in traffic impacts. Overall, even with the increase in units and the additional trips that are caused by that increase in units, it is still a net reduction from the existing daily trips to the site. The only increase in trips is during the morning peak hour. And that was detailed in the memorandum that was submitted by GPI.
The project, though we are reducing the number of parking spaces, continues to exceed the minimum number of spaces that are required by the zoning ordinance. So it is still compliant with the parking requirements that are set forth for this district in the zoning ordinance. And we are not proposing to change any of the mitigation that was agreed to. So you'll see in the conclusions in the traffic memo that was submitted by GPI, they do not believe that this change results in any additional adverse impacts or warrants any additional mitigation.
So the zoning ordinance allows this board to approve modifications where those modifications do not amount to a waiver or substantial alteration of any condition or requirement of the board. In this case we do not believe that the changes to the proposed project amount to either a waiver or a substantial alteration of any condition or requirement that was in the board's decision. Um, we are not proposing to change any of the conditions. We are not proposing to change any of the mitigation that was agreed to. Um, the project as previously approved remains zoning compliance and, um.
These modifications really don't impact any of the board's findings. We do believe the only finding as I noted in the chart that was implicated is the finding with respect to traffic and parking. But as we noted with respect to the G.P.I. memorandum, because this doesn't result in any additional or any traffic safety hazards, that finding that is set forth in the zoning ordinance remains met by the project. And so with that, we're happy to answer any questions that you have.
We do have representatives both from GPI and the site civil engineer, Beals & Associates is here tonight, as well as the project architect and Barker are all here to answer any questions you have.
[Chair Doug Carr]: We'll start with you, Paige, and then we'll go to Dina next.
[Page Buldini]: Thank you so much, Valerie. So I just had, this was as a newer board member this fall, this was one of the first site plan reviews that I got to be through the process. So it's very exciting. Can you just help me, I'm just curious to know, is it typical when we've put through a site plan for it to come back with a big, a decent change to parking and units? I know every site is different, but I would love to know more about the vision and what the true change was, if it was financial for what they thought the units would go for. I would just love to know, just as a board member, that I would love to continue to work with this.
Do you have those answers?
[Valerie Moore]: So it's not atypical for a project to change after it appears in front of you. When you see us recite plan review, you're reviewing preliminary plans. Those plans then get advanced to far more detailed drawings. And as the design gets refined and advanced, it's pretty typical that we come back for modifications to reflect the changes. Really the changes here were driven by market demand. There's more demand in Medfords for smaller units rather than those larger two and three bedroom units. So it's really designed to be reflective of that. And that's what this is driven by. Okay.
[Page Buldini]: And then. With those units for the bedroom counts, I know you had mentioned that some of those bigger units will now be smaller. Do you know what that number is out of curiosity? Because I think that does kind of impact our thinking about parking. If there's now just a ton more one unit bedrooms, that would change a three to four bedroom. So I was just interested.
[Valerie Moore]: So I will ask our project architect, Bill Mensinger from MBARC to give you the exact unit count changes and breakdown. But I will note the parking remains compliant with the zoning ordinance. So we are still meeting the required minimum, even with the change in units.
[SPEAKER_12]: Great. Thank you, Valerie. And for the record, Bill Mensinger with MBARC. Great to be here with you guys. And Paige, just to answer your question, yes, so that we really just, it was a real game of just playing with the demising walls, shifting them within the footprint and readjusting the facade. So what it equated to is where we have a series of, we have what we're calling the studio and junior one beds, which make up about 27%.
of the building enclosure and those are around 490 to 510 square feet. Then we have a series of one beds, which have broken up into one bed small, one bed medium, and one bed large. So it's a nice range of one beds. Some of the large might have a den or something like that. Those make up 42 percent of the building and they range from 580 square feet to around 720 square feet. Then we do the same thing with the two beds, the small, medium, and large. They make up 28 percent, and they range from about 875 to just over 1,030 square feet. Then rounding up the last three percent would be three bedrooms, mostly utilizing some of the prominent corners of the building where we have the facade space, and those are around 1,300 plus square feet.
[Page Buldini]: that. Awesome Thank you so much. And then again, this was one of my first APM reviews, so I know I can look back in the minutes, but I know that there was discussion with the neighbors, and I really greatly appreciate when the developers, designers, architects, everybody speak to the neighbors. I think there was discussion about as we just saw some epic snowfall about the neighborhood residents potentially having assistance with parking. I don't know if that was one of our conditions, but I'm just parking is such a hot topic, but if we're being neighborly and that was something with removing some of those parking spots, then create an issue. I'm not sure if that we can answer that, but I would just love to bring that up.
[Valerie Moore]: Right, so in the condition that was in the decision and in the discussion at the prior hearing, that was always a, if there is capacity, then we'll allow neighbors to park there during a snow emergency. Now, with the reduction in parking, it's less likely that there will be that additional capacity. Um, but it was never a requirement or commitment that there would be capacity to provide that. So it's not truly a change in that regard. Okay.
[Page Buldini]: It was just more of a discussion, but not a condition. Okay. That's good to know. And then I think that's what I have for now. I'll let the rest of the board speak. Thank you so much.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Go ahead, Dina.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, okay. So does this have to be, I guess, maybe a question for Janelle, Alicia, does this need to be reviewed by traffic or any of the city staff at this point? That's my first question. And then second question, what is, what were the number of parking spaces before? What is it now? Number of units before? Number now?
[Valerie Moore]: So I can answer first the number of units is now 297 and that's up from 248 and the number of parking spaces is 215 and that's down from 247 in the previously approved plans. Um, the zoning ordinance does not require that the board circulate a modification application to city departments for comment, right?
[Dina Caloggero]: So at this point we would need the city staff to take a look at the proposed changes to see if there's any additional conditions that will be associated with the modifications. Correct?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Actually, it said our zoning does not say that it has to go to additional staff. But Danielle, did you send this? You were about to say something. I thought I saw it went to Todd.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So Todd was out today. I wasn't sure if he had seen this. He should see it. Because I will say that Attorney Moore is correct in that this doesn't Account to waivers, like, changing any waivers or any of the conditions, and it's still compliant because it's only 0.5 spaces per unit is what's required and the Wellington station multifamily overlay district, which is, you know, our zoning that we. Yeah, so the zoning was written to comply with the law. We had to write zoning that would. be able to yield a target amount of units that was set for us.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So I guess, I know this is... Danielle, what I might add is that Todd actually feels very strongly, overall, I work with him through the traffic all the time, that when he recommends a requirement it must be tied to a direct impact, and it must be tied to a worsening traffic condition, or because they're getting a waiver for zoning, like, right, if they're getting, being allowed to do less parking than required by zoning. So I actually feel pretty strongly that he would look at this and say they're still doing less per the traffic studies, which, you know, typically you would look at would take, they're doing less vehicle trips per day. So that doesn't warrant additional traffic impacts and it's under zoning. So he wouldn't feel that he had a legal place to come from with additional impacts. Whereas this project is already providing traffic mitigation, even though he would not have said you have to do it.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Right, and so the mitigation was mostly about the cut the existing cut through traffic that exists without the development. Yeah, so, I mean, it's. It's kind of a, like, a toss up. I don't know what he could require, because I believe that the trip generation memo, I think it showed, was it like a 14 additional trips or something like that in the AM and the PM from the increased units? I think that was, I mean, I'm not a traffic engineer, but I don't know if that would be considered significant or not.
[Valerie Moore]: We do have our traffic engineer, Rebecca Brown here from GPI, if you'd like her to speak to that.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Before we do that, I just want to see if Sean, do you have a question? And we'll go to Dean after Sean.
[Sean Beagan]: A couple of questions. So this is, I'm understanding the math. It looks like it's a 20% increase in the number, approximately 20% increase in the number of units. and a decrease by approximately 50, no, 30 spaces.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, about 30 spaces.
[Sean Beagan]: OK. And so when this applicant was before us back in the fall, I recall that we had some discussion with the applicant. And at the time, I think we were suggesting maybe you have too many parking spaces. Why do you need all these parking spaces? And the applicant was telling us, yes, we do need all these parking spaces. Our studies and our experience finds that we do need them. And essentially, I think you had one to one. So I'd like to hear from the applicant what has changed in regards to that thinking.
Um, and is it the business plan that has changed? I mean, was it was the thought? Maybe we'll make these condos. We want to have a parking space for each unit at some point in the future. And now that's off the table. I mean, I'm not necessarily opposed to reducing the number of parking spots because I think I was one of the people who said you had too many to begin with anyway. And I think if and also, if you could just confirm for me, are we getting eight more affordable units with these increased spaces?
That's my, those are my comments.
[Valerie Moore]: I know Peter Spillials will certainly address the reason for the parking change, but the number of affordable units will increase proportionately as required by your zoning ordinance with the increase in the number of units. So yes, you're going to be getting additional affordable units as part of this.
[Sean Beagan]: Is it eight more affordable units? Do we know the number? I think it's 15% of the increased number, right?
[Peter Spellios]: You know, I don't know it off the top of my head, but I can it is it, but it is 15%. So, whatever, that's apologies. I can't do the head math myself, but it is 15% of the additional units will be affordable consistent with the underlying units.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: And I believe I'm through the chair that they were doing some deeper affordability to get an incentive. I think.
[Peter Spellios]: We, we are we are a certain percentage of those of the overall affordable units are also a deeper, deeper affordability.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So, but that number might also be affected, but, yeah, we'd have to. do that math to figure out if.
[Peter Spellios]: No, it is affected and we will be complying fully with both the underlying affordability requirement and the deeper affordability because of the incentive bonus that we're taking advantage of.
[Sean Beagan]: And so if you could just address the question as to the thoughts on the Need for last time you were here, it was we need the parking spaces now. Obviously, you think you can do with less and I don't necessarily disagree with you. I just want to hear how the. The thought process changed and why why you're coming back for less spots and more.
[Peter Spellios]: I appreciate it, thank you very much. Peter Spellios with Transom Real Estate. I think it's a really valid question. And I'm not one that likes to eat crow, but I think the chairman and you both pointed out that we had lots of parking last time. And I said that based on the current Unimix that we were working on, it's always been contemplated to be rental. It's still gonna be a rental project. So it wasn't as you surmised or suggested maybe having anything to do with home ownership units at the time. The original plans, which Valerie was right, very preliminary plans, assumed larger units, which then from a marketing standpoint, I think we applied a higher parking ratio for larger units. As we've advanced plans and talked, frankly, with our team and completed additional markets studies, what was clear was two things, that the demand for smaller units was driving the market pretty substantially here. And secondarily, that wasn't just because of unit types, but also because of cost. And larger units obviously goes to say are more expensive, smaller units are cheaper. And so it was really about finding a cost point that frankly was more affordable and more attractive to the market. In doing so, the corresponding parking demand that typically goes with those units goes down. And so while we're at 8.7, now with what we're proposing, it's really a more three-dimensional calculation that gets us to 0.7, which is we ascribe for larger units, a greater parking ratio, and then the smaller units and affordable units, a much smaller parking ratio that really nets out at the 0.7 to come back and do this. Rest assured, we would have loved to be able to stay with the original plan if it was viable for us to stay with the original plan, just because this creates a whole nother process. We're redoing some plans here. But in order for the project financially to be viable and to really, I think, hit what the demand is out there, we've made this change in Unimix. The other thing I would like to just respond to is really, and we're cognizant of this, which is, look, the traffic study talks about trip counts. The traffic study doesn't really predicate itself on what your parking space count is. So in this situation, what we actually expect is we're actually just gonna have a lot more drop-off traffic. We're gonna have the Uber, the reliance on public transportation, the pedestrian, which is why we changed the pedestrian entrance building, because I think we're realizing we're gonna be much more pedestrian centric and MBTA centric. And really what's gonna happen here, because we're not gonna bring residents cars here. We previously said that we wouldn't be allowing residents to be parking on 9th Street and adjacent streets. So residents are either going to have a car or they're not, and they're going to be able to park in the garage or not. By reducing the number of parking spaces, we're effectively reducing the number of cars that are actually going to be coming in and out of our building. And to the extent there is increased traffic or volume, it's really going to be that drop-off, the Uber lift drop-off and pedestrian. And that Uber lift drop-off is all happening on Middlesex and not happening on 9th. and not happening in the neighborhood. So we feel pretty strongly that in effect, yes, the unit count is going up, but by reducing the parking, we're actually quieting, further quieting the activity, the practical realities of the activity on Ninth Street and our surrounding streets, because there's gonna be less cars coming in and out of our garage as a result of the reduction of parking.
[Sean Beagan]: John, are you good? Yes, that was a very thoughtful answer. Thank you, Peter. Okay, I'm gonna go back to Dina.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, just a question. Um, I can't remember back in the fall. We did this, but we did put is part of stipulation or condition that there would be no, um, residential permitting parking associated with this building. I just want to make sure that folks won't try to park on the surrounding streets if they do have an additional car.
[Valerie Moore]: So as I indicated in my presentation, we're not proposing to change any of the conditions that you put on your original approval. So that condition will remain in place.
[Chair Doug Carr]: OK. John Anderson, do you have any comments or questions, John? No, thank you. Okay, thanks John. Let me chime in here. I was one who thought this project was over parked, so I have no issues with, this feels more realistic to me. I understand If you take out 30 parking spaces, you're saving at least a million dollars and you're adding, obviously, more units. I know there's a huge contingent in Bedford that's looking for more housing, so I'm quite confident that the city as a whole, I think the political consensus is in this favor. I actually wish the other project, the KISS 108 site, would take the same approach, frankly, because I feel it has an even better case because It's not a 10 minute walk. It's a 2 minute walk to the city, but I'll let that stand for now.
My concern, I want to dwell a little bit on drill down a little bit on the on the kind of. It wasn't a promise, but it was a significant gesture made towards the neighbors about, you know, you didn't say you could absolutely park here when there's a snowstorm above X number of inches, but there seemed to be, as you said earlier, Ms. Moore, Attorney Moore, you had capacity then that was, it was kind of an easy thing to do because you were over parking and now you're not. You're still over parking compared to zoning. But my worry is that I feel like we might be taking away something from the neighbors that we all but promised them. And I feel like, I'm not sure how we can thread that needle, but I'd like to hear some ideas about it. Maybe, Peter, it sounds like you have an answer.
[Peter Spellios]: Mr. Chairman, I don't know that I have an answer, but I hear you on that. And you know this through your experience, parking garages are not really revenue generators. At the end of the day, they never generate enough revenue. I have yet to do a project where we're over capacity on those things. So even in the reduct, I would love to say we would be over capacity and it'd be a revenue driver because that supports the finance ability of the project. But the reality is we've all come to realize that almost without exception, the garage is whatever size, we'll have vacancy, we'll have availability. We're quite good at being good with our neighbors and making things available here. But even that gesture, I think was what we made a number of gestures, right? A laundry list, I think there's six or seven conditions specifically that were the gestures that we made. And the parking in the garage was really not one materialized in the condition was one look at if we can do that stuff, we will do those things and be good neighbors.
That problem about parking on 9th Street exists today, whether or not our project is here or not, and the winter parking situation. So we are just by virtue of being here and being able to offer even one space to someone. We're making the situation better than what the current situation is today because 9th Street is a very difficult situation currently. So we stand ready to fulfill that and do that. I suspect, as much as I would love to say we'll be fully occupied in doing it, I suspect we're gonna have capacity to do those things. Obviously can't make promises, because I don't know what the capacity is gonna be here. But we're gonna, all the conditions, we're gonna do everything that we said on Ninth Street. We're gonna do everything on the adjacent streets. And this one, which wasn't a condition, The parking, it was merely people asked and I said, if we have availability, we will. So we're not asking you to change a condition or ask us to go back on something that was a condition of the original approval and we stand by. If we can do it, we're going to do it because it's an easy thing and it's a right thing to do.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Peter. I appreciate that. Also, just one last thing. Having an elevation of the building that is not parking garage, car grills, now you're having units is an improvement to the neighborhood for what it's worth. That's not unimportant as a quality of life, as an aesthetic thing. The parking is virtually invisible for this project now. Again, another improvement compared to the original design, which was still quite good. Are there any other city board questions before I open it up to the public?
[Sean Beagan]: I had one more question, Mr. Chairman.
[John Anderson]: Go ahead.
[Sean Beagan]: This is directed more towards Danielle and Alicia. So the applicant is here essentially with a petition and the premise is that this is not or doesn't equate to a substantial change. And that is why they can go through this and ask for this essentially an amendment without having to start at the beginning again. And I guess I'd like to hear from the two of you where most of us are new to this board, what's been your experience with past issues such as this where they're, I mean, they're seeking 50 additional units. I know they're not changing the footprint, But in my mind, it's certainly a change from the plans that were approved, which was a condition.
And I'm not necessarily looking to hang them up. I'd just kind of like to know what past precedent was for these types of changes and whether they were considered substantial or not. And any comments you have would be greatly appreciated.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And I guess I can speak from Medford's experience. Danielle may have additional experience from other communities that she's worked in. The reality is we haven't actually approved that many very large buildings through the CD board in the last six years. We have three very large buildings that are under construction, but two came through the 40B process and one through, it's in the Mystic Valley, the MVDC zone, that does not go through Medford's Community Development Border Zoning. So they're not really truly like for like. We have had things come forward where they have looked for other projects that needed amendments. And in the past, we've said, geez, this is a really small change, but we really should be able to approve this administratively. Um, but we don't have that. So that's actually why we had any conditions. That's something that's really, that's small or technical. We could just approve administratively. When Danielle and I looked at this, what I thought about it was, well, this is not a small change, but it is actually in line with what the board was saying to them when they were here, exactly what you and, um, the chairman just said about, uh, you thought it had too much parking and that kind of thing. We want the housing on the same footprint. So we felt like it's in line with what the board was asking for. It's still within zoning, but we did not feel that it was a small enough change that we could just approve it administratively, that it properly needed to come back to this board for you to see.
But I will flag that this is still site plan review and it is still in compliance with zoning.
[Sean Beagan]: So in terms of public notice, this meeting was noticed, but unlike, you know, the process before, the abutters weren't directly notified. This was just a public notice for the meeting, correct?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Because our, right, because our change process does not require a legal public hearing with the newspapers and everything, just a public meeting. Right.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, I would add that we're, we're looking at what qualified for the modification, um, that this, yeah, this didn't rise to a public hearing, but definitely not something that Alicia or I could approve administratively that we felt strongly. This did need to go to the board. Um, and I'll say it, yeah, it's hard to see, you know, any past precedent because This was a fully by right project where previously we didn't, there were very few multifamily developments that were ever by right. Usually there was, they had to go to the zoning board for use variances or setbacks and, you know, a million different things, like even 255 main street, that was eight units that you approved the other week that required tons of variances before it even got to you. So if they were changing number of units, you know, that boom, they had to go back to zoning board if they wanted to change something, whereas this was by right and still would have been by right. If they came out of the gate with this, which is why we felt that legally it was. You know, just a modification, even though it, it does feel kind of significant, but it is still in bounds and, um. Especially with the multifamily overlay district that this was had to be by right. It was never something that could be discretionary. You know, this, this was zoning that we had to put in place. Per state law, this, this wasn't something that's been around. This was the 1st, this was the 1st project. I think, and the only project that's gone through. the overlay for the MBTA communities.
[Chair Doug Carr]: So. Go ahead, Dina, you had a question.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, and Danielle, just to give you, so I can, we're all, so I'm perfectly clear. This is the parking right now that is part of the modification is all within the MBTA overlay zoning right now. And actually it's above the requirement. So this is all by right and certainly within the bounds of the zoning within the MBTA overlay, which was, it's all state mandated. Correct?
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah. So the requirement is 0.5. And they're providing 0.7, 0.7, right? So I think it was, I think, I think there's an extra 50 spots. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 5, 0, I think. Then they need to provide, so it's still. A project so based on the zoning and the state law. That the zoning was put in place. I don't think that there's really a lot of. There's not a lot of discretion that this board has.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, the only thing I stated before was that there would be no option for residential parking on the neighboring streets. That could be a problem. We hear that echoed in all of our conversations on these site plans. So, no, I'm fine with it.
[Chair Doug Carr]: So, Danielle, before I open it to the public comments, the question was raised, I think, in one of the comments you received this afternoon about, you know, does any of these changes require that we have to start, someone has to go back to the state, deal with any of the, not just Todd and engineering or the traffic in Medford, but is there anything beyond Medford that would be triggered by this change that you can see?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The state does not review our MBTA zoning applicants.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm talking about Route 16, I think. I thought that was that.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: If you're talking about Route 16, the MassDOT, you could ask the applicant. We would never. That's not under our purview at all.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, there was a comment letter that came in today from Zachary Chertoff. He's not here tonight. But I forwarded it to Todd, but he's not in today. That's not my wheelhouse, that's not my area of expertise, so I don't.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Right, it's up to the applicant to make sure they comply with MassDOT. I see that Peter has his hand raised. Do you mind if I make him a co-host?
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, go right ahead. Peter, go ahead.
[Peter Spellios]: Yeah, Mr. Chairman, great question about the state involvement. We have separately and independently, we are working with MassDOT relative to their review because of the Route 16 and a portion of Middlesex being under state jurisdiction. That's distinct and different from the site plan process that happens between this time and the time we pull a building permit. So we had actually started that process and we're similarly modifying that process with them just to reflect the change in unit count and parking spaces. But that's a separate process that is administrative that we're going through with MassDOT. And we will be catching up, if you will, post tonight with MassDOT on these changes. So the state will have its opportunity to review those things as well.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Peter. Rebecca, would you let me unmute you? Go ahead.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Yeah, so I was basically going to say the same thing that Peter already said that we are already in the process with MassDOT. We've gotten through our 25% application with them, which is the first phase. They sent us back some comments, which are all very minor comments just to adjust kind of the angle of the driveways as they meet the roadways. We're in the process of addressing those and after tonight's meeting, we'll be submitting that back to them. for the next review, but we don't anticipate that it would change anything. The level of traffic impact, it doesn't meet any new thresholds requiring any different permits or anything with them. So we'll continue on the process that we're on with the driveway permits.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, thank you, Ms. Brown. All right, I'm gonna pause here. I'm gonna open up the public comment period. Let me just read the preamble. For those who wish to provide comments, please use the raise hand feature on the reactions in Zoom. If you're dialed in a phone, you can use star nine to raise your hand. You can also message Alicia in the chat if you're having technical difficulties. Before providing your comments, please state your name and address for the record. A reminder to not use a chat for any comments to city staff or board members, as it is not part of the public record. And if you're having audio or technical issues, please message the staff for assistance. Each participant will have two minutes to speak. And I'll start with Bri. Could you give your name and address for the record, please?
[SPEAKER_01]: Uh, hey, everybody, my name is Eric. You hear me? Right?
[Chair Doug Carr]: We could hear. Okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfect. Yeah. My name is Eric. I live on 9th street. So, right. You know, I could see, I could see where this is going to be developed. And I just sorry, just totally. Okay. Thank you. Yep. And I just want to let it know that I don't think the issues that the apartment is being built, I don't have a problem with more people being around here. I just think that the current infrastructure that we have right now on 9th Street does not really support the density that is now not only just being proposed and grown upon, now about a 20% growth in apartments right now.
So yeah, I don't think that's the real problem, but I think that some of the infrastructure on 9th Street and the confusion around that general area is probably the biggest problem with putting a huge development right there, at least from my point of view and from the point of view of a lot of people in this area. There's a lot of elderly people in these buildings, probably the four or five apartment buildings that are right around there. And I think this, this would just be a little bit of a emergency vehicle emergency kind of hazard, you know, because of the lack of infrastructure that is kind of being poured into this area. If we're going to have this much more traffic and, you know, I know you guys talked about.
I think a reface of 9th Street, was I wrong about that? I'm pretty sure I saw a slide that says refacing 9th Street, or I don't know if that meant that you guys are going to repave it or redo it, but it's definitely taken a big beating and it keeps getting worse every single year. But yeah, I feel like I don't I don't think the trip count really takes an account the the guests The family members that are gonna be visiting the you know, the uber drivers back and forth the deliveries for food It's not just you know, a couple of uber drivers dropping off people and and picking them up I feel like it's a lot more than a lot more traffic and Currently we we kind of use the cappies parking lot behind Cappy's for emergencies and stuff. I'm not saying that's our right to do, but I feel like that helps in general. If that's not taken into account with that space being gone, I don't know what a lot of people will do when there is some problem, whether it's too much snow or whatever it may be. But I think the lack of infrastructure right there is probably the biggest problem, not the parking spots or anything like that. If you guys have any insight on what's going to be done for 9th Street, to help the infrastructure there. I mean, I'd love to hear.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Eric. I do believe, and I think Attorney Moore did put the various infrastructure improvements that were proposed for Ninth Street that were approved back in the fall. Those have not changed. So I think that maybe it's just worth maybe just Valerie just walking through them very briefly.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sure, what did the resurface mean? I just wanted to ask about that too, the resurface of 9th Street. Did that mean you guys were going to repave it and fix it in that way? I just kind of was unclear about that.
[Valerie Moore]: Yes, that's part of it. I'm actually going to ask Rebecca to go through the mitigation and before she does, I'll just say none of what we proposed in terms of mitigation is changing as part of this. So as the board recalls, we did make some significant commitments in terms of improvements to 9th Street and all of those will remain in place as part of this.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Go ahead, Rebecca.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: All right, thank you. Yeah, so we are planning to resurface 9th Street. So what that basically means is milling down the existing pavement and then putting a new layer of pavement over the top of it. And then also reinstalling all of the pavement markings out there. I know some of them are faded in that area. Some of them haven't been reinstalled in quite some time. So we would be putting down new pavement markings out there. The other thing that we would be doing is putting in a raised crosswalk just to the west of our site driveway. And that would also serve as a traffic calming device, because it is a race device so that would help to slow people down and adding some pedestrian crossing signage. Along the roadway as well as warning signage to let people know that there are raised features along 9th street and then down at the intersection with Middlesex Avenue. We'd also be installing some signage there to alert. people that that is a private roadway, so they are not allowed to turn onto that roadway unless they are local traffic. A similar type of sign would be located out on Revere Beach Parkway as well. That was in our proposal to MassDOT as part of that application. They did not comment on that, so we are proceeding with installing that sign as well out on Revere Beach Parkway for that right-hand turn onto Brainerd Avenue to alert people that that is a private road and right turns are prohibited unless you are local traffic in that area as well.
There are some other improvements that we had discussed and are still in the works with the neighborhood to determine if those are the best fit for the neighborhood, which includes some additional speed bumps on both Brainerd Avenue and 9th Street, as well as some upgrades at the intersection of 9th Street and Brainerd Avenue itself. With installing additional signs, private roadway there for 9th street traffic, installing new stop signs, crosswalks and curb ramps in that area to kind of narrow down the intersection effectively to make it a little bit more difficult for someone to take it. to turn at a high speed. And so those are things that the applicant previously agreed to fund 50% of the cost of those improvements, provided that the neighborhood agrees with those. And there would be some cost sharing between a couple of the other buildings that are located along 9th Street and Brainerd Avenue for the other 50% of that funds.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah. Thank you, Rebecca. Sean, you have a question.
[Sean Beagan]: No, just Mr. Chairman, just for a point of clarification and transparency, I want to make sure the gentleman who made the comment understands that the portion of 9th Street that's being repaved is only the portion that is adjacent to this property. They're not repaving the entirety of 9th Street because they can't, because this was a lot of the discussion last time was there's limitations on what can be done here because it is a private way. And they need cooperation of the budding landowners and we went back and forth and that's I think that's why the a lot of these.
Conditions are qualified with the 50% number 2, because there's adjoining property owners that. reasonably should be contributing to some of these improvements, but they can't repave the entire street. I suppose they could if the other property owners allowed them to and they wanted to, but they can't do it on their own.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: The remaining part of 9th Street is not in as bad of condition because it was reconstructed more recently. The section along 9th Street, along the site frontage is in pretty poor condition. That's where you have a lot of the potholes and things like that, pavement patching and everything in that area.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you. I'm going to go back to the public comments. Mehmet Ergezir. I'm sorry if I butchered your name. Please give your name and address for the record, Mehmet.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: Thanks. My name is Memo Ergezer. I live on the 8th and 9th street. And I'm on the HOA board here in the Parkway Plaza West. I guess regarding the last comment that was made, being a private way and having some obstructions. If they would like to build the resurface to full street, I like to believe many of the residents and buildings here will be willing to work with them. I like to think there wouldn't be an obstacle on that. This project did unite the multiple buildings on the 9th Street, as Eric mentioned, because of the infrastructure limitations that we've been facing here on the street.
Okay, thank you. We appreciate that. And then if I'm here, I also want to ask, one of the conditions was that was enforcing no parking on 9th Street. Well, was no parking on 9th Street for the new residents of 248 before and almost 300 now. Um, I guess we're curious how we could enforce that. We've been trying to look into it on our own and realize that if it's right to you and come with like a sticker kind of a method. If you wanted to get somebody told we have to go in person to the Medford city police or something like that in the city, even though it's a private trade. Um, we were just curious if you wanted to enforce. One of these conditions, how can we go about it? Any recommendations?
[Chair Doug Carr]: Go ahead, Alicia.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Chair Memo, if you want to shoot me an email about that, I will connect you with the city staff who can provide that information. It's a one time. There is a notification to the police that you have that posted. And then I believe it's actually like a phone call over there if you're actually having somebody towed. But actually, there's we have the information on the city's website. And we have staff who are conversant with that, who can follow up with you on how that works.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: OK.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I assume you have my email. I'll put it in the chat here.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: I have your email. Thank you. OK. And then, similarly, they would mention that reducing the parking would reduce the number of cars. But I also believe, as Eric mentioned, there would be now with 50 more units, will be significantly more Uber drivers and food delivery. Um, again, similarly, how can we ensure that those people don't park on 9th Street or even in our properties? There's already Uber drivers, like, pulling into our driveway, using our parking spots. Um, any suggestions for that, either from the city or the property?
[Chair Doug Carr]: Um, Rebecca, can you speak to that? I think you did have some changes you made in that area of the drop-off, right? That was why you did it, I believe.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Yes, so we've actually established a drop off from Middlesex Avenue and Valerie actually, if you want to pull up the. the site plan showing that. But there is actually a drop-off area that is proposed on Middlesex Avenue itself where all of those deliveries and Uber drivers, those types of things are intended to occur so that people do not need to use 9th Street or any other areas around the site.
[Chair Doug Carr]: We could zoom in a little bit to that corner. Is that possible? I don't know if this is a PDF. Yeah, there it is. Just to get a little better look at it.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Yeah, so there's a pull-off area there that has kind of three visitor spaces or Uber or Lyft driver spaces for people to pull into. And then there's a couple of spaces right up against the building too where you can see vehicles in there where someone who's waiting to pick someone up or dropping off food would be able to pull in that area.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Is that about five or six total spaces there potentially?
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Yes, six passenger vehicles could fit in there or like a Amazon van or something like that. As well, six of those can fit.
[Chair Doug Carr]: What was it before the last iterations?
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: I believe the last one was also six that we could fit in there. Okay.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: I mean I guess for this moment this is six places for visitor parking and the food delivery and Uber. Like we are a fraction of the size and we have a lot more visitor parking and we already run out of spaces for those. So I don't know if the board, like I'm afraid this is not gonna help the 9th Street case.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Oh, sorry memo. Yeah, I was just going to say visitors can park inside of the parking garage to do that area in the front there from Middlesex Avenue is really meant for your, like, short. term, where somebody is picking somebody up on their way to work to carpool, they could pull in there or an Uber or Lyft driver, something like that. If someone is looking to come and park more long term as a visitor, they would be pulling into the parking garage and doing that.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Rebecca, how many total visitor parking spots in the garage of the 216 or the 15?
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: I don't know. Matt, do you know that number? I know Matt Costa is on the line too.
[Peter Spellios]: Do I see that? It's Peter Spillers. We don't designate spaces in the garage. Okay. So there isn't a predetermined number of visitor spaces in the garage.
[Chair Doug Carr]: So it's the leftover.
[Peter Spellios]: Yeah, and again, space is not exclusive. So anytime there's an empty space, there's availability.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay. Paige Muldigney, go ahead.
[Page Buldini]: Real quick, with this map, can we just show some of the residents, please, where everybody will be going in and out of the parking garage? Because I think you tried to pull that away from 9th Street. Is that correct? To kind of limit, I mean, you can't limit part driving on 9th Street, but I think that was, an opportunity to pull it a little bit away, right?
[Peter Spellios]: Please go ahead.
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_24]: Oh, I was gonna say there's two entrances into the parking garage area. One of those is from Revere Beach Parkway, where I see Valerie's got her cursor over that area. That's where a lot of the traffic will come in and out of the parking garage. The other location is on Ninth Street. And we've pulled that back as far away from the intersection with Middlesex Avenue as possible there to get it away from the intersection. As you know, right now, there is a driveway that's almost right up against that intersection. So we've pulled it up away as far as we possibly can there. And that's where people who, for example, Head South down Fells Way, they're likely to come out onto 9th Street to be able to do that because it would be difficult for them to get across multiple lanes on Revere Beach Parkway. So those are the people that we anticipate would be utilizing the 9th Street driveway to come back out of the site.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Okay, thank you, Rebecca. Are there any other public comments? Anyone wants to speak in favor or against any aspect of this project? If you are, please raise your hand. Kristen Scalise, please your name and address for the record. Go ahead. Thank you, Kristen. I can't hear you. No. Volume a little higher, that's all? Or just speak. Go ahead. I think I can hear you now.
[Scalise]: All right, can you hear me?
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes, I can.
[Scalise]: Sorry about that. I'm Kristen Scalise. I live at 89th Street. My husband and I own a condo here, and I am also a member of the condo board. However, I want to stress that my comments that I make here are my personal opinion, not of the condo board. I have a lot of thoughts about this development, but overall, I think it'll be a positive addition to the neighborhood. 15 years ago, Cappy was a good neighbor. That's not the case anymore. Building parking lot, decrepit, falling apart. They don't shovel their sidewalk on time. Our entire neighborhood is covered in nip bottles. So while I am not psychic and I don't know what the transom building is going to be like, I do know that Peter has been communicative with the three condo boards on 9th Street. And he has made a few adjustments to their plans based on a few of the concerns we brought up to him, like the positioning of the 9th Street entrance and the garbage.
And also, just since I'm not an alarmist, I want to point out that an increase of the number of units doesn't necessarily mean there's going to be an increase in the number of residents. Three roommates in a three-bedroom could turn into three individual people in studio apartments, so we actually can't assume that it's going to be a larger number of people and there's already a lot of people in our neighborhood who live on this street who either don't have a car or like me and my husband we have only one car between us and we chose to buy here specifically so we could walk to the T and take it to work. We have one car between two people and we almost never drive it so it's not unusual. And since this building seems like it's going to pull in a younger demographic, it seems even more likely that there will be fewer drivers. But aside from that, regarding the parking, transom's not the problem. Everyone who lives here has been complaining for years. The one thing this has told me is that Medford is the problem and everyone should be paying attention to that.
And I think my time is up, so I'll stop.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Thank you, Kristen. Well done. All right, any other public comments? Seeing none, I will close the public hearing and then I'm going to ask the board informally how they would like to proceed. Any takers?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Does the board need to know that you are being asked whether or not to approve this?
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'm asking if they feel that they're ready for a vote or not. Are you feeling comfortable? I'm going to be honest here, before this meeting, I wasn't, because I wanted to make sure the neighbors knew about this. And my concern about the traffic, if Alicia says that she feels she could speak confidently on behalf of the traffic and that it won't be an issue on behalf of the city because of what she sees, I take her at her word. I'm sure she knows. She knows the people in City Hall far better than we do. But I don't want to speak for the board. I want to get your thoughts. If you feel comfortable moving this forward, are there any open issues that you do not feel comfortable with?
[Sean Beagan]: I'd be ready to move it forward. I think if this plan came before us originally, we would have liked it better than the plan they proposed.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, I agree. I think that it's by right. by the MBT overlay, the zoning is still, the parking is still well above the required parking as part of the zoning. And I think that the applicant has put together a good case for the modifications made. Okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: How about you Paige?
[Page Buldini]: I agree and thank you for bringing up the public comment about MassDOT in the roads. And if that's something that's already taken care of that we know will be, you know, updated or discussed or whatever, I think that's really important. So I do feel the same and I echo what the board is saying. Okay.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah. And as long as there is no other type of review that is required as part of the city staff, I'm comfortable with it.
[Chair Doug Carr]: John Anderson, how are you feeling? I'm fine with it. All right. I'll entertain a motion then to, if so inclined, to approve the modification to site plan approval for 10 and 20 River Beach Parkway for the drawings. Seconded. Very good. I'll do a roll call. John Anderson? Yes. Sean Began? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes. Yes. I actually think I agree with Sean. I think it's a better project and I'm going to go out on a limb and say, I still think you're a little over parked, but that's okay. That means the neighbors, maybe we'll get a deal next time we have 20 inches of snow in Wellington.
[Sean Beagan]: We got everything we asked for last time, more affordable units and less parking.
[Peter Spellios]: I will do better to listen to you all next time. Thank you again.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Cheers. Talk to you soon. All right, next item approved new linkage fee rates. This is something that obviously maybe Danielle, you could walk us through this one. I can do the preamble. November 2025, the state legislature approved a Home Rule petition to allow the city to adjust its linkage extraction program between periods of review via the Consumer Price Index. This new schedule adjusts the fees originally adopted in 1990. 36 years ago by the CPI for 2025, which was 2.7%. Alicia, Danielle, do you have anything you want to add to that? It sounds like the linkage fees could have doubled in those 30 years if we'd kept up with the CPI.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, it's, so I can bring up the, let's see.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: While Danielle's doing that, do you want me, I feel like we've discussed before, I don't remember if every member of the board was here when we did, why we are not recommending using the compounded CPI difference from 1989. Would you like me to repeat that?
[Chair Doug Carr]: You should because it would be a ton of money, right?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: It's painful to see what could have been. In a very high, very high level, In theory, we're also supposed to do studies periodically to make sure that they are in line with what's allowed. And so the updated thing was that we were supposed to update them every three years. They were never changed. We should do studies. Our feeling is that if we actually updated them by the CPI from 1990 to now, without doing a study, we would face a lot of lawsuits from developers who would say our rates were out of line and out of control. And our lawyers tell us we wouldn't have a very good defense. Whereas by just saying that at this time, we are going to start updating them by the CPI. And I believe, did you read the part? There was a thing that says that every 10 years, we have to do a study to make sure there's still an alignment. That's something we can plan for. So that's why this is in front of you.
[Chair Doug Carr]: That makes sense. We can't undo the last 30 years. We can only go, let's just move forward. I don't disagree with that. Paige, go ahead.
[Page Buldini]: Just for clarity, because I was looking at this too, what is considered southeastern Medford only for the roads and traffic facilities? Do we have a, do we know? I know what I think it is, but I don't know.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So Christian actually found some documentation that. had pretty good boundaries.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Christian, do you have that handy? I'll tell you that Christian found something that nobody in the city has been aware of for the last 20 years. So we have just been using the common sense of what seems to be southeastern Medford for the last 20 years, as far as I can tell and looking at documents. But he found language in the original study. Oh, cool.
[Christian Zepeda-Lipovsky]: Yeah, the language is that southeastern section of Medford includes the area roughly bounded by the Everett line to the east, the Somerville line to the south, Interstate 90 to the southwest, Locust Street to the west, Spring Street to the west, Myrtle Street to the north, and the Malden line to the north. And if Danielle wants to stop sharing, I made a map of that area that I could share.
[Chair Doug Carr]: We're all going to learn something new about Medford tonight.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: If anybody's looking to hire a future lawyer, somebody who's this precise, Christian is looking for a job when he graduates.
[Christian Zepeda-Lipovsky]: That's true.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I wish we could make him a job, but that is not. I have been informed that we will not be getting a new full time position on our staff.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Is that not Glenwood, or is that?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: This is more what we would call the Wellington area. OK.
[Chair Doug Carr]: But it's more than that.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: You said 90. You meant 93.
[Sean Beagan]: Are we looking at the area in red? Yes. Yes.
[Christian Zepeda-Lipovsky]: Correct.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And I think, Christian, you actually said there was a reason for this area. Do you want to explain that?
[Christian Zepeda-Lipovsky]: The reason they said was in the nexus study that there wasn't a full traffic study done for the whole city. And the only traffic study that was done was for this section of Medford. And the roads were so bad that all of the A linkage fees that would be collected for that area within that area would only be able to be used for traffic improvement projects in Southeastern Medford, which is why there's the rational nexus between collecting those fees in that area. That's still true. 36 years later.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: that we don't have other studies? Well, we've had a lot of studies all over the city, but none of them looking at this exact, like for this purpose. In 10 years, we can.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, it sounds like it. All right.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: CPW is going to be pretty unhappy. They like collecting. They spend the roads money that comes in.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Are there any other questions by the board about this topic. We do need to vote on it, but I just want to give it time. I know it's getting late and I honestly think we're not going to have a lot of energy left for Medford Square because it is getting late and that's a rabbit hole. I don't think we can go too deep down.
[John Anderson]: Can I ask a question? Go ahead, John. What would be the mechanism if we wanted to do some catch up?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: We'd have to do a study and we anticipate, we've done research on that and we're talking like 80 to $100,000 for that. And we cannot use linkage fees to pay for that. It'd have to be a cash appropriation. We checked that too.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, the attorney said no. But we can do the 2.7% this year and every year following
[John Anderson]: without any approval by anybody? Yes.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah. Right.
[John Anderson]: Yes.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Well, each year it's 2.7% this year, but it might be different next year. It might be something different next year.
[John Anderson]: Oh, right. CPI. Right. Gotcha. So this is half a slice is better than no loaf.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Any other questions about the linkage fees, the new linkage fee rates? When do they go into effect?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: When immediately the question is, I think that one question that we've sort of floated is that if a project that's already. So let me give you the two, the couple of examples, projects that have been already approved by this board that have doing or working through their financing, who had an assumption of linkage fees, they have to sign their agreement with us. So usually The point at which we set the actual dollar amount is when they apply for the building permit, because that is when their, for residential, their number of units is set, right? Any project might vary, like this, a normal, this project could have gone up by like 10 units or down, and you would never, it would have been noise.
So that's the point when we set the exact, they sign an agreement and they pay the linkage fees before the building permit is issued. If we were doubling them, I would argue that it should be only ones that haven't come in front of you yet. Since the amount that we're changing is noise, I don't know that this amount is going to be meaningful to anybody. And it's easier to just say, going forward, anybody who needs linkage. I may want to accept the one project that we forgot to collect linkage fees for before the building permit was signed. And so they're actually almost done with construction and looking for like getting close to occupancy. And we realized that we never did linkage that feels they should have paid their linkage fees a year and a half ago. And so it feels bad from my perspective to ask them to pay the higher rate.
Anybody else though seems fair.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Was it 3,000 bucks a unit for the last 30 plus years?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I don't know what the number is. The one that's in question for me, though, is Herb Chambers. We never charged them. So there's by square footage, not by unit.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Got it. I mean, 2.7% goes from 3,000 to 3,081. John? How about the guy we just approved on Salem Street?
[John Anderson]: What would his linkage fees go up by?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The change? Here, do you have the numbers in front of you? Residential. The residential, the number of, so he is within Southeastern. So it's 3903, who knows the number of total units right now?
[Chair Doug Carr]: 14, that's 42,000.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: $42,000? I think so. Is that the chance?
[Chair Doug Carr]: No, that's the base.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Oh, that's the increase. No, not the number of units he changed by.
[Sean Beagan]: It's only like $100 per unit.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: It's like $1,400. Oops. It would be 4,009.37 minus 3,903.97 times the number of units. Couple of trees. About $1,500, I think.
[John Anderson]: Okay, I guess I would have sort of felt sorry for him if we, after we charged him for some extra trees, then we were gonna say, oh, and by the way, this thing went out, but you know.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Oh, do you mean the 14 units?
[John Anderson]: Yes.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yeah. Oh, oh yeah.
[John Anderson]: That would be sort of a dirty trick if from the same night we approved it, we raised his fee, which we're doing, but I guess.
[Dina Caloggero]: It's the rounding error. That's just mean. We've already approved the site plan, no.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'll entertain a motion to approve the new linkage rate fee.
[Dina Caloggero]: So moved. So moved.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Second, please. Second. All right, John Anderson.
[John Anderson]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: John Began. Yes. Page Buldini.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Dina Calgaro.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes, please.
[Chair Doug Carr]: All right, Goffman is absent and myself Doug Carr, yes. Motion passes five to nothing. Again, we're closing in on 10 o'clock. I just don't feel we have the ability. We don't have the ability. I just think maybe Danielle and Alicia, you could give us a five minute executive summary of what we're gonna be for next week.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Is it circulate the updated zoning? So Danielle and I have sent tonight comments to, uh, in this updated the zoning. Danielle and I have put comments on it that I think Danielle, you sent, I saw you sent those to Emily. Um, today, those that version of the zoning has been available to Doug and Sean. Did you send it to the whole board? for comments. I know the city council has had it to comment on. I have no- I think only you and I were the only ones that did comment. If anybody else commented, they did not share those comments with us. Let's put it that way, right? It's possible we're the only ones who made comments. I'm happy to share out to this board if we haven't, again, or for the first time, the updated version of the zoning with our comments on it, what we expect that you're going to get on Monday is a clean version of the updated, like with our comments sort of resolved in some manner. I personally haven't seen Danielle's comments. I've been too busy with other things.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Because of open meeting law, we all can't be collaborating, or the board at least can't be collaborating with comments on a draft. We can share what we, what Alicia and I's comments are. You all could be commenting on yours. Yes, I just had finished my comments today, actually. sent the rest of it during this meeting, during the Wellington presentation. I'm always multitasking. There's not enough hours in the day to do this stuff, not same time as other things. We did get an updated map tonight or this morning. I think it was this morning. I can share these.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: We'll share these.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Could you show the updated map? Yes. I'm sharing it now. Can you see that?
[MCM00001814_SPEAKER_10]: Yes.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: So I was very pleased to see that they carved out these two parcels on Garden, which had no business being in the district, GR, and then carved out this one by the CVS, which also had no business being in the district. So those three are gone out of it. And then they down-zoned these ones. These are two circa 1900,
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Let's see houses that the residential or commercial at the moment, but they, they present like, yeah, and so those.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: They switched it down to the. Medford square 1, so we changed the nomenclature so that we're not having this generic 1 to 2 to a, it was just getting to. How many sub districts can we have? And then for them to, and then having to make sure that that district, that sub district would be appropriate for that part of the square, but also somewhere else in the city, it was just too much. So this is what it is now. I still have.
some unresolved questions about step backs and making sure that the height to right of way ratio is appropriate. So it's not creating urban canyons because high street, this right of way is quite narrow. And so I don't think it can support a sheer wall of four or five stories right at the lot line.
[Dina Caloggero]: I completely agree. I completely agree.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: But I think that the right of ways over here are quite wide and could have Higher heights, maybe with different step backs at different levels. So I just want the consult. 1 of my comments is for the consultants to really look at that and study that making sure that their. Assumptions about height align with how we measure height. And how that will relate to. the right of way and the pedestrian experience. So there's still that sense of enclosure of in a downtown, but not a canyon where we're going to have a wind tunnel and all kinds of like microclimate adverse impacts. Have you ever walked through like assembly row in winter? I was just going to say that. It is miserable. It is absolutely miserable. It is a wind tunnel. It was horrible. Terrible. We don't want that. We want the still to be a pleasant place. So we have to be careful.
I'll get off my soapbox now. Dina, you had a question?
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah. So I took a walk on Ashland, especially after the session on March 11th. So on Salem Street, right on Ashland Ave, those first two houses there. The first one is a MD. It's like a doctor. But that house right next to it on Salem Street. There's one there that is historical. The building was built in 1829 circa. And that is 11 Ashland. So those houses should be removed right there. And then on the opposite side of Ashland, there's the blue Fuji restaurant. And then to the left of that is another residential building. It's actually a halfway house that should also be removed.
So how do I submit- Are you saying that you wouldn't want the building that is currently the Hatchway House to be able to be redeveloped at some point in the future to- No, I think it's, I think it's, I think I'm going to leave that up to if that's allowed in the mixed use, but right now it's seven stories. It could be up to seven stories in that area, right? According to that.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yes.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah. So I think that's much too high.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: And actually, the incentive zoning. So this is the details. This is where the devil is in the details. Let me reread this. But it was my understanding. My memory is that the incentive zoning is only allowed on the main streets on High Salem Riverside. and not on the side streets. So actually, even though it's the dark blue, it only has the base, which is five stories, not seven. I don't know if that makes you feel better.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Does it say that in there? Maybe it does. I have to look at that closer then. It should be in the definitions. Yeah.
[Sean Beagan]: But I would still take it. I think that language is definitely in the Salem Street zoning. I don't know if it was in this zoning.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, I did not see that. I agree with Sean.
[Sean Beagan]: I just can't remember. I'm not saying it is or it isn't. I just can't remember.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Are you still awake? Can you write that down for us?
[Sean Beagan]: Did you have a question?
[Page Buldini]: Just real quick. I know everybody is tired. So thank you. How can I just ask, because I'm looking at the working meeting minutes, and I'm so appreciative that you guys are all taking another time for meeting. How is the vibe? Are you feeling it's collaborative? I just want to make sure that we're going into these joint meetings prepared. working together? I don't know. Could you give a quick two-second recap? Because I want to make sure we're supporting you guys on the board and Alicia and Danielle. I know.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I'll let Sean. Sean, you missed the last one, but you've been to enough of them. You can probably speak generally to what the vibe is.
[Sean Beagan]: I mean, yeah, I wasn't at the last meeting, but I felt that As between the Community Development Board and the City Council members, everyone seems very open to listening and taking suggestions. And I mean, I think that's reflective in all the changes you've seen so far from the product we started with to where we're here. I mean, everyone's been pretty receptive, I think. I don't wanna speak for city council, but I think that they want to get this accomplished in a timely manner and move on and not spend months on it. But to the same extent, I think they have been receptive to our arguments that we have to take a little bit more time to get a very thoughtful and nice product that everyone's gonna be happy with. And that makes sense for people who wanna build in the city to know what they can do.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, I would agree with that. I think they're just generally more in a hurry, and we want to be a little bit more thoughtful about it. But we're all going to get there. And this is the biggest change we've seen so far. This is just the boundaries. We haven't even talked about historic protections and the parking, which was the really big meat of our concerns as a group. And again, I don't think we can get into that tonight. It's just too late.
I think when we get to this meeting next week, they're going to want to pass it. And I just, I think we're still going to have to tweak. We're not quite there. We are at the 5 or 10 yard line, but we're not the 1 yard line because there's still some things here. Danielle still has questions. They have comments. And you guys need to digest all this. I saw it, but I still have, I need like two days where I just think about this and really digest it and look at all the what ifs to make sure it's right. And I'm just not gonna be sure that will be ready to be done by next Wednesday night. I don't think it will be, but we're not far.
[Sean Beagan]: Can I ask a question? That purple, the purple square that's across from the public library, is that the armory building?
[Chair Doug Carr]: And they put in the public library, but they did not put in the church. I'm just curious if there's any any rationale for that.
[Dina Caloggero]: I think that purple building is a large condominium. And the reason why it looks so high is that I took a walk down the river. And so it's important to note that that building, it's important to measure what is the height level. Is it measured from the river view or is it measured from high straight? Because there is an exceptional gradient height difference when you're looking from the river to looking from high straight.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yeah, it's 20 or 30 feet difference.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Yes, that's what Danielle was referring to about clarifying this height.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: It would be incredibly it'd be incredibly inappropriate to have a 9 story building. at the lot line there without step backs. And we need to make sure that we're all using the same language and scale when we're measuring.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The difficulty here is that the consultants thought that they were measuring from the building as you look at it. If you look at that building and just look at the building, It's a seven-story building. It goes down two stories below the high street grade. But those two stories are above grade. They're above the Mystic Ave grade. So they thought that that's where we were measuring from. And I'm a little confused why they still have it purple because I thought we were very clear with them that actually the grade is measured from the curb at High Street. And that is something that there's two things going on. One is we need the definition of height clarified in our zoning because it turns out reasonable people interpret things differently. So our building commissioner has requested the words to be changed to reflect better what we're actually doing. And I think we just need to lean in to tell Emily, change that you have to understand that all of those that the height is being measured from the high street curb so we so what but the thing is here's his thing he wants to say that the height is measured from the grade the land where the prop for the building sits that was His preference, because that's the average the average yeah because, for example, the way our height is literally technically done it's from the curb at the frontage it's from that curve. We have roads with no curbs, whatever. We also have houses where the curb is at one height, then you go up an entire full flight of stairs or two flights of stairs, and then you get to the front door of the house. Does that mean that house is four stories tall? That's right. Yeah, that doesn't make any sense.
[Sean Beagan]: So, only for the person climbing the stairs.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: 1 thing that I yeah, and 1 of my comments is is also when you look at the table of dimensional standards, they're only the height requirements are only in stories. They have nothing in feet. Yep, that's a problem. That is a problem. Good one, Danielle.
[Sean Beagan]: Can we just play that, Alicia and Danielle, can we just play that the situation out for this lot that's in purple across from the library? So I know this building, I know the one you're talking about, and it's two or three floors below High Street is where it starts. Right. So are you saying that if this was The purple is seven stories by right. You're saying you would measure the seven stories from high street or no?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The way our zoning is currently written, yes.
[Sean Beagan]: Okay.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The way the building commissioner would actually like to change the definition, you would measure it from the ground.
[Sean Beagan]: That makes more sense to me. So that that building doesn't become a 12-story building or whatever.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: We either need to change the height allowed here or the definition. That's right. He's actually advocating that we change the definition throughout the entire zoning.
[Chair Doug Carr]: That seems to make sense. John Anderson has his hand raised and I'll go to you, Paige, next, and then Dina. Go ahead, John. Are you still with us?
[John Anderson]: Oh, yes. I'm still with you. The Iron Man. At our last meeting, I was convinced that overlays were no longer needed because the same thing could be accomplished more consistently with just straight zoning. Now we've got the transom overlay has appeared. I saw the memo from the mayor about that. And when I look at the, Well, they don't really show a map of it, but as best I could determine, the transom overlay will take about half of what's in Medford Square 4, maybe even more, and a good chunk out of that piece between Riverside and Clippership Drive. So it seems to me that we really ought to include that in our discussion.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So actually, let me explain this for you. Let me just back up a sec. So it's three parcels, but it looks like lots of little things here. It's what went out to bid. And it's not because of the heights. It's not because of the setbacks and stuff. It's because this is a property owner that we're doing a lot of negotiation with behind the scenes. We have a lot of control over the building. and what it can and can't do, how it's going to look and feel.
This project wants to have some waivers for some areas. For example, We want 12 foot sidewalks everywhere. There are a few places on these few parcels that in order to get 12 foot sidewalks, he has to lose parking spots. So he wants waivers from the zoning that we think are probably appropriate, but you do not wanna allow that leeway throughout all of this Medford Square, because there will be other property owners who are going to, build to the limits who are going to do what they want to do and may not negotiate nicely with the city and may not be good partners. So you want to make sure that things are pretty strict in a lot of the zoning, whereas we would probably give transom some leeway in order to do what we want them to do on these specific parcels. So that's actually the reason it's not the height, it's not these things, it's that on these three parcels, we wanna allow things that we wouldn't allow anywhere else in the square.
[John Anderson]: Now, MS4, that is only in that general area by City Hall, right? It's not Grace Episcopal Church in that area. Right, no. Which by the way, just let me mention as an aside that it would be really helpful to recolor this map it's very difficult, it's really a pain to try to figure out, to comparing these shades of blue and purple. But anyway, going back to the main question, I still don't see why, what you're saying is, you wanna fix the zoning, but meanwhile, you'll be making commitments or the intention of changing it again very quickly.
We could, for example, focus our efforts on the overlay MS4 and MS3 and get all that done with.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: No, it's not all of MS4. So here's the thing. You also have Vita Real Church and there are two additional buildings that are sitting there. You also have the housing authority and a private owner on 99 Riverside, which is a property there. You don't necessarily want to give them all the same waivers you would give transom. You don't want to give, there's, I'm sorry, I'm going to try, I'd be happy to have a couple of offline conversations about this as well.
Because it's not about the heights, the setbacks, it's about the details.
[John Anderson]: Okay. But I mean, in general, The way you zone one area is also, if there's supposed to be consistency between the zone and its neighbor.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So let me just frame it this way. Their lawyer is going to present this on the 31st. It's, I shouldn't actually be presenting it to you in this meeting. We should let their lawyer explain it to you and the reasons behind it. That's the proper way to do this. That's actually a separate public hearing. I cannot appropriately explain this to you. I've been at work for 14 hours.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, and that public hearing hasn't been opened yet, and it'll be separate, so we shouldn't talk about that tonight.
[John Anderson]: Yeah, and Alicia and I dueling to the death about it is not appropriate at this time. I certainly agree to that. Can we at least update the map?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: You want us to ask them for different colors?
[John Anderson]: Yes. Another thing that would be very helpful. I remember back in the old days when we were rezoning the entire Medford, there were zoning maps that actually showed plot addresses. Yeah, that would be helpful. That would be extremely helpful.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes.
[John Anderson]: And save us arguing about whether, you know, one purple blot is a condo or whether it's the armory. I mean, if we want to get this done quickly, give us the tools so we could discuss this.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Oh, you mean the interactive map? Yeah, yeah.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yeah, that doesn't exist anymore. But we should get one just for the square. I thought we'll have to make it in house or something. If we can't get one.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: I thought Emily said that she was almost ready to bring that back.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I want to go to Paige for a minute because she raised her hand. But is it anyone else? See that the key on the left side does not match the colors of the plan. I mean, the bright blue just doesn't on my screen looks completely different than the bright blue in the in the map itself. Is is is that just my screen or I thought it was my screen and it's hard because the footprints of the building.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: are on there that also create a darker shade. It is hard. It is hard. Maybe there should be like stippling or something or hatching to be able to see it.
[Dina Caloggero]: Oh, that's a good idea. That's a good idea, Danielle.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I just don't see the colors. Other than the white, the top one, Medford Square One looks like a match. The other ones just don't look like the map. Go ahead, Paige. You were going to speak.
[Page Buldini]: Super fast. Is there any possible way that we could just get a schedule of all of the meetings? Do we have a meeting on the 25th or was that moved to the first? We are not meeting next week, right?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: The joint public hearing is on the 25th, the Medford Square. That's the same. There is a separate and that's joint hybrid city council chambers. The hearing for the Medford Square overlay is the 31st. It's a Tuesday night and it is Zoom only. And the city council actually agreed to do that as a joint hearing as well. The next hearing, the next meeting after that is actually April 15th, which is the CD board meeting.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: There'll be big stuff on there, like the Tufts Aquatic Center, just to give you a preview.
[Page Buldini]: Because I was messing up my dates, so I just want to make sure with all of the joint meetings and then going forward, because then we're going to roll into Boston Avenue and Tufts.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: So is that a blip to it? We can, Matt, Councilor Leming has put together a meeting schedule. The problem is the version that we have has all the internal working group meetings too. So, I feel like we need if we were going to send you a version, maybe Christian can help us with giving us a version. That's just for the board. That'd be great.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: They update the planning and permitting committee meetings because they had inadvertently scheduled those during the board is not invited to those. I mean, they're, they should be aware of when things are. Yeah.
[Director Alicia Hunt]: Oh, excuse me, are you saying that the PP meeting is not a public meeting? It is a public meeting. It's not a board.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: You're not, you don't show up to those. I mean, you can't, you can obviously watch them, but you can't have a quorum there.
[John Anderson]: You're saying you can't participate.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Yes. Okay.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Uh, Dina, you had a comment.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yep. Um, so I'm going back to the MS 1 question. All right. So if I look at, I'm going back to the chambers recommendation on high street. And the question is, why is one side of High Street higher than the other side? So if we make the adjustment, the adjustment to the definition where the ground sits rather than the height of the building from High Street, that would show uniformity in the height of the buildings on High Street. Is that correct?
[Chair Doug Carr]: I don't think so.
[Dina Caloggero]: Because High Street, if you look at it, those buildings too that are MS1, like next to the, I like the cartoon armory, there is also a difference from when you're looking from the river or whether you're looking at High Street, almost a two-story difference.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Not all of them, because some of them.
[Dina Caloggero]: Not all of them. I agree, not all of them. But some of them.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Most of the ones to the right of the pedestrian bridge don't have any basements. They're just sitting on a wall that's a retaining wall.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yeah, the bank has a basement. The building next to it has a basement. The units on the corners do not. So there needs to be a clear definition of where we're measuring these buildings, because it does look Very strange. Very strange.
[Chair Doug Carr]: We've got to fix it. It may be situational because we obviously want it to be a certain amount on High Street, but we do not want it to be crazy high.
[Dina Caloggero]: Right.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Yes, that's my point. When it does start stepping down, I hate to say it, but it's almost building by building.
[Dina Caloggero]: Right, it's going to look quite big. It can't be seven stories and then four. It looks stupid. And then the other thing is, could you please put versioning on these maps? I have so many maps, I can't figure out what map is active, which one isn't.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Agreed.
[Dina Caloggero]: And the other thing is, how do I propose changes? Like, I want to propose a change for the Ashland properties that I took a look at today. I'm sorry, I'm getting a little grumpy, but I'm really tired. I had a long day.
[Chair Doug Carr]: I think you're sending through Danielle and Alicia.
[Dina Caloggero]: So the Ashland properties that I feel should be removed. Do I just comment on this map? Do I send comments to?
[Director Alicia Hunt]: That's just an email to me and Danielle. OK. And we can see about getting that included in the changes before the new version comes in front of the board. That would be excellent. Yeah. Right. Anything that anybody feels strongly should be in there before it goes in front of the board, send us ASAP.
[Dina Caloggero]: OK, I will do that. I will do that tomorrow. I will take a screenshot. I'll make my changes, and I'll send you a snip of what should be removed. Thank you very much.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Folks, my office is gonna sign me off my computer in six minutes. It does this automatically every 10, 1030 on Wednesday night. So I don't think we have much more time, but we have a hell of a lot more to discuss on February 2nd. We just don't have the time for it or the energy, obviously. So I'm going to recommend we actually defer the minutes to next time, because I don't, just adjourn the meeting and everyone's just start sending their comments to Danielle and Alicia, if that's okay.
[John Anderson]: I move to adjourn.
[Chair Doug Carr]: All right. Roll call. John Anderson. Yes. John Began. Yes. Paige Bolini. Yes.
[Dina Caloggero]: Yes, please.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Good night, folks. I'm about to be. Good night.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Good night.
[Chair Doug Carr]: Good luck.
[y94cUzx0pcQ_SPEAKER_01]: Recording stopped.
[Senior Planner Danielle Evans]: Good night. Go home, Alicia.
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