The parcel is currently assessed at $3,200
Even with the wholehearted support of the Planning Board, Select Board, Finance Committee and Housing & Sheltering Committee the rezoning of 5.79 acres on University Drive from office park to limited business just barely attained Town Meeting required two-thirds mark, 117 yes to 57 no.
Now the developer, UMass New Build LLC, can move forward with a badly needed (mostly) student housing development consisting of 29 townhouse units with three of them set aside as affordable units.
Concept plan for 29 townhouses, 58 parking spaces on 5.79 acres (2.3 acres of it non buildable wetlands)
Since the property is in Chapter 61A it currently pays the town under $100 in property taxes, and obviously the high end housing development will pay in the six figures annually.
The town will have the "right of first refusal" once the deal is signed but since a disgruntled abutter leaked the potential selling price as $1.5 million, safe bet the town will not want to cough up anywhere near that to keep the 3 acre portion of the site in agricultural production.
$18.70 in taxes paid to the Town as farmland vs. $200,000 as allowed, by right, under current zoning. What's the problem?
ReplyDeletehttp://amherstsaves.org/13B-33-univ-dr/index.html
Without the approval of Hornik and Weiss, the usual suspects would have voted it down.
ReplyDeletei can't imagine any families would want to live with more than 100 rowdy students (at the permitted four unrelated in 26 townhouses) right across the street from three marijuana distribution centers. AND, you can believe that come November these will be Colorado style marijuana stores. Anything for economic development!
ReplyDeleteThis is terrible! Where are they going to grow all the pot for the 4 dispensaries?
ReplyDeleteBuild it….University DR should have been the town's economic whore. Per usual, they balled that up. May as well develop land in an area where there are very few neighborhoods to disrupt. BUT..are they going to widen the roadway there? Make/add a bus stop? Use the tax $ for a firefighter? Cop?
ReplyDeleteNah…a crosswalk needs lights and a lawsuit pends.
What a great housing solution. Better than The Retreat. It's very close to UMass.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great move. Will do a lot to help the student housing squeeze. Its in a great spot as well.
ReplyDeleteI don't see families having a problem living here. There are families who live in Puffton surrounded by students and surrounded by other student heavy complexes. And the pot joints won't be "Colorado style" because they will be only for those sing it for medicinal reasons, not everyone and their uncle. For now.
The cost (ecological and financial) of dealing with flooding and wetlands there will prove too much for the developer and if the place is ever developed as planned it will wind up costing the Town millions in infrastructure to (only partially) mediate the more frequently flooding along University Drive that will ensue. The naive may think this is a wn-win, but in the end it's a lose-lose: Larry's great aerial photo shows why: it's actually great farmland!
ReplyDeleteYeah, if only they had invented drainage pipes.
ReplyDeleteThe engineering was figured out long ago on this. The planning board took a lot of testimony on this issue from qualified engineers including the town engineer and it is easily doable.
ReplyDeleteit's a pity they can't find an old gravelpit somewhere and use it to "mitigate" the loss of wetlands here, drain the site, and develop the whole thing.
ReplyDeleteI think the EPA permits that, and as land in Amherst is far more valuable than in the hilltowns or up by Quabbin (much more ecologically sensitive areas), this would make sense -- which is why it cant be done...
"BUT..are they going to widen the roadway there? Make/add a bus stop? Use the tax $ for a firefighter? Cop?
ReplyDeleteNah…a crosswalk needs lights and a lawsuit pends."
This must be written by Ed, since the commenter clearly doesn't know that there is a light and a crosswalk, and is simply blathering without any knowledge.
It was NOT written by Ed. So sorry to disappoint you.
ReplyDelete