ZBA chastises crowd for excessive applause
Published on May 18th, 2005
STONEHAM, MA - Rising tensions between the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) and a large contingent of out-of-town residents over the Langwood Commons project continued to escalate last Thursday after the board demanded that the opposition stop applauding.
The third continuation of the public hearing on the 550-unit affordable housing project at the former Boston Regional Medical Center (BRMC), last Thursday's meeting marked a second night of lengthy presentations challenging the accuracy and reliability of traffic data presented by the petitioners.
With the passionate assembly clapping and cheering for each speaker - including a light applause for the lone person speaking in favor of the project - ZBA members apparently had enough approximately two-hours into the hearing.
"Excuse me, this isn't a political rally. It's a meeting," ZBA Chairman Frank Vallarelli shouted.
When the audience - which routinely ignored Vallarelli's gavel-banging for silence - responded to the Chairman's demand that the clapping and cheering cease with another in-your-face applause, ZBA member Bill Sullivan immediately motioned to adjourn the meeting.
"I'll be more than happy to withdraw my motion in exchange for a little common courtesy," Sullivan then told the gathering, who continued to shout out in anger at the board members.
"This is arrogance. What a charade," various citizens screamed as ZBA members packed up their belongings after Sullivan's motion passed unanimously.
Data Accuracy
The sole person to support the Gutierrez Company and Simpson Housing, LP, development plans since the meeting was opened to the public, Stoneham resident and Planning Board Chairman Gus Niewenhous argued that the ZBA needed to base their ultimate decision on evidence, not popular sentiment.
According to Niewenhous, while those at odds the mixed-use proposal contend that the site is too dense as-proposed, the fact that the property has a long history of varied uses needs to be considered.
And while the Planning Board Chairman, who sat on the town committee that endorsed the proposal, admitted that the development plans fell short of perfection, Niewenhous claimed that the petitioners' had submitted an overall sound project.
"I know I may be preaching to the unconvertible tonight. [But] ladies and gentlemen, the ship has sailed for this site becoming a forest primeval. There's never a perfect project. There's no one on this earth who can dictate perfection. That's reserved for others," Niewenhous said.
"To those who oppose this project, and I can feel that in this room, bear in mind that based on fact, you need to make your decision based on what's best for the Town of Stoneham. It's not a popularity contest," the Planning Board Chairman added.
Challenging Niewenhous' insistence that the ZBA should utilize both the petitioners' and the BRMC Committee's data when rendering its final decision, the small army of residents fighting the development maintained those studies were filled with flaws, oversights, and inaccuracies.
According to Melrose resident Mike Ryan, the proposal ignores a 2003 demand from the state's Executive Office of Environmental Affairs that the Gutierrez Company reconfigure its former 914,000 square foot office park proposal on a reduced scale.
Instead coming back with a development nearly 100,000 square feet larger - according to Ryan's statistics - the environmental activist labeled the current Langwood Commons plan as the worst proposal for the hospital site yet.
The Melrose resident also disputed the petitioners' traffic studies, which conclude that the proposal will only generate 440 more vehicle trips to and from the site after the property is fully built-out. Specifically, the member of the Friends of the Fells advocacy group argued that traffic consultants calculated that increase based upon an erroneous estimate of the site's vehicle counts when the BRMC was still fully operational.
Yet according to Ryan, that historical analysis, which estimated that close to 8,000 vehicle trips occurred at the site when the BRMC was operational, ignored an actual traffic study conducted in 1986 concluding that 2,020 trips were generated at the hospital.
"The famous traffic study with this so-called historical analysis [proves] that the developers are trying to create a myth. People here tonight, who have lived in the area for a long time, agree that this is the way it was: 2020 traffic trips a day," the Melrose resident commented. "And I believe that an independent analysis would undoubtedly push that number higher."
Also refuting the petitioners' traffic figures, Peter Paicos, one of 70 physicians currently practicing medicine at the BRMC property, claimed that the estimates simply ignored reason. Specifically, the physician questioned how only 440 more traffic trips could be created from a development that will construct 550 new housing units, not to mention the reuse of 250,000 square feet of commercial space.
"That the project would only create 440 more trips per day defies logic. The project alone is creating 550 residential dwellings. A conservative estimate should at least assume 550 more trips," the local physician said, who also characterized the two-plus year old traffic data as stale and in serious need of being updated.
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