The developers behind the proposed 489 Worcester St., condo complex at the intersection of Cliff Road have been doing the rounds with various Wellesley town bodies, from the Planning Board to the Wetlands Protection Committee. But their focus will now shift largely to the Select Board in an effort to get eventual state and Town Meeting approval to build their planned 45-unit project.
The window is tight to get its zoning amendment bid on the warrant for the 2024 Wellesley Annual Town Meeting in March. But developer Victor Sheen says his team’s plan is to make as much progress as it can and be ready for whichever Town Meeting, annual or special, works out.
Sheen and partner Peter Holland during the Nov. 20 Planning Board meeting (see Wellesley Media recording) said they’d be pursuing approval for their project under 40R zoning, a more streamlined smart growth approach than the residential incentive overlay district method they were leaning toward in earlier meetings with Planning. One big benefit to a developer of going the 40R route is that Town Meeting needs to approve it by a simple majority rather than a two-thirds vote, as is the case with most zoning bylaw amendments. 40R projects, like the William Street apartment complex in Wellesley, are attractive to municipalities because they stand to get significant state funding in return.
Getting 40R approval involves a well-documented process that in the case here starts with the developer working with the Select Board and allowing the town to conduct various peer reviews, such as for traffic impact. If satisfied, the Select Board submits an application to the state, which gets a few months to chew over the materials before giving a thumbs up or down. In the case of 489 Worcester St., to be ready for Annual Town Meeting, this would mean needing to get everything to the state by about year-end.
The planned project has undergone numerous changes since emerging early this year. Big news in the presentation shared by the developers at the Planning Board meeting was that the proposed project would be reduced from its original 69 units to 45 in a main manor building (9 units would be deemed “affordable” based on a state formula). Plans for townhouses have been scrapped, and 2 existing single-family homes will be retained. The team has also made other adjustments to the proposal, from traffic schemes to aesthetics to sustainability commitments, based on feedback from town officials and the community. A transportation impact assessment, municipal systems impact analysis, and other reports have also been included in the latest presentation. The developers had scooped up several properties, including the big one at 489 Worcester St. (aka, Rte. 9 west), to make this project possible, and have proposed landscaping and design of the main building intended to keep it from overwhelming Cliff Road.
The project has clear supporters on the Planning Board who want to see it move ahead quickly. Others on the Board still have questions and concerns, as do members of the public, who commented during the Planning Board meeting on issues such as the project’s scale in a current single residence district, traffic impact in light of Upham Elementary School soon closing, and ledge removal. But by taking the 40R route, the project team mainly needs to get the Select Board and Town Meeting’s blessing (and eventually the Zoning Board of Appeals), with the Planning Board playing more of an advisory role to other town bodies (Planning discussed putting together a memo with its recommendations). The project team has also been meeting with the Wetlands Protection Committee, and is slated to meet with that group in December.
Planning Director Arbeene noted this development won’t count toward the town’s still developing MBTA Communities commitment even though it is relatively close to the Wellesley Hills commuter rail station.
A liaison update on the 489 Worcester St. project is slated for the end of the Select Board’s Dec. 5 meeting.
Update 12/5/23: (8:30pm) We had turned comments off because things were getting too back and forth, and long. We’ve turned them back on, but will turn them off for good at noon 12/6/23.
Jon says
Andrew – what do you do for work? Let me guess, real estate development…
Andrew B Mikula says
Local government, actually. So far in my career, mostly parks planning and grant administration.
Ed Rachins says
I moved to Wellesley because of the single-family homes in the Evenness of the neighborhoods and I rejected Brookline because it had single families next to Multifamily residences The town appears to be destroying The quality of life And turning the town into Brookline
Andrew B Mikula says
I highly doubt that more multi-family housing will “destroy the quality of life” in Wellesley. It may not be your personal preference as a place to live, but Brookline is consistently ranked as one of the best places to live in Massachusetts: https://www.niche.com/places-to-live/brookline-norfolk-ma/
Nor will one 45-unit condo building turn Wellesley into Brookline overnight. Consider that, even with Wellesley’s current pace of building (which is very fast by historical standards), it would take until 2087 for Wellesley to have the same population density that Brookline does today. That’s based on 2020-2022 population change in Wellesley as estimated by the Census Bureau, as well as population density figures available on Wikipedia.
V-Dani says
There were many other concerns which were raised about this project – the potential to increase flooding because of blasting and tree removal next to wetland and year-round water stream. Many houses, major streets nearby to the project could get higher flooding and related damage. This is not hypothetical anymore, please see news reports of flooding damage next to natural streams and creeks in Massachusetts towns – Leominster.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6G7G9gxeoOg
https://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/area-of-leominster-urged-to-evacuate-amid-potential-issue-with-dam/3133385/
https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/08/22/north-andover-flood-damage-merrimack-valley-rain
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/08/22/metro/north-andover-sustained-nearly-30-million-flooding-damage-town-official-says/
While these were because of torrential rains, a large disturbance in the water table (caused by blasting and removal of mature trees) – as will happen with the 489 Worcester/ 8 Cliff Project – worsens the flood risk and accelerates soil erosion.
Is it really worth developing mostly high-end, very expensive apartments and in the process endanger safety of current residents, as well as increase the chance of damaging homes and city streets?
In these days of global climate change and shrinking natural spaces – Has anyone considered the adverse impact of a sudden increase in human population density, right next to (abutting) a wild-life corridor ?
Andrew B Mikula says
I’m certainly sympathetic to the idea that there are better locations for development in Wellesley in terms of environmental sustainability – the Tailby lot comes to mind.
I’d also like to point out just how many concessions the developers of 489 Worcester have made already to address these concerns. They include:
– preserving almost all of the existing tree canopy along Cliff Road
– creating a permanent conservation easement encompassing the 25-foot buffer zone around the wetlands
– using alternative methods to blasting within 100 feet of the wetlands
– exploring the feasibility of blasting alternatives for the rest of the site
Frankly, I’m a bit skeptical that this development in particular will “endanger” current residents, nearby homes, or Town roads in a tangible way. I don’t doubt that any kind of development places some burdens on Town stormwater infrastructure and marginally increases flood and erosion risks, but I also think that multi-family housing is an excellent way of mitigating other, large-scale environmental harms. If the alternative to building denser housing in largely built-out Wellesley is to build sprawling subdivisions in, say, Wayland or Sudbury, then I think projects like 489 Worcester could be good for the environment on net. It lowers tailpipe emissions when people have shorter commutes to their jobs (not to mention access to the Commuter Rail), and dense multi-family housing is also much more energy efficient than single-family homes. Moreover, fulfilling Wellesley’s housing needs with more built-up styles of development and infill enables us to preserve more of the rest of town.
You mention the “high-end, very expensive” market-rate units as another reason why we shouldn’t want to build 489 Worcester. But there’s a tough tradeoff between holding down the price of the market-rate units and wanting a more environmentally sustainable project. The concessions the developer has made on this front – preserving more trees, creating a conservation easement, limiting blasting, etc. – all cost money, and will likely be paid for primarily by raising the price of the market-rate units to the extent feasible.
Bottom line: you’re considering the local impacts on the environment, but not the aggregate impacts. A “sudden increase in human population density” certainly isn’t good for wildlife in the immediate vicinity, but building multi-family housing right near a train station allows us to preserve more land for wildlife on the whole, because it renders exurban subdivisions, widening highways, etc. unnecessary, all while facilitating a more sustainable lifestyle for more Wellesley residents.
I absolutely understand that these aggregate environmental impacts might seem less significant to you given that you live so close to the project site. But please consider that there are also adverse impacts to the environment by NOT building projects like 489 Worcester.
V-Dani says
Wow! Such a lengthy promotion of the developers’ interests, those who stand to gain windfall profits by selling units worth multi-million $$$s.… Either way, it is very, very insensitive to exclude/ignore legitimate concerns of fellow Wellesley residents!
Residents of Wellesley …. this is how it starts – ignore this development’s impact on a small wetland nearby…it’s just local etc….And then, before you know it…. other areas in town will be subject to Re-zoning. So the larger, town-wide problem still remains – if a large demolition & blasting effort, next to a protected Wildlife corridor/ Wetland, does go forward – this sets up a bad precedent in town. Wellesley has always tried to protect its natural spaces, and fellow residents enjoy those spaces. It keeps attracting people from diverse backgrounds to Wellesley!
The notion that this project – on Cliff road – will somehow ‘mitigate larger environmental harms’ is very naive and just *aspirational*, appears more like a fantasy, and perhaps may be unscientific!
But, @Andrew M. – they do make a good point – This project may be a bad choice of location for multi-unit development. There are certainly “better locations for development in Wellesley”. Extending from your own ideas, Andrew – at alternate locations, the developers will NOT have to deal with “a tough tradeoff between holding down the price of the market-rate units”. Then, perhaps the project can include lower price points for condos – more of which will be available to middle-income, middle class families – thereby addressing a major gap (as well as housing demand) in Wellesley – “the missing middle”. That wont be too bad, would it?
Frank Pinto says
Residents of Wellesley: If you don’t want high density condos and apartment buildings in your single family neighborhood, encourage your town meeting member to vote AGAINST the Cliff Road project. You have to feel badly for the Cliff Road residents whose home values will be diminished by the adjacent high density 45 unit development.
With the Wellesley office park development and the Linden St and Weston Rd development, we will have added nearly 1,000 multi family units. Adding more units will put additional demands on our infrastructure, schools, police, fire and add even more traffic to our already congested town.
Archie Abrams says
I’m extremely supportive of this project. Wellesley needs more housing. Period.
I hope this goes as planned.
Andrew B Mikula says
Empirically speaking, there’s scant evidence that new multi-family construction lowers the property values of surrounding single-family homes. In fact, many recent academic studies find the opposite. Here’s a smattering:
– https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10511482.2020.1821747?needAccess=true
– https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10835547.1998.12090921
– https://gardner.utah.edu/wp-content/uploads/HighDensity-Feb2021.pdf
It’s true that adding more housing units will increase demands on Town infrastructure. But in many cases, it will expand the Town’s tax base even faster. Check out this 2019 fiscal impact analysis for the Wellesley Office Park redevelopment: https://wellesleyma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/14656/Fiscal-Impact-Analysis—Fougere-Planning-and-Development—1-17-19. It takes schools, police, fire, and other general fund impacts into account, and projects that the annual net positive fiscal impact for Phase I alone will be more than $900,000.
But even if you don’t believe a narrow analysis of one project that was prepared for a developer, in general multifamily housing tends to be more fiscally positive for municipalities than single-family housing because it creates more taxable value for a given amount of infrastructure. Again, here’s what the academics have to say about this:
– https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166046216301259
– https://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=geog_facpub
I don’t think that traffic in Wellesley is going to get better anytime soon. But if, hypothetically, we wanted to meet our town’s housing needs in a way that limited the impact on traffic, locating more units within 1,000 feet of a train station (and/or right next to the commercial areas of Wellesley Square, like Terrazza and The Bristol) seems like a good place to start.
Enjoy your weekend, Frank.
Frank says
Andrew, Is “Building a Better Wellesley” funded by developers? or anyone else? If so, how much funding does it receive and are you and one of select board members paid for you efforts? If so, how much are you and our Select Board member paid? I see from your LinkedIn that you are a Senior Planner for the City of Malden. Are your efforts with “Build a Better Wellesley” a conflict with your full time position with the City of Malden? Also, isn’t it a direct conflict that our select board member is associated with this condo development and multi unit advocacy group , “Building a Better Wellesley”?
Andrew B Mikula says
Frank, you’ve asked most of these questions before. The answers are as follows:
“Is “Building a Better Wellesley” funded by developers? or anyone else? If so, how much funding does it receive and are you and one of select board members paid for you efforts?”
No, no, none, and no, respectively. BBW doesn’t accept donations or solicit funds from ANYONE. We’re a group of volunteers who are passionate about the positive role that thoughtful residential development can play in our town. The vast majority of what we do – educating the community, speaking at public meetings, etc. – doesn’t require any funding at all. Anything that does cost money (our Zoom account, website domain, refreshments at in-person meetings, etc.), is paid for out of the personal accounts of our leadership team. No one is paying us to do this advocacy work.
“Are your efforts with “Build a Better Wellesley” a conflict with your full time position with the City of Malden?”
No. As a public employee, I am barred from representing private interests on issues over which the City of Malden has jurisdiction. The City of Malden does not have jurisdiction over housing development in Wellesley.
“Also, isn’t it a direct conflict that our select board member is associated with this condo development and multi unit advocacy group , “Building a Better Wellesley”?”
First of all, it’s not fair to say that Select Board members are “associated with” the 489 Worcester project. They aren’t members of the development team. Rather, they are engaged with evaluating the project and working with Town officials and members of the development team to make it better.
And again, BBW is little more than an organized group of volunteers. It’s not a conflict of interest for a pro-housing Select Board member to be involved with BBW any more than it’s a conflict of interest for a member of Congress to work to expand SNAP benefits while volunteering at a food pantry. An affiliation with BBW itself is not affecting a pro-housing elected official’s actions. Instead, those pro-housing opinions are what explains both the involvement with BBW and the person’s actions as a local political leader.
If BBW members were paid, maybe that would be different. If a Select Board member were speaking before other Town boards as a representative of BBW, that would definitely be different. But private associations where an elected official is not acting as an “agent or attorney” before the Town are not conflicts of interest. If you disagree, please point out the exact clause in the state’s Conflict of Interest Law that applies here: https://www.mass.gov/info-details/summary-of-the-conflict-of-interest-law-for-municipal-employees