Wellesley’s 49 Walnut St. back in play for multi-family housing

The property at 49 Walnut St., in Wellesley lower falls, which last year was among a couple of possible future multi-family housing sites linked to  proposed zoning changes shot down by Special Town Meeting, will soon be back in the public eye.

The new Walnut Park project would do away with a cluster of current office buildings along the Charles River and replace them with a 4-story, 28-unit complex with 6 units deemed affordable based on a state formula. Each of the 2- and 3-bedroom units will also have two garage parking spaces. The original Walnut Park project would have featured 41 condo units as part of a potentially larger development along Walnut Street.

Developer Joe Hassell, who brought the previous plan at this site forward, is also behind this proposed structure. It would span about 66,000 sq. ft.  and sit on a lot of nearly 74,000 sq. ft.

This project of significant impact will require a special permit from the town to proceed, and an online public hearing before the Planning Board is scheduled for Sept. 11 at 6:30pm. A collection of documents, including architectural and traffic plans, are available on the town website.

More details on the proposed project can be expected at this meeting, which will focus on projected off-site impacts.

This property last year was the subject of debate regarding a zoning mechanism called a residential overlay incentive (RIO) intended to boost housing production. In the wake of Special Town Meeting’s rejection of two proposed RIOs, a resident put forth a citizen petition at Annual Town Meeting to try to return the RIO bylaw to an earlier state, but that also failed to gain Town Meeting approval. However, in its wake, the Planning Board formed a RIO Task Force to revisit the bylaw.

This time around, there is no RIO bid involved. The property is located in an Industrial A district, which allows a density of up 17 units per acre, so no zoning change is needed (see Area Regulations Bylaw Section 5.2.C.2). According to Wellesley Planning Director Eric Arbeene, “Because the project is going to consist of newly constructed floor area of 10,000 or more square feet, the project is required to go through the Project of Significant Impact (PSI) special permit process. It will also go through the Site Plan Review process by the Zoning Board of Appeals. The Planning Board will open the PSI public hearing at its meeting on Thursday, September 11.”

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