This letter appeared in the Wakefield item: What’s Larger than a Football Field and Based on Assumptions? Growth is inevitable, but all growth does not equal progress. An opportunity is not a good one if the cost of taking it is too high. Because of a deal devised by Town officials, the size of the proposed Brightview assisted/independent living project has been expanded from 90 to 140 units, an enormous complex – larger than a football field and at least 5 levels high! – all of which will be crammed into virtually the entire downtown Main and Crescent Street block. Houses – some historic - will be torn down. Residents and businesses will be displaced. Those who are left to live in the area will surely see a huge and permanent change to their neighborhoods and this idea has made many of them afraid and outraged. This parking garage would stretch from Main Street to Crescent Street, with no connection for cars between the upper and lower levels. There would be at least two more stories of Brightview living units on top of the garage, making this at least a 4 story structure right on our Main Street, at the gateway to our downtown. One architect noted that more levels could be added later, something that he sees happen frequently in his line of work. Town officials have focused attention on the garage only and so the enormity of the BrightView complex has become a sort of non-issue. This will clearly be the largest building in downtown and would be nearly 2/3 the size of the Boston Garden! Is this what we want for downtown Wakefield? If built, the garage would be shared with many - the Brightview residents, staff and visitors, The Savings Bank, the Wakefield Cooperative Bank and the town. Any additional parking this would provide has been purported to be a magic solution to revitalizing downtown. Yet our Town’s Master Plan clearly says other parts of the puzzle must be put into place prior to building parking garages – things like enforcing parking time limits. As I rarely have trouble finding a spot to park, I believe that the parking problem has been greatly exaggerated. How have our downtown restaurants thrived and several new ones opened if parking is so severe an obstacle? It is very, very important that we all keep in mind that the projected financial gains we were shown at town meeting are based on assumptions, or in other words, speculation. What happens to those projections if the tax rate does not continue at 2.5%? It is a very real possibility that Wakefield might not see that amount of revenue, so keep that in mind when weighing the pros and cons. Let’s not count our chickens before they hatch. This proposal is not a solution. It is not at all in keeping with the scale, style and sensibilities we want for our downtown. As someone said recently, “If I’d wanted to live in Everett, I’d have moved there.” Let’s not just develop, let’s evolve responsibly. For once, permit the head to rule the wallet. Bronwyn Della-Volpe
Posted on: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 17:03:10 +0000