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HomeMy Public PortalAbout150218 Minutes for 480 Arsenal Community Meeting_201503051316374678Community Meeting 480 Suite 3 Arsenal Street Proposed revitalization of Warehouse Building to Office Building Meeting Minutes and Q&A Date of meeting: February 18, 2015 Presenter: William McQuillan, Developer, Boylston Properties  Introduction of Project Team- o Boylston Properties (Developer) o Spagnolo Gisness & Associates (Architect) o Vanasse and Associates, Inc. (Traffic Engineer) o R. J. O’Connell and Associates (Civil/Site Engineer)  Project overview o Currently the site is an industrial warehouse utilized by Verizon. The existing building consists of a taller “high bay” space and “low bay” space, most of which will be retained. o The proposed project consists of opening the site up by taking down the chain link fencing and connecting to the Watertown Greenway, Arsenal Street via Birch Road, and Coolidge Square via a new opening opposite Bigelow Ave. o The proposed building will be inserting a full 2nd floor in the high bay space, and a mezzanine space in the low bay space. The newly revitalized building will be 185,595 SF. Presenter: John Sullivan, Architect, Spagnolo Gisness & Associates  Discussed why the project is named “Linx”. It pulls from the idea of “linking” to the Watertown Greenway, neighborhood, Coolidge Square, The Arsenal Project, and the River. The connection is accomplished through a large outdoor amenity space connecting to the greenway, taking down the fences, and a new connection onto Nichols Ave, across from Bigelow Ave.  The building will be reused. The warehouse space lends itself perfectly to what the current techy tenants in the marketplace are looking to rent. The building will be carved into and added to, to allow in more natural light to the deep spaces.  A rendering showing the proposed architecture was presented, showing a lot of glass and interesting building treatments. The main entry highlighted was oriented towards the south and the Greenway.  The building will be reused and will seek LEED certification. High performance systems will be utilized. There will be a focus of sustainability throughout the design process.  Areas of open spaces were shown around the northern and southern entries, providing large green areas for employees to work outside as well as inside. Presenter: Giles Ham, Traffic Engineer, Vanasse & Associates  Overview of access point to the site and general existing traffic patterns.  Presentation of traffic generation tables showing existing, proposed, and the net change in the average daily trips, peak morning hour, and peak evening hour.  QUESTION: Please explain the existing and proposed graphic.  ANSWER: We studied the existing traffic entering and existing the site by Verizon in November, which set the existing numbers. The proposed traffic generation is based upon industry manuals that estimate the expected traffic based upon a proposed use (retail/office/etc). The Net change is the difference between the two.  Presentation of the roadways and 12 intersections studied for the project under the existing condition and the proposed condition. These intersections were based upon discussions with the Town and general knowledge of the area. Included in the report were the other currently submitted and recently approved projects before the Town.  QUESTION: You had referenced “Bays” in the earlier presentation. How much truck traffic will you have?  ANSWER: The term “Bays” being referred to were the building structural dimensions, and not truck bays. This will be an office with only the usual associated truck traffic- UPS/FedEx etc.  QUESTION: All the existing traffic on site is on Arsenal Street. How is that represented in your report?  ANSWER: Let me run through the other slides, which may better answer your question.  Site traffic patterns under the proposed condition were presented in a graphic. The graphic showed the anticipated percent of traffic that would utilize the Arsenal Street access versus the Nichols Ave. access and then how the traffic would disperse through the area, to the regional road networks.  An overview of the proposed mitigation measures was presented. The project’s Traffic Demand Management program was laid out, which includes encouragement of public transit at the T stops in Coolidge Square and on Arsenal Street by requesting the proposed tenants subsidies mbta passes, providing a strong focus on bikes and access to the Greenway, car sharing program, requirement of a welcome package be included when a new employee starts so they understand their transportation options, among others. Also included was signal optimization and timing at intersections.  QUESTION: What do you mean by signal optimization?  ANSWER: The study took a look at the area traffic signal times to see if they can be adjusted to make an intersection operate at its most efficient. For example, the intersection of Nichols and Arlington has what is called an “advance” for the traffic heading south on Arlington Street. This is to allow those heading south on Arlington to take a left before there is oncoming traffic. It was found that this does not get used very much and the time currently given to the advance could be used to help traffic pass through in other directions, resulting in a more efficient intersection.  QUESTION: This area around Bigelow Ave is very very congested and opening up a Nichols Ave entrance would make it worse. It’s really bad today, much worse than what your numbers are showing.  ANSWER: The existing numbers are gathered by doing traffic counts. They are what they are because they were counted. As for the future numbers, traffic counts are added by reviewing US Census data, traffic data, and other local input. The percent of where the traffic goes upon exit is estimated based upon these assumptions. Any of the assumptions will be reviewed by the Town and a Peer Reviewer, which may tweak the numbers slightly, but we are confident in the numbers presented in the traffic report.  QUESTION: In the peak morning hour, how many of the 244 vehicles will come from Arsenal vs. Nichols Ave.?  ANSWER: 25% will come from Nichols Ave., so we are talking about roughly one more car per minute on Bigelow Ave.  QUESTION: There are more than 270 parking spaces on site, if that the peak, why do you need more spaces?  ANSWER: The peak is only the one hour that sees the most traffic. There are still other cars coming and going at other times, but the peak is just the highest one hour use. Presenter: Roy Smith, RJ O’Connell and Associates, Civil/Site Engineer  Overview of the site, including adjacent properties and their uses and the existing building footprint and its use. The layout of the site was shown, illustrating access to and throughout the site, the various parking zones, the open spaces, the proposed one level structured parking deck, and stormwater features. The lower level of the deck will be sunken down slightly, to take advantage of the difference in grade between Nichols Ave and the site, and plantings will be provided on the street side to help screen the structure.  The proposed building is in compliance with zoning and adheres to all the setback, bulk and dimensional requirements. The project will not require a variance, and is by-right with a special permit from the ZBA.  One item of note is the significant additional open space being provided, more than double the required amount- 22% open space versus the required 10%. A substantial area devoted to open space is the connection between the entry and the Greenway. This allowed for a meandering main access drive through the site that divides it into various zones, instead of the current one main significant parking field.  The new access on Nichols Ave was shown, along with proposed improvements. Pedestrian bump outs are being provided to enhance crossing Nichols Ave safely, crosswalks are being proposed for the same reason. The angled parking spaces being displaced by the new entry are being relocated to the west and east of the existing parking. A sidewalk running the full length of the site frontage on Nichols Ave. will be constructed as part of the project, along with roadway drainage improvements consisting of Tree pit filters and a rain garden area.  A review of the stormwater management system was provided, which includes the significant infiltration of storm events. In addition, a large rain garden, pretreatment, and detention are all elements of the proposed system, which will be a substantial improvement over the existing condition.  QUESTION: What is the eastern curb cut shown on Nichols Ave?  ANSWER: That is for emergency access only, to provide access to the east side of the building. Question/Answer portion  Comments from Town Councilor Angie Kounelis o The Driveway on Nichols Ave is a problem. Looking back historically from the rubber factory to when the property got redeveloped, there was never a vehicular access from Nichols Ave to the Site, and there shouldn’t be one now. o The community meeting should have been better publicized by the developer, specifically citing the opening of Nichols Ave to vehicles. If better notification had gone out, more people would have attended and expressed their concerns on the subject. o The access from the site to Nichols should be open for pedestrian access, which would be supported by the neighborhood.  QUESTION: We have a major problem with flooding at Melendy and Oak. I’m concerned that it will get worse.  ANSWER: This project is down stream of that flooding problem. From the sounds of it, it may be an inlet capacity problem. Infiltration on our site may help, by opening up more downstream pipe capacity.  QUESTION: We understand that you won’t start construction of the building until you have a tenant, but will you start site work?  ANSWER: We will wait to do site work until we have tenants as well.  QUESTION: Have you thought about using porous pavement in the parking areas?  ANSWER: We are using porous pavers at the entrances, and incorporating numerous underground infiltration systems. In addition we have 22% open space and won’t be adding porous pavement.  QUESTION: If you add together the peak hour traffic together, you do not get the total. The numbers aren’t adding up.  ANSWER: The peaks are only at the peak hour. Traffic will come before and after the peak.  COMMENT: Excellent job on the Stormwater Management measures.  QUESTION: Can you do a traffic analysis with and without the Nichols Ave entrance? It seems that those cars would need to get there somehow.  ANSWER: Yes, you are correct. No matter if the Nichols Ave entrance is open or not, people will need to come from the North to get to the site. If they do not come through the entrance on Nichols, then they will need to circumnavigate the site some way, filtering through the neighborhood- School Street, Dexter, still on Bigelow and Nichols, Elm, and through Arlington intersections; all to get to down to the Arsenal Street entrance or back to the North- Belmont/Cambridge/Watertown. Instead of concentrating the traffic and straining intersections, we think it’s better to open the Nichols Ave entrance and make the connection across Bigelow Ave.  COMMENT: The traffic in the neighborhood is not your typical- there are schools, churches, funerals, etc. The drainage system to the south of the site was installed too small.  QUESTION: Will you pay any mediation money?  ANSWER: Taxes and Nichols Ave. improvements. Taxes alone should triple from somewhere in the range of $250,000 to $750,000 per year.  QUESTION: Will you include solar panels?  ANSWER: This will be a LEED certified building. Due to the reuse of the existing structural columns and footings, it doesn’t look like it will be feasible to add solar on the roof.  QUESTION: Do you have a timeline for construction?  ANSWER: We’d anticipate a deal will be made in late summer at the earliest, followed by 12 months of renovations, 15 months once the building tenant is on board and finishing their work.  QUESTION: How did you get to 565 parking spaces?  ANSWER: As much parking as possible is needed. The marketplace demands it. The deck will be 10’ high, but will be sunken and screened.  QUESTION: Will you add bus service?  ANSWER: We looked into a private bus system, but the cost was substantial. It’s unclear if a tenant will want to pay that additional rate to have it, but it will be up to them.  QUESTION: How will the new commuter station at New Balance impact the project?  ANSWER: It’s unclear. We must first see who uses it and how much it gets used. If it’s heavily used, there may be forces that require us to contribute to alternative transit.  QUESTION: How many Boylston Properties employees will be from Watertown?  ANSWER: The property will be managed by a third party, whom won’t have consideration for where they reside.  QUESTION: What is the process?  ANSWER: A meeting with the Town Departments is scheduled for next week, followed by additional meetings with the DPW, a Peer Review, then on to the Planning Board/ZBA. Another community meeting probably will occur prior to submitting to the Planning Board.  COMMENT: Another meeting could be helpful.  QUESTION: What about “cut through” traffic?  ANSWER: We don’t like the idea of traffic cutting through the site and will put in speed bumps or something along those lines to discourage it from happening, if our monitoring shows that it is occurring.  QUESTION: Will the neighborhood be able to pass through the site (walking or on bikes)?  ANSWER: Absolutely. We are taking down the barbed wire fences and replacing them with connections. Connecting to the neighborhood is valuable. Connecting to Coolidge Square is extremely important. We are striving to do what we can to support Coolidge Square and its businesses, as a strong successful Coolidge Square is an integral part of what makes this property this community so attractive.