survey and then we're going to be discussing subsequent to that i'm assuming that that will take some time on one seventy eight more street we're going to discuss the adoption of a twenty five mile per hour statute here in beaumont there will be an order call in the warrant for that that so other than the topics i just discussed other any questions from time residents his absence to discuss with provide to us we've heard this before but also for the viewing audience of the folks here exactly what the role of the board survey is and what discretion you know how we look at these types of applications when we're a somewhat unique there's only believe you might be down to two towns now in the commonwealth that still use the board of survey as opposed to the planning board and the subdivision control law which you may be familiar with from other circumstances s o your just your role under the board of such as the board of survey is more limited in approving plans than it is under than that the similar role of the planning board in a subdivision control law and r control law which is that the board of survey actually is functions more as a quality control of plans as opposed to a having a wider discretion to approve or deny plans  they so that it's an it's a much older statute the subdivision control laws been now adopted in most towns but not in balance so when you're functioning in that capacity as i as i said you're role as as a board is it's fairly limited you're looking at the plans and looking to see if they meet with yours with the standards that you have in this case i understand there are three waivers being requ consider you may be able to ask for a reasonable modification because of because you're not beating them and but you can't deny a waiver simply that microphone over to you and they will move back when we take comments from the audience and have since nine hundred eighty and i am proposing a road in from my street and i'd like to give you a little history and one nine hundred eighty when we bought the house it was seven and a half acres we assumed at some point in the future that we might actually want to develop the property so the first thing we did was we connected didn't have any sort and i know it didn't hit me sore because i worked on putting the school on in my street when i was in high school and it stopped at woodbine road and made a right down a woodbine road and ended at the end of woodland road so the first thing i did was connect the sewer from my house to woodbine road on the theory that at some point we wanted to develop a and the second data point was that one of the things that we did was talk to dick betts i don't know if anybody remembers dick betts and dick dick of course suggested two alternatives for potential development of the property it's on to a point the future one was connecting woodbine road and building a cul de sac we still think that's a possibility but we got an awful lot of resistance from the neighbors on what i think is a simpler and maybe even a better solution but there was some resistance so we went back to coming in off of  coming in off of my street what we're going to show you today is a plan that comes in off from our street and i want it to be noted that we've been through the conservation commission in this road has been designed to meet all of the conservation commission the standards that were put in our out of her of conditions we're not asking for any approvals or any lots we're asking of only for approval in the road so this is the second thing that's happened is that when we came to the board a survey they asked for a peer review we've done a peer review so all the questions that been raised by the peer review are happen to be stand back and i don't know stand txi are represented in any way we've we've we've been asked the questions and we answer the questions and the last thing that i think is important is that i have four kids we're going to have a number of lots we don't know exactly how many before by the time we're finished but this is not for me i'm no intention of moving from belmont it is probably for my kids and we think that we've done everything necessary in required and we believe in doing everything necessary and required by the law we think it's important team cliff who's been the surveyor on this property and it goes with a piece of property of this size you have to be careful to make sure that all of the meets and bounds are accurate and cliff has done that and now gal who is designed the road and i'd like to now bring al up here and the other thing is i'd like to introduce my two boys that are here chris stand up turn around smile and my all this boy don junior  and so they're here part of the team and we're here to ask and answer whatever questions you may have and hopefully come through a nice happy resolution of what we all want to do what i want to do  and what i have here is the existing conditions plan as it is right now the property is six point eighty six acres area currently there is one single family house  neighbors what i have on this plant two other resource areas that were approved by the conservation so this is usually our starting point in the design so we have filed with them the resource areas have been identified this pression here is basically taking the water the storm water runoff from woodbine road this the pression takes storm water from adjacent properties and the property itself the wetlands are in the back of associated with other the stands gradually towards the low area on the site then it gradually rises again to this area at the end of woodbine road so based on that we look at the best way to design a roadway that be in this configuration coming off from our street extending as much as we can away from these these resource areas and creating simultaneously five build so the road is approximately seven hundred fifty one feet in length it's got a forty foot right of way twenty six feet of pavement with it's got granite curbing both sides the slopes are very moderate about proposing one percent two percent slope for this road and it will have sidewalks also every attempt has been made to include sidewalks in the project i'll move to the proposed plan which i have highlighted a few areas of interest here you'll see in orange the orange system is basically a network of catch storm water separators oil separators detention areas that will clean the storm water runoff before it actually enters into these into these areas we also have highlighted here where we  think tension locations for houses we also have street trees that we're proposing and all the utilities will basically run through within the layout of the roadway except when we get down to would would  road water line we're proposing a loop system coming from marsh road mar street to woodbine road eight inch line sewer system has done was mentioning he has houses connected to the sewer system on woodbine we would modify that slightly and and propose a new sewer system within this road layout connecting all the houses into the woodbine road station and finally but not least the drainage system you'll see i highlighted this area here this is a six called run under the road and they allow the water from the adjacent property to go under the road into this area and follow through  as it was mentioned before this system has been reviewed very carefully by stan tac the consulting engineer for the town we've worked with them diligently for the last two weeks and ironing out all the small details of the projects and  finally the profit the project does does require waivers and there's three waivers that are required one of them is the roadway slope and the rules and regs say that this area here when it joins the existing roadway has to be half percent we're proposing one percent slope it's a minor change we feel that it will provide better drain each and it's more the standard of the day one percent minimum slope on the roadway versus half percent the other waiver is the sidewalk we are proposing sidewalk around the whole project except for an area near the called where it's where we have  to be more conscious of the proximity to this isolated area and finally the roadway length proposing seven hundred fifty one feet and we feel that you know we have position after studying this in reviewing it with council that a waiver for the length of the road really isn't needed and i'm going to just give you that the data the rules and regulations of the board of survey clearly provides that the turnaround radius is applicable applicable to both dead end streets and cul de sacs in the same section the regulation provides one sentence later that in streets shall not exceed six doesn't have it within its discretion to what it but surely one of seeing what historic who may have occurred in time whether there are roadways this is just off fact based on the trying to present any sort of position here other roadways that are seven hundred greater than levy there on the downgrade of the upgrade five percent or one percent i think this really is really insignificant notwithstanding the fact that you know that that section of road flexibility fifty feet or so  five to one percent of the requests for weight on the sidewalk there's approximately two hundred feet of sidewalk away that cannot be constructed because it would be built in an area where there is resource area on the site and so the applicant is  ask for a waiver so that there was no construction necessary to conflict with resource area that's on the line the remainder of the site so coming in from our street on the right hand side all the way up all the way around until you get to the culvert system there will be sidewalk on that title but be about two hundred feet with there's a gap in the sidewalk and continue back to march street given the nature of the road the number of houses i don't feel it's unreasonable for someone who lives in that neighborhood to have to cross the street or even walk on the street stormwater by law and within that stormwater by law there are rules or regulations that were adopted into certain developments the town has the ability to ask an applicant to pay for a third party review of this storm water system so this i think has been a little confusion as to the roles of the jurisdictions of the conservation commission versus the stormwater by law we struggled with that question internally with stuff i will be very honest we are we actually looked at this first of all recognizing that there was a significant process before the conservation commission that established the location of the resource areas that was a long process ultimately there was a delineation that was approved and that's what was reflected on the plans  at it her first blush on it was i think there's conservation jurisdiction here we continue to talk about it mary may have had conversations with her commission i'm not sure but i think she did have contact conversations you know ultimately you know we were at a point in time where there was a hearing in pending before the board of survey and it looked like that hearing needed to be continued and so i wrote in a memo that we had some questions about the about the environmental review and at that point we thought it was a conservation commission jurisdiction and that's what i wrote in that memo as we continue to look at it in the end you know i looked at the act again this evening before i came over here and i feel the act is very clear that there is nothing being proposed for the construction of the road and  want to be clear because the border surveys role here is to look only at the construction of the road there is nothing in the construction of the road that triggers a conservation commission jurisdiction i read the act again this evening i believe that  review the way the by law is written in the rules or regulations the applicant pays for that review we hire the consultants but they have to pay the bill we did all of that stan tech raised certain issues throughout the process and have to be honest a lot of that conversation was directly with our peer review engineers and mr should fire those engineers there was a lot of conversation back and forth issues were discussed worked out plans were modified at the end of the day i got a report from stan tech which by the way all this information is on the town's website if you go to the office of community development you'll find the entire application all the supporting documents online but ultimately that report did say that they were satisfied with the design and that they addressed all of the issues as to what guidelines if any prior boards of serbia were acting under before nine hundred eighty nine ok so i just want to make that clear so we've got the first situation here is an awful prospect street if you take kenmore ro into garfield road if you look if you put those two roads together the total length is seven hundred thirty one feet there are there is there is no outlet when you come into kenmore and into garfield you've got to turn around and come back out again so in essence those two road would by road is a total of twelve hundred twenty two feet there is no cul de sac at the end of woodbine and goodbye was actually approved in in two segments the first one in one nine hundred thirty secs and then the last before i open up to all of the folks that are here and i know there are a number of folks that are here we've gotten e mails we've gotten petitions so please understand that we've gotten everything i've read every single e mail i've looked at the petitions that we police and fire and one of these fired up public works ok with a lot of division of public works because of the utility i asked the fire chief specifically if he was troubled by the length of the road for public said it contemplated a certain type of fire equipment at that time but there is a phrase in there that requires them to meet the standards of today and so one of the things that we do by routine is where the fire department to make sure that we have the most up to date information on their equipment in the turning radius of their equipment which has that on to the designer to make sure that the culdesac that the design can accommodate the fire department appointment so the rate the culdesac that you see designed here this evening will accommodate all of the equipment the fire department has here in belmont i think of it's fair to say that if thank you if there were five properties before the border survey and they all had that in we would and you know we're free to talk to our counsel and we're free to talk as you know glenn and i think all three of us have done that and read what submitted what mark said he's read all the e mails i've read that  so you know i'm i'm i'm curious about article one one in the in the border survey regulation one one the board of survey rag streets the board made upon an express finding that such action is in the public interest and is not inconsistent with the intent of these rules waive strict compliance with any provision contained here right ok ok so this this concept of in the public interest is in embedded in the rules and regulation it is but let me go back to what i said earlier so it is obviously the terms public interest don't have a lot of definition to them so you have to look at a couple of things one is what does the actual rule say and what's the intent of it so you have heard for instance on the called the sac rule the need for fire equipment to be able to turn so your public interested in  that case is colored by that it's also a matter of whether a waiver is appropriate given past practice of a few examples here admittedly older ones and ones that predate the rules themselves and then the last one is are there any reasons waiver ought not to issue and that's so that's in there so it is a broad term ok you do look at other things ok and i think one of the one of the ways these discussions go out of scope as they say in town meeting is is when you're talking about a concern that for lack of a better term is not admissible before the board here so i want to ask you about the environmental concerns that that's not that's something that is handled by by other bodies rather than the board of survey isn't at  well if you ask me when i get back to this the scope of this board it is very limited as a board of survey mr clancy described the role of the conservation commission here which has a specific role by withstanding the lack of response once again i read the act again this evening before i came over here and i am convinced that my reading of the act and this includes specifically looking at the definition of the word alter which had me sort of you know intrigued i am convinced that the conservation commission does not have jurisdiction over the construction of this road now there are two house lights that are proposed that fall within a buffer zone that the conservation commission will be your jurisdiction over but the road so my knowing that because that's where i was going with this question because we're there we discussed that today and what this says is that we're talking about the road that's correct and on at the end of the two residences that are kind of unfold in there but that's subject to the planning board that does that and that requires the conservation commission approval well there's two build here ok the buffer zone from the border in vegetative weapon which is highlighted here in green based on the way that they've cited these two propose structures they fall within the hunger for buffer zone and therefore this familiar with a subdivision control process where a local planning board looks at the proposal in its entirety for better or worse belmont does not operate that way belmont has a board of survey that is looking strictly at the layout in the construction of a road and then the zoning bylaw and any of the zoning requirements in that bylaw govern the development of any lots that are created as a result of that new road so there's the it's a sort of a dual process  and you know so the this evening i try to limit my comments to the road itself and well that's why i bring it up because before you go away there's there's another lot out there that's affected by that pool of wood by road in the same way no no we didn't discuss that today and you know you know this so there's not another one there's not another i feel like i'm a little bit stepping on the toes of the high paid front row here mr fowler if you want to make a donation to a local charity on my behalf and it would be welcome but if they are there there are three areas on this site that are considered resource areas two of them are isolated land subject to flooding isolated land by statute does not have a buffer zone associated with it that's why i'm so it's only the well that's why the road even though the proximity of that road is so close to this isolated area because there is no bus one thing we do want to make mention of is the fact that we are looping the water line which is actually helping woodbine road because at this point that is a dead end line which is not great for water quality so we are so it's a dead end line it it does not go anywhere except for a fire hydrant at the end which they probably open up to clear out the line at some points that's more for the time what we are doing is they were actually looping it so it where it's coming from the end of woodbine we're taking it bringing it back out in the marsh street so we're creating a loop so there's no stagnant water that is staying in that line and the other part of it is by bringing the road down here it's actually helping probably fire access at the end of woodbine road because it's fairly close so thank you for your comments roger if you want to pick just just identify yourself either i mean you know  director of habitat i'm also a belmont resident in a town meeting member from precinct five i just had one question before i get into my remarks and that is is this road at the current surface of the land cut and fail when we build the road there are areas that we have failed there is that we have to cut so this road because we have a low area because we have a low area here basically shape the slope of the road to match where it whenever we can the grades when we get up here we're pretty much close to existing grade but we do have to in this section ok let's say if you could just say what what is the elevation of the road over here what is the elevation of the surface here now and what's the elevation of the road now basically you've got a road that's elevated for most of its way about six feet above that the current grade i would say most of the way well can you maybe you can describe that elevation down there  d these are these other that we have existing grazes of the vast lines here this is the proposed right so there is a substantial amount of roadway that will be filled so my my question is for one of the  rs who's not able to be here now right now when they look from their property onto one seventy eight more street they basically see forest well they see now flows down through belmont and we also share a six hundred thirty five foot border with the property habitat is a very special feature of belmont habitat is only one of twenty communities in massachusetts to have a autobahn sanctuary and the only reason habitat exist is because of the vision and generosity of several families in belmont who understood the value of the town preserving what is now eighty eight ninety acres of woods wetlands and meadows on belmont hill habitat is in its fifty six year of offering our fellow residents peaceful trails for quiet contemplation meeting up with friends and getting out for some exercise in addition we offer a variety of programs to people  to ninety nine last summer we hosted over one hundred fifty belmont kids in our summer camp habitat is also part of a rarity within the route one twenty eight beltway a large block of over twelve hundred acres of interconnected open space in belmont lexington and waltham known as the western greenway some of the greenway properties are protected for example the beaverbrook reservation and some are privately held but have allowed easements across their property the landowner at one seventy eight more street would like to develop his property which is his right as long as he complies with local and state rules in this case the landowner requests the board of survey waive its rule on the length of dead  streets to gain access to more of the property for additional development that additional development would adversely affect habitat and belmont residents along the road gives access to the part of the property closest to the sanctuary it would remove a forest that is now a haven to the wildlife that is enjoyed by visitors to saying to the sanctuary homes built in this part of the property would be visible from the sanctuary trails one of those trails is called the border trail which pass whether what was the purpose of this limit on the length of dead end streets and also whether the rule in belmont is unique i contacted the planning departments in neighboring towns and found that the rationale for limiting the length of single access streets is public safety the longer a dead end street the greater the probability it can be blocked from emergency services that's specifically stated in the wellesley subdivision bylaws and in the list of dead end streets that glenn mentioned one was a school in which was blocked by a tree a couple of years ago during a storm is belmont's role unique i was informed that arlington has a five hundred foot limit and does not grant waivers lexington has a maximum of six hundred feet no waivers granted wellesley has a five hundred foot limit no waivers and conquer at the limit is six hundred feet with a single waiver granted in two thousand and eight for a cluster development that set aside substantial conservation land winchester subdivision law does not allow any dead end streets we believe that the board of survey has the authority to deny waivers and require compliance with its rules and regulations according to the rules waivers may only be granted when the board expressly finds the exceptions serve the public interest i believe there is overwhelming evidence that the public interest in this case is served by adhering to the rules and not granting exceptions that will allow more intense development on this property i have provided you with the petition signed by two hundred thirty three belmont residents which urge you not to current waivers that allow more intense development at one seventy eight mar street than is permissible by right i'd like to just add one more thing no matter which way you decide to night or on another night what i would like to ask for is a provision made that an easement be granted across the property for the existing border trail which i thank you roger appreciate that attorney in winchester representing audubon and been working with roger on this this is the letter i sent on march first to the board a survey disserves i represent the massachusetts audubon habitat education center and wildlife sanctuary which is an immediate abutted to miss a cio fars proposed six lot subdivision off of march treat the sanctuary comprises over eighty eight acres of permanently protected open space and hosts over twelve thousand visitors in annual e it is by far the most significant piece of preserved open space within the town while we acknowledge the landowners rights to develop his property as a residential subdivision and we are very concerned about the potential impacts to the sanctuary we strongly object to the developers request that the board of survey waive certain of its regulations in order to allow more intensive development of the land than would otherwise be allowed if the project were simply built in compliance with the town's regulations as presently proposed the developer has requested three waivers of the board's rules and regulations including regulations relating to road grade sidewalk and street link we are most concerned with the developers request that he be allowed to exceed the maximum length of a dead end street by one hundred fifty feet the board of surveys regulation eliminating the length of dead end streets to six hundred feet has been in place for over twenty five years and is very similar to those adopted by neighboring cities and towns under the subdivision control law in fact the town of arlington has a maximum length of dead in streets of five hundred feet and the town of winchester specifically prohibits the creation of any new dead end streets clearly the board of survey six hundred foot maximum is hardly usual onerous these regulations also serve an important purpose as discussed in the case of wheatley vs planning board of hang them with a kohut stated this is the appeals court quote dead end street regulations are inactive because of a concern that the blocking of a dead end street as by a fallen tree or an automobile accident will prevent access to the homes beyond the blockage particularly by fire engines ambulances or other emergency equipment to date the developer has not offered any compelling reason as to why it's in the public's interest to waive that longstanding regulation similarly we see no reason to waive certain of the board sidewalk regulation given that the proposed subdivision will certainly have a number of young children the standard for the grant of waivers under the board's rules and regulations is a very clear and a very simple one as stated earlier the board must make an express finding that waiving strict compliance with the standard is in the public's interest and not inconsistent with the board's rules this is the same standard generally a political to the grant of waivers under the state's subdivision control law and the standard has been discussed in numerous legal decisions dead end streets are notorious subject of of litigation and under the subdivision control law generally the board's determination of whether granting a developer a waiver is in the public interest is given great deference by the courts as stated in the case of a regal replanning board of franklin by the appeals court who stated if consonance with the public interest is a deuced standard it is obviously one that involves a large amount of judgment discretion if in a given case it is one to which reasonable minds might in good faith differ without doubting the reasonableness of the opposing view the conclusion reached by the planning board should be sustained on judicial review forward is the board and not the court to whom the statute delegates this discretion and the role of a court is merely to ascertain whether the board exceeded its authority thus the board's evaluation of whether it believes that it is in the public interest to waive its regulation in any particular case is given strong deference as of this date over two hundred thirty belmont residents have signed a petition opposing the grant of any waivers we all can understand why it's in the developer's interest for the board to waive its regulation however no evidence has been provided so far of why doing so is in the public's interest at a minimum before the board should even consider the appropriateness of waiving regulations the board should require the developer to prepare an as a write plan which would demonstrate the number of lawsuits the developer could build if he'd stead it here to the town's rules and regulations instead of seeking waivers of those rules i respectfully request that you place these comments in the record at the march sixth hearing i'm going to make a few brief comments just to summarize there first legal standard issue here is really very clear and file a i agree with the meenas opening comments that belmont support of survey is not subject to the subdivision control law i fact the standard of review for waivers under the subdivision control law is the same public interest standard and there is lots of  there's really no dispute that this is a reasonable standard it's legally valid and longstanding in fact we just heard it's much more lenient than other towns in the area and we've also just learned that it's never been waived by this board in the twenty five years or more that it's been in place and as we heard the board is given strong deference by the courts and it's a target of the public interest you have strong evidence of the public view tonight of whether they believe it's in the town's interest to waive its regulations to allow more intensive development that has regulations actually come into play and finally i want to stress that we are not contesting developers rights to build on his land provided that he obeys all the laws and regulations of the town but we heard the board not to waive those regulations in order to allow more intensive development than that which was originally anticipated by its regulations ok thank you thank you just well first from what i would say is that we're not cheating that's not what we're trying to do here which right design the best roadway we can for the property that we have so in response the question about the six hundred feet in the length the road to six hundred and six hundred is the way we have it right now seven hundred fifty one feet up so we were just basically site slide a back a hundred fifty feet where that take is  live and live on woodbine road we've we've lived in belmont since one thousand nine hundred two and i want to say first of all we're really grateful to the board of selectmen we know you've heard heard a lot we appreciate you reading our e mails we appreciate the effort we're really grateful to the town conservation committee that gave all of this a very large amount of consideration and in the end my own memory of this was that the town conservation committee essentially got somewhat trumped by the division of environmental protection of the state so it's not like the town condemnation committee to proceed actually looked at all this and said it was a good idea we're grateful to the town you know to  to council we're grateful to you know to town employees that have been thinking about this very carefully and i know that there's an opportunity for all of us to say a lot of the same things because we're you know let me also say we're especially grateful to live so close and also to live in a town that actually had the you know had had the wisdom and had the smart people who preserve the land to be sure that there would be that green area here what i want to emphasize is that  there's a lot of jargon and a lot of gobbledygook about the way we talk and so for instance this is russian but actually it's a pond i mean people skate skate on that if we didn't have so much global warming a little more but hate on that it's not a depression i mean and yeah because of the rules it doesn't need work or around it like the wetlands do but it's a pond this big depression it's holding water from you know surrounding lots and from this lot and it's not holding water it's you know it's basically a place where you know where wildlife that require water or require vernal ponds live so again we sort of get that that mr chief our owns this land and has owned it for a long time we get that there are rights and you know and we and we understand it's not like somebody wants to cut down a bunch of tree is and take one of the one of the rare remaining green spaces and make it less viable as habitat for you know for you know for you know for the need of and and flora around we're not it's not about sort of it's not so much about good and evil but it is about there are a set of rules and those and and you know there is you know there there would have to be a powerful reason to to go against those rules to to to make it easier to go in this very very sensitive area so that's that's that's all i have to say but if we are very grateful for that for this consideration and we know it's not you know we don't we know we've done all sorts of activities there and we have come to appreciate habitat since the atkins family was still there i actually would like to start with a question i heard for the first time tonight i didn't realize that the seven hundred  fifty one fetus to the center of the bulb of the cul de sac it's not the end i'm glad you clarified that mr williams is that what is the six hundred feet applied to the regulations state that the six hundred feet goes to the middle of the cul de sac or  into that the energy of the answer or glenn what i can say is that the past interpretations have been to the middle of the cul de sac so for example in this proposal which is seven hundred fifty one feet plus or minus the seven hundred fifty one practice that binds this board or even really informs its judgement doesn't really matter what the board did nine hundred thirty two or nine hundred forty nine hundred fifty six when the board has a consistent practice over a number of years it has to follow that practice unless there's a good reason but there's no consistent practice here that's that's hear on the length of roadway it seems to me if you've got driveways coming off the far end that's where the emergency vehicle has to get to the cop doesn't stop in the middle and the fire truck goes doesn't go to the middle it goes to to the driveways to the houses to the  people and so unless there's some compelling consistent practice to measure the six hundred feet to the so the middle seems to be the whole point of the other regulation so you should measure to the far end that's total distance from that from the public road so i are only speaking for myself and i think that your comments reduce the apparent objectivity of town council well i'm being honest with you that's why i didn't even want to say that it  the seventy four bus here and i had dinner at gregory's pizza if i had known he was coming i could have done i could have gotten a ride i am here only for myself and have had no contact with george hall with me and or anybody else of the firm about  this i know i work where i work he works where he works i am not undermining or questioning his opinion i'm also not supporting his opinion i'm speaking only as a resident of l i can't make it any clearer whether you know what you do with that is your is your your business i'm just saying  can't help where i live and that's that's the parents you asked the question i think is an important one at six hundred feet how many houses would that road allow the answer was we don't know we haven't done that i would request that the board push the developer for that answer because every developer in the world knows the answer to that question when they propose a project that requires a waiver the first thing they do is they say what can we get without any waivers and then they say ok what would you like to get here's the waivers we need i i am without making this personal to any anybody on the applicant's team and i am highly skeptical that they don't have the answer to that question so i would ask the board to pursue that if you think it's worth my of my other comment is that waivers by their nature are sparingly granted and you heard the legal standard and i'm not going to touch it as a as a legal matter but waivers ours as you heard from other commenters not to be handed out unless there are particular findings particular standards are met there are exceptions to the rule you're not supposed to be the rule they're not supposed to be the same number of waivers as non waivers they're basically exceptions to be granted where the public interest gem that's one of the things that is one of the best features in belmont and it has been for the thirty years i've been there and that's where that's where the public interest really lies in that in this case the no longer road not only permits more houses i believe although they said we didn't hear the answer to that question but but it not only encroaches on the edges of habitat more but more houses on an overlong street is worse than fewer houses to have five houses worth of people back here along on an extra long street is is more of a safety problem if a tree falls if there's an emergency than if you had two or three houses so it's not only for the impact and habitat but for the impact on the public safety concerns that are implicated by the waiver itself along a road that permits more houses it's not just along the road but the more houses is a bigger self public safety problem so i would urge you to deny that broke like waiver thank you  out the obvious complication when mr craig began to talk my son pointed that out to me and i just want to correct a couple of things listen i think the police and fire of studied this road and they've come to a conclusion one thing that you can't see here if you can't see what's up here and that would bind road yes now i'd like to now turn for my vote what was the idea coming through would bind road and what was the opposition wanted to talk and i say with i'd like to get your ideas in you know this is what i'd like to do and so i saw a lot of resistance there and it was basically number one if you're going to build houses you would create construction traffic and i said well that's easy what will do is will come in this way with construction and we'll just you know we'll just loop a little culdesac in and that would be a much simpler point but there was resistance to that and we said ok so why do we want to fight with our neighbors if we don't have to and so when i thought that coming in off from our street created a simpler plan may be more expensive certainly more expensive because it's a much bigger road but it would you know when everything was more as oh bright totally as of right i didn't recognise until we get into it that there would be certain waivers you know that's sort of normal for the process it's not want you to rejoin the team i can answer questions from the audience in which want to come up to the mike you can't please because i can't i can't we can hear your questions but it's really important for the viewing we're on to agree that is my understanding the a barter is to the private with each of the i think as a private because we look to the private way and on the hill cross neighborhood each you know those folks right that live there that you own half way to the roadway so that you own it's a private way it's not a town way so in order to agree to but yeah but no but so on a private roadway each resident each house owns half to the middle of the street in terms of their the next step of whether he can gain access rights by getting a consent from the about his own woodbine i think that that's the case but that's a legal question yes a legal question but it seems to me that every of butter we need to agree to that i do not  public's best interest because there is no cul de sac on this dead end road we would have been creating a way for a fire truck coming down here to actually turn around but the a butter saying they didn't want that which is why we had to go the other way but well they would be aligned a little bit differently because of course there's a house right now in between that where would buy and road is in the cul de sac so they would have been turned around there would have been four houses at the end of the cul de sac like there search i'm mark davis from precinct one lived in belmont for forty years i speaking in opposition to the proposed development one seventy eight mar street in particular i'm opposed to  banning the banning down roads exceeding six hundred feet unless the road serves the public interest there are several reasons for this position first the proposed seven hundred fifty one foot d road only serves the private interest of the developer to the tune of several million dollars even if it goes to his children eventually you know it has added several million dollars to whoever owns that property no public interest has been mentioned as being served we see no public interest being served for instance there were no public facilities that are being reached that would be reached by the road as  d secondly if the proposed non compliant road is approved with no public interest being served then the board of survey will have seven days dangerous precedent on what we have heard is this will be the build a developer for purchase of land locked the first parcel of land to acquire one adjacent lot fronting an existing road and plan a long dead end road and make millions and then would be having set a precedent that even having no public interest and only serving development you could get a an extended road my third point has already been mentioned several times about the issues of public safety which works are up in the air but the longer the road is the harder it is to get in either for medical emergencies or driving a hose if there's a blockage at the beginning of the ro raised in belmont and traffic and i am concerned about the labors and i think my overriding concern is that if you're looking at this phrase in the public interest you have to consider what would the plan be without the waivers to know if it's in the public interest to grant the waivers and so i would like to urge the board of to make that comparison in making a decision when i think about what's in the public interest i'm concerned about a few things people have already spoken about the loss of what is so precious to us and habitat at the place that so many of us have taken our children have gone to seek refuge and have found great joy and losing parts of the border trailered be very sad and access to the border trail also i'm concerned about as a member of the traffic advisory committee the sidewalk and the raised level of the road where joins marsh street i know it's  there's not going to be many houses on it but what about access for handicapped people on the area where there's no sign one of the big things that comes to the traffic advisory committee all the time are people complaining that their roads aren't safe and their kids have nowhere to fall and people wanting sidewalks so that's one concern a second is where the prose road would meet mar concerned about ronald and and perhaps glenn has an answer to this or for someone else does but i'm concerned about in winter weather when there is runoff and it freezes are we making and i think i think you should that we live right there and the a number of deer and all kinds of wildlife that you constantly seeing a number of people we see enjoying the trails on habitat on a day to day basis i don't know if he really realizes he's way out over there but we get to see the benefits every day of live on albert avenue i'm not here to discuss the road i was hoping that everything would be resolved before i could stand up i'm a lifelong resident of belmont and now i'm a senior citizen and i pa very high taxes and i want to stay here in the town and we have no industry here have to help us with the taxes to pay for our schools and for and support the town and we need all the tax revenue we can get as long as a person follows the rules on his property he should be allowed to build what he what he wishes to build as long as he's following rules and i think that we need to think about tax revenue because we don't have industry and i know this is off the subject a little bit but i have to as a concern senior i feel that we need to raise our tax base so i am fully in support of the project because they'll be more homes and they will be more tax revenue unfortunately areas second point that i heard about sidewalks well you know we're talking about a two hundred feet of sidewalk that those are not installed here but what by and road has no sidewalks marsh street has no sidewalks so where you going with the sidewalks my question there are is the slope of the road another way for we're asking for but it's not really that we can't do it we just feel that the s that half percent which is what the regulations say that they will actually create a public hazard the water will not drain properly that's why we're requesting for a slight increase of the water will shut off besides the fact that there  country and i really appreciate all the comments have been provided i know mr schiff i want to have any final say here i have a couple comments i'd like to make don if you want to do that before i just want to say thank you and you know it's  great town a great community and it's wonderful the people are so energized about ideas i just hope that we're not going to be against everything and i want to make the point that i probably w and one of the biggest tax payers in the town with a proud piece of property that i have and you should discuss that if you had full lots of five what you actually would increase the tax base base significantly and lastly i want to in the interest of full disclosure the senior citizen see my oldest sister and so i have to be supportive because i actually expected there wouldn't be too many friends here and i actually thought don i actually thought she was your younger sister in significant we've provided that before i think the most significant issue here is of course the length of roadway and so i think i need some clarification one is there is by mr krieger what is the length a roadway is in the middle of the cul de sac or is at the end number one i'd like to see john you have legal pin that you have in terms of is a cul de sac the same as a dead end street and i would ask our town council to consider that as well as part of this deliberation and frankly i would like to ask  the developer and the engineers think it should provide to this board what a six hundred feet provide to you in terms of this development as you know for further consideration as well those are the things i'd like to see intrude again that for me is the more significant issue you know will be helpful i'm jus if i may you know can you provide that might be helpful to provide to this board just some little bit more detail behind that question i think that's helpful helpful yet let me ask you couldn't you provide any landscaping committed gate to the visual you ok and then for from a legal standpoint i think you know we've had a lot of attorney speaker tonight and i believe that the comps on the length of the road from whole lot of vision loss is that the case that's my understanding yes so if if we say that they never grant an exception that's because they're subject to different law than than we ourselves employ  i'm not asking you as an attorney i just saying as a matter of fact you can is that true you know so in other words you can't really argue what you join to the mike judge you can't really argue that such that a town that subject to a different law doesn't make exceptions and so even though we have different law that that we have to follow their guidelines i mean that doesn't seem to make i'm not i'm not suggesting that you know that we grant the waiver i'm just saying that doesn't make sense to me as i said to begin and you do have a different standard for your your discretion and other towns i can't speak for every town down why they do it you know i understand but we didn't adopt the subdivision law did we that's correct even in those other those other towns that you mention in your letter they they are subject to two different law that yes that's correct but i would offer you know in large part the board of survey is the functional equivalent of the playboy i mean we have a lot you know i'm ok i'm ok i just want to go to standard of the public interest one of one of the things and i'll ask our attorney i think property rights is in the big you know maintenance of property rights as in the public interest and again i'm not arguing for or against a waiver but i do think property rights are are an important matter of public interest how do you how do you see it  go i go back to these are your rules and regulations so your interpretation of the public interest does matter here so i don't i think that maybe i'm not sure that's a there's a legal question in there that i can so for example if we wanted to condemn properties along leonard street you know you would ask whether you know that would be in the public interest or not in that that goes to the issue of property rights and so i think the idea that that someone wants to develop their property is not necessarily a bad thing it's just a question of how it's done and whether it makes sense and as the regulations as it's it whether it's consistent with with with the body of the regulations in place is that fair to say you do need to look at the body of the regulations when thinking about whether or not to grant a waiver i think that's that should be or touched on this as to the regulations ok i think you are going to get on thank you and i do support property rights as well jim ok so i think there are certain questions that i need to make a decision i'd like to suggest that members of board survey that we i don't know whether we need agreement or sort of a continuance to our next meeting which is march twenty seventh i believe but i think we need some legal don i'd like to see your legal adopt a lower speed limit of twenty five miles per hour within the dick lee settled areas and business districts in an effort to gather information on a regional perspective on the matter and also looking to our neighboring communities i have gathered the following information as far as communities that have or will be adopting the language of mass general laws chapter nine hundred seventeen see to lower the speed limit to twenty five miles for all those cities and towns are going to boston cambridge chelsea lexington is in the process of doing it as well as some of the has adopted it and want to time as well and those are all those cities and towns that i were able to contact and get the information available i think in that sense as far as the process goes and what we have available i think it would be a good thing for the board to as this were achieved so we say thickly settled a business district is that every street in town number one or two what's the effective date with signage and is there an education aspect to this well there's a couple of things you've given me a number of questions of what we can do is what he obviously what you would have to do is once we decide if this is something that we want to do we've got to notify the department of transportation and that being said and that is all we need to do is just say that what we're going to opt in and accept the conditions property down to propeller road is not the cliche of those well so every other place some time is pretty much the cli saddle the only question i glenn and i have talked about is propeller road itself now that being said because of the agreement as far as the process we signed a five year traffic agreement i need to check the wording of that agreement to see whether or not speed limits are captured typically traffic signals traffic signal timing that type of stuff that's the type of stuff that's captured in settled area and then again as a as a commercially ok and as a general by law this would be it would be it would have to be adopted by town meeting is that my question would be at all of pretty much has to be adopted by that talk about different ways of stablish ing the signage we can do it as at the boundaries because that way there is it says the cli cell twenty five miles per hour town wide unless otherwise posted now that would include one around ou now you have a lot of them i don't you've probably seen them on pleasant street right out thirty miles per hour thickly settled so those would have to come down and what we would do is like i said they have put in into it you know rather than having all these n put up you can put them at the boundaries and move forward that way so glenn any estimate of cost it's going to come up the wara committee you know i mean i would defer to public works on that i think that we're trying to implement this in the most cost effective way as the chief said we would do it segments be twenty five along with the rest of the town that he do that well that's a special speed zone i would have to be created that has its own process but for the purposes of what we're trying to do i think we would move ahead with the idea that the those three exceptions would remain at thirty and then the rest right yes thank you of i've been practicing that overall they did a study back in two thousand and twelve what the idea of what the impact would be about this and like i said i have the study right here it's probably ninety pages long and they have come up with a lot of information obviously the main focus here is the safety aspect you know what those lower speeds the lower rate of speed but obviously have less and less injuries officer to that area for us we cannot capture the traffic data and a lot of times when we do that you know people look and say cause a speeding down here doing fifty miles an hour but in reality once they gather that information and we show it to them and we say this is actually what they're doing but obviously sometimes people don't understand that piece of it but we got the data to back it up there also used to be a rule because i'm the liaison to the traffic advisory committee i don't go all the time but i am aware of what goes on in in one case we had people who were complaining about speeding on on street across from the school behind cushing square and the idea was that if you if you wanted to put a speed limit on that street you had to then survey the yes the traffic and if the average speed limit was higher than thirty  or then you had to post that yeah right so this is going to overcome that's what are you going to overcome all that then this is something that they looked at him and said you know what we're taking away all that was other pieces if this if we do this is twenty five miles an hour yes and i mention to you by haven't really followed up with you but but we can do it or you can you know the idea was that we would get smart intersection going there with the with the train signal and then we would put a senior partner to take a personal position on a case where his associate is giving us objective advice does not present a proper appearance of  objectivity i agree with you but i don't want to change tell the council i'm saying i'm not prepared to reappoint them right now ok that i mean that message has to get out either you're going to get paid and make a profit from representing belmont which mr krieger does to name people or you're going to take positions personal positions on specific cases as a resident and i respect i respect either approach but you can't have the two at the same time because it presents and it does not present an appearance of objective a d i agreed that it was i mean and it makes us my experience as a select oh i beg your pardon i'm guy carbone e i live in precinct zero and i was elected to two consecutive terms as a selectman in watertown some years ago and i can only tell you what we did them with regard to town council we always waited in tap until after the town meeting to appoint a town council we did that because we wanted to make sure that whatever happened there were three people who were going to continue to serve and therefore they should be three people who would have a vote report the town council also i would like this sammy for what he just brother is causing the somebody else but when sammy brought it up i think it's very important i'm not talking about whether they should recuse themselves whether they should continue to be town council my only position is that in would be hired to quote unquote update the opec report and that are engaged meant a firm to report to us what our actual costs were open data because we need to issue the light department's financial statements so i have no problem with that but i thought i might none of us you know these he's an appointed member of the board david is not a david was not a sitting so when he's the town administrator floyd knows what his position is and i wasn't is still an r f p that is in the works for for an actuary study affirmed to complete an actuary study not for two thousand and seventeen but for two thousand the timing was the problem because an r f p would have to be advertised they would have to be evaluated new york to use it for the year that is expired already for which we have to have the valuation was too tight to do or issue of liability is the town's largest liability and what that firm was supposed to do ralph jones sat right there and said that they had the breakthrough in wayland and we all they proposed that we and but i don't want to do it a year from now or two years from now i want to hire those people get them to work and find out what we're doing and the largest liability that the town has and people who are appointed to committees are not supposed to be making decisions that that's our purview you know let me let me agree with jim if this board makes a decision and gets a directive that i don't think it's proper for committee members that we appoint to change that decision now it is proper for either you or the former town administrator or even a committee member to come before us and say can we why the consider the time and for these reasons i think that's perfectly proper ok but to just make the decision without forming us think they hired somebody else all they hired someone else they hired they hired k m s to do it who hired  if it's all of us who the both of you i mean i can meet with them i don't think that free parking is the way to go here but let's talk with them to see what their concerns are maybe the segregated parking but again i think we were we were justified in going from ninety