Yard Signs
With the threat of an inappropriate over-sized 192-apartment development on Rice Road, that has the potential to have a devastating impact on our well-established single-family neighborhood and all surrounding neighborhoods and risks to public safety, we are introducing a yard sign campaign for anyone who is interested in participating.
There are so many things wrong with this Chapter 40B LIP apartment development concept plan with 25% being "affordable units", some public safety issues include, but are not limited to:
Rice Road is an inadequate road with road widths of only 16-feet wide in spots that is currently in poor condition;
The Providence & Worcester Railroad is a major public safety problem now, even without the addition of 192 more housing units being added, such as: a width of only 19-feet, a one vehicle at a time crossing, no sight lines over or across the railroad tracks, no crossing gates, a steep grade down/up from Providence Street (Route 122) making it dangerous in winter months, which was the main reason for the denial of the previous iteration of 46-condominium units, because the developers Steven F. Venincasa and James Venincasa would not agree to pay for the necessary upgrades only necessitated due to their proposed development;
Two non-standard T-intersections at South Main Street and Providence Street (Route 122A) and an impossible right turn southbound on Providence Street (Route 122A) to Rice Road;
The traffic generated from this proposed Chapter 40B project would drastically increase traffic not only on Rice Road, but on a minimum of South Main Street, Woodland Street, Herricks Lane, Sycamore Street, Maple Street, Curve Street, Providence Street (Route 122A), Riverlin Street, and beyond.
Drinking water is a problem now, whereas we had to purchase over 57-million gallons of water from Worcester to meet our current needs and have a water ban, which makes no sense whatsoever to add more housing units;
Fire safety is a concern due to the scale of this proposed four-story apartment development, one entry/exit point, and with a volunteer fire department; and
The density of this proposed Chapter 40B would be the second largest in town of Millbury, if it gets approved by the Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD).
We will reply to each interested person with the cost per sign when we have been able to gauge the interest to refine pricing from the vendor.