Editor’s note: This story has been corrected to reflect the fact that the former nursing home property is zoned R2, not R1.
GREAT BARRINGTON — Despite a flurry of fierce opposition, developers received the green light last night for the conversion of a former nursing home on Maple Avenue to a 30-unit apartment building.
The original proposal from developer Jon Halpern of Great Barrington Development LLC would have added a third story and converted a now-empty 88-bed nursing home at 148 Maple Ave. into 48 market-rate apartments. After questions were raised about whether the town’s zoning bylaw allowed a building of that height, Halpern agreed to put the kibosh on the third story. Click here to view the revised proposal as of March 11.
Addressing previous concerns about parking and traffic impacts, Halpern’s attorney, Charles J. Ferris of Great Barrington, disclosed a traffic study by Fuss & O’Neill that concluded the apartment building would generate about 40 percent less traffic than an 88-bed nursing home.
“That strongly suggests that traffic in the neighborhood would not be seriously adversely affected but would be benefitted slightly,” Ferris told the Planning Board, the special permit-granting authority charged with considering the controversial application.
As for whether Halpern’s project would include sufficient parking, Ferris said it offered more parking spots than other multifamily developments in town such as Bostwick Gardens, Forest Springs and Powerhouse Square.
The 148 Maple Avenue developers also say the project is consistent with Great Barrington’s award-winning master plan, which states flatly that “redevelopment and reuse of existing buildings and infrastructure preserves open spaces.”
Maple Avenue is also a busy state highway otherwise known as Route 23 or Route 41. The property is zoned R-2, or acreage residential, which Ferris said is entirely consistent with the density of the proposed apartment building.
“It’s well within what’s contemplated in the zoning bylaw,” Ferris said. “And I think that’s an important fact.”
See video below of Thursday’s Planning Board meeting. Fast forward to approximately 15:00 to see the public hearing on Great Barrington LLC’s proposal for 148 Maple Avenue:
The fact that the project had been scaled back, coupled with revelations that traffic impacts would apparently be less than originally thought, did little to assuage the concerns of the neighbors who turned out to object.
Some suggested Ferris had made an invidious comparison because the former Kindred Nursing and Rehabilitation Center had never been at full capacity in the last several years before it closed in 2019, so Fuss & O’Neill’s traffic projections never reflected Kindred’s actual numbers.
“The traffic claims he made, as if the nursing home was full, is in a way absurd,” said neighbor Geoffrey Purcell, who added that the increase in traffic would be “not consistent with the neighborhood’s character. It’s more like an invasion to us.”
Several letters had been distributed to the board in advance of the hearing, which had been continued several times since the selectboard gave it a positive recommendation in early December. Some letters were critical, while several others supported the proposal.
But Maple Avenue resident Amanda Hanlin Hochler, an opponent of the project, noted that several of the letters in support of the proposal were written by relatives of Sam VanSant, Halpern’s project manager.
Hochler also said her group is gathering signatures for a citizens’ petition asking to alter a bylaw passed last year that allows for conversion of nursing homes.
Since the property is zoned residential, the project requires a special permit from the Planning Board. At a special town meeting in September 2020, voters approved Article 24 — a change to the town’s zoning bylaw allowing the conversion of nursing homes to multi-family housing with a special permit.
The relevant portion of that bylaw, Section 8, has been approved by the state attorney general’s office, thus clearing the way for the Planning Board to grant the special permit, which it did unanimously on Thursday night.
“The bylaw was specifically created for this project,” Hochler said. “We know that we need the apartments … but we really feel that you are overdeveloping this property.”
Hochler added that, “Once it’s built, we’re not sure what kind of recourse we have … “We don’t want to file a lawsuit against the town.”
Royce Jones, of 135 Maple Avenue, lives across the street from the former nursing home. The angry Jones called Ferris’ traffic comparisons “simply ridiculous,” the situation “intolerable,” and sounded the alarm about possible road rage.
“There would be difficulties pulling out onto Maple Avenue and, people being people, they would become outraged and you would find violence erupting on Maple Avenue,” Jones warned, his voice rising.
There were also complaints about aesthetics. One letter writer, Silver Street resident David Unger, who described himself as a “40-year experienced financier,” characterized the design as “ugly” and said it “looks like a prison or mental institution.”
“It’s not that we don’t want that building developed,” added neighbor Bernard T. Kinane, a physician. “We don’t want an eyesore. We’re advocating for something more in character with the neighborhood.”
While the immediate neighborhood in question is essentially residential, the broader neighborhood is mixed-use in character. Just to the east are several commercial enterprises, including doctor’s offices, the Great Barrington Agway, an outpatient center for Fairview Hospital, a Dunkin’ Donuts, and a grade crossing for the Housatonic Railroad’s freight trains. There are also offices and a construction yard on the cross streets between Maple Avenue and Route 7 to the east, where Ward’s Nursery and the large Beech Tree Apartments complex are located and, a little farther to the south, the Big Y Plaza.
The board adjourned the public hearing and began making minor revisions to the language of the findings prepared by staff, including town planner and assistant town manager Chris Rembold.
After almost fours of back and forth, a vote was called. Board members voted 5-0 to approve the special permit. The only condition attached to it was that no tenants be allowed to sublet for fewer than 30 days. This was, board member Jonathan Hankin explained, an attempt to prevent the units from being used for Airbnb — or short-term rentals.
Associate Planning Board member Garfield Reed, who has reportedly taken out petitioning papers to run for selectboard in May, could be seen nodding in approval at the comments of the opponents of the project. Reed even applauded some of their remarks. However, as an associate member, Reed can participate in the deliberations but may not vote.
Before he voted, Planning Board member Pedro Pachano, an architect by training, read a statement expressing his disappointment at the “ultimate objective” of opponents of projects such as Halpern’s, which he said is “to not welcome new residents and families to town.” To wit:
“I believe the fear expressed by residents is not so much traffic or parking, but a perceived deterioration of safety on our streets, safety that is not associated with automobiles but with new people coming into our neighborhoods.
“What is most troubling is that the adults that raise their concerns against these multi-family developments do not acknowledge this as their main issue. It took the 15-year-old daughter of one of the residents of this neighborhood to say what no one else would during our first public hearing — that she would not feel safe walking down the street with 30 new and strange families in her neighborhood.”
Click here to read the rest of Pachano’s statement. The next step will be for Halpern’s team to appear before the board again to engage in site plan review. That date has not yet been set.
