After a year of deliberations, the ZBA may vote on the 528 Boylston Street project on May 1. There are two key reasons to support this project — affordability and climate action.
Affordability: Newton needs more homes of all kinds to address the rapidly rising cost of housing.
This project goes beyond the requirements of 40B by including units at 50% AMI and having an additional family size unit (3BR).
There will be significant savings for people renting the affordable units compared to the market rate units – ranging from saving $10,000/year for a studio apartment at 80% AMI to $45,000/year for a 3BR at 50% AMI.
Climate action: We need to make it to live without having to drive everywhere! Climate change already impacts us all and will increasingly impact our children and grandchildren unless we take action now.
The key here is location, location, location! We need more options for people to live in towns such as Newton with access to transit and where people can live closer to jobs, schools, stores, restaurants and places of worship.
If Newton blocks new homes, we are pushing development further away from all these amenities.
More forests and farms are destroyed. If instead a similar number of homes (184) were built with quarter-acre lots, 46 acres of trees and fields would need to be cleared.
You need to drive both more often and farther distances to get anywhere. Living in Newton compared to living west of here, a household’s carbon footprint is lower. Compared to Needham, it’s lower by the equivalent of 60 mature trees, Wellesley – 75, Wayland – 145, or Hopkinton – 270 mature trees!
Kathy Pillsbury
Newton Highlands
