HUDSON – Developers are proposing to construct a 1.28 million-square-foot distribution warehouse at the former Intel site.
Now, the project will go before the Planning Board on Aug. 30.
However, residents at the Villages at Quail Run, which is a 55+ community on Autumn Drive, have voiced concerns about the project.
“It’s really the wrong project in the wrong location,” said Mike McCormack, who is the treasurer for the Quail Run Board of Governors. “The reason I say that is that we have an over 55 development on both sides of the proposed project. We have a day care center right in the front of the project and we have two schools within less than a mile radius from the project.”
What is proposed at former Intel
Earlier this summer, Intel confirmed that it planned to sell its 149-acre site at 75 Reed Road to Portman Industrial, which is a real estate developer in Atlanta.
The site is located within Hudson’s M-6 industrial zoning district.
According to their site plan narrative, Portman plans to demolish the existing buildings. They are proposing to construct a 1,284,640-square-foot distribution warehouse with 190 loading bays and parking for 540 trailers and 447 employee parking areas.
The main access to the site will be off Reed Road. However, there will be another passenger vehicle entrance off Marlborough Street.
“The building is being designed and entitled on a speculative basis to allow the Applicant to market the project and seek a tenant,” the narrative said.
Portman is projecting a total of 2,236 trips daily, including 770 truck trips and 1,466 auto trips.
In an email, Hudson Director of Planning and Community Development Kristina Johnson said Portman’s proposed redevelopment is allowed under the town’s zoning bylaws because the site is zoned as industrial.
She wrote that it is also subject to the Planning Board’s site plan review and that a public hearing to discuss it will be held at Hudson High School on Aug. 30 at 7 p.m.
Resident opposition
Susan Lalli is working with McCormack and other residents to organize opposition to the project. They have raised almost $1,500 to make signs opposing the redevelopment, and over 200 residents from Quail Run, which has a population of 235, had signed a petition against it.
Nearby residents said they were concerned about the uncertainty of who would lease the facility.
McCormack said it made it difficult to accurately predict how much traffic the project would create.
“But 1.2 million square feet with hundreds of loading docks tells you it’s got to be a big operation,” McCormack said. “Somebody who generates 25 truckloads a day isn’t going to be in this facility.”
Quail Run resident Alan Goldsworthy said that a distribution center could have three times as much traffic than what was indicated by the proposal.
For an over 55 community with many people older than 90 the amount of diesel fumes from frequent truck rotations is frightening, said Lalli.
The group also voiced concerns about noise pollution and the potential of the project lowering their property values.
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