The Board of the Brunswick West Neighborhood Coalition wishes to express our support for E. Benet Pols in the race for At Large Town Councilor in Brunswick. This is the position being vacated by our supporter and neighbor, Debbie Atwood.
It is important for Brunswick voters to get out in large numbers in support of this worthy candidate. He's got strong, community oriented values and doesn't hide his intentions behind closed doors. He is also willing to stand for what is best for his constituents, and not swayed by the political alignments of the rest of the Town Council.
Benet has been vocal in his support of our fight against locating the NNEPRA Maintenance Layover Facility in our neighborhood.
http://benetpols.org/downeaster-extension/
Please consider casting your vote for Benet!
Thank you!
Proposed Facility
This is a residential area, not an industrial zone.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Thank you!
The Neighborhood wishes to send a heart-felt Thank You to Councilor Debbie Atwood. At the last Town Council meeting, she spoke out on our behalf regarding the appointment of Councilor Joanne King to the NNEPRA Layover Facility Advisory Board, and it is MUCH appreciated.
What more can you really ask for from a Town Councilor? She is honest and dedicated, and we are please to have her as out representative and neighbor!
Further, Debbie was right! Councilor King does not have the confidence of the neighborhood most negatively impacted should this facility should it be constructed in NNEPRA's proposed site. NNEPRA should not be allowed to dictate who represents Brunswick. We need a Councilor on this Board who will fight for us and knows the basics of construction. For those reasons and more, we support the appointment of Councilor John Perreault to the NNEPRA Layover Advisory Board.
What more can you really ask for from a Town Councilor? She is honest and dedicated, and we are please to have her as out representative and neighbor!
Further, Debbie was right! Councilor King does not have the confidence of the neighborhood most negatively impacted should this facility should it be constructed in NNEPRA's proposed site. NNEPRA should not be allowed to dictate who represents Brunswick. We need a Councilor on this Board who will fight for us and knows the basics of construction. For those reasons and more, we support the appointment of Councilor John Perreault to the NNEPRA Layover Advisory Board.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Update:
Hello, Neighbors and Supporters!
We are pleased to start updating the blog more frequently now that the busy summer is over. Thank you so much for all of your continued support. Please contact us at NeighborhoodVoice13@gmail.com if you have information or would like to assist us in this fight for our Neighborhood and with the responsible development of Mid-Coast Maine.
For a multitude of reasons, we do not feel we can trust that NNEPRA (or the Town Government) will do
the right thing at any point in this process. Our goal is to relentlessly hold them accountable at every opportunity. We will do this with our letters to the press, conversations with other Mid-Coast residents, and pleas to our elected officials. We encourage you to join us!
~The Brunswick West Neighborhood Coalition
The following letter was recently sent to our local and state politicians:
Greetings:
We represent approximately one hundred homes in Brunswick neighborhoods on either side of the railroad track that runs between Church Road and Stanwood Street. The Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority (NNEPRA), after a flawed and short-sighted selection process, has chosen this site ("Brunswick West") for the construction of a proposed Amtrak maintenance and layover facility.
We are committed to appropriate economic development that serves not only Brunswick but the greater Midcoast Maine region. We are convinced that Brunswick West is the wrong site for this facility, and that this is the wrong way to bring healthy development to Brunswick. We base our assessment on a review of NNEPRA’s Request for Engineering Qualifications, site selection reports, public and private meetings with NNEPRA and their engineering consultant Parsons Brinkerhoff (PB), meetings with Town Manager Gary Brown and Town Planner Anna Breinich, discussions with Brunswick Town Councilors, consultation with Maine DEP Staff, and our own technical analyses of the pros and cons of each candidate site.
NNEPRA’s planning for the site has ignored repeated legitimate technical and cost questions. It has dismissed the technical analyses of several critically important issues, such as noise, vibration, and contaminated soils remediation associated with the Brunswick West site. It has not addressed groundwater contamination, on-site buried pipelines that may have served underground petroleum storage tanks, storm water runoff impacts, a 50% increase in the size of the originally planned building, and the likely major increases in project costs necessary to deal with these issues. According to public presentations, the NNEPRA/PB site selection report did not objectively weigh these considerations when evaluating alternatives to the Brunswick West site.
The Brunswick West site is inappropriate for the proposed facility. At 60,000 square feet, the structure will radically transform an attractive residential neighborhood, introducing noise, vibration, and pollution hazards that constitute threats to our families, quality of life, and home values. The facility as proposed enacts a poor vision of transportation and economic development.
Mid-Coast Maine deserves better.
This project is about much more than simply servicing trains. It is about sensible transportation development in Mid-Coast Maine. By placing the facility at Brunswick West, opportunities will be lost to leverage its use into a more viable model of transportation development that serves the broader goals of regional economic development – especially as related to Brunswick Landing’s on-going successful development. The site itself is simply too small, and too poorly situated, to offer opportunities for further expansion.
There is a realistic alternative site that is far superior when consideration is given to both short term and long range economic development opportunities. If placed in a more suitable location, such as the “Brunswick East” site identified in the Cook’s Corner area, the facility could contribute to a thriving transportation hub for freight, passengers, and tourists. It would act as a lightening rod to attract development, jobs, and revenue for Brunswick, the Midcoast area, and the Lewiston-Auburn freight (rail) intermodal hub. The “knowledge corridor” between Boston and Bowdoin College would be well served by such a placement. If, on the other hand, the facility is placed on a small, tight site in the midst of the Brunswick West residential neighborhood, the facility will do nothing other than hurt families, diminish
the residential tax base, and play a limited role in the economic development of this region.
We appreciate the opportunity that has been afforded us to publicly comment on plans for the facility. We now openly request all of our public officials to assist us in thinking through alternatives to the Brunswick West site that offer clear advantages for the development of Brunswick and the region.
We look forward to your help going forward. Let's get transportation and economic development right in Mid-Coast Maine!
We are committed to appropriate economic development that serves not only Brunswick but the greater Midcoast Maine region. We are convinced that Brunswick West is the wrong site for this facility, and that this is the wrong way to bring healthy development to Brunswick. We base our assessment on a review of NNEPRA’s Request for Engineering Qualifications, site selection reports, public and private meetings with NNEPRA and their engineering consultant Parsons Brinkerhoff (PB), meetings with Town Manager Gary Brown and Town Planner Anna Breinich, discussions with Brunswick Town Councilors, consultation with Maine DEP Staff, and our own technical analyses of the pros and cons of each candidate site.
NNEPRA’s planning for the site has ignored repeated legitimate technical and cost questions. It has dismissed the technical analyses of several critically important issues, such as noise, vibration, and contaminated soils remediation associated with the Brunswick West site. It has not addressed groundwater contamination, on-site buried pipelines that may have served underground petroleum storage tanks, storm water runoff impacts, a 50% increase in the size of the originally planned building, and the likely major increases in project costs necessary to deal with these issues. According to public presentations, the NNEPRA/PB site selection report did not objectively weigh these considerations when evaluating alternatives to the Brunswick West site.
The Brunswick West site is inappropriate for the proposed facility. At 60,000 square feet, the structure will radically transform an attractive residential neighborhood, introducing noise, vibration, and pollution hazards that constitute threats to our families, quality of life, and home values. The facility as proposed enacts a poor vision of transportation and economic development.
Mid-Coast Maine deserves better.
This project is about much more than simply servicing trains. It is about sensible transportation development in Mid-Coast Maine. By placing the facility at Brunswick West, opportunities will be lost to leverage its use into a more viable model of transportation development that serves the broader goals of regional economic development – especially as related to Brunswick Landing’s on-going successful development. The site itself is simply too small, and too poorly situated, to offer opportunities for further expansion.
There is a realistic alternative site that is far superior when consideration is given to both short term and long range economic development opportunities. If placed in a more suitable location, such as the “Brunswick East” site identified in the Cook’s Corner area, the facility could contribute to a thriving transportation hub for freight, passengers, and tourists. It would act as a lightening rod to attract development, jobs, and revenue for Brunswick, the Midcoast area, and the Lewiston-Auburn freight (rail) intermodal hub. The “knowledge corridor” between Boston and Bowdoin College would be well served by such a placement. If, on the other hand, the facility is placed on a small, tight site in the midst of the Brunswick West residential neighborhood, the facility will do nothing other than hurt families, diminish
the residential tax base, and play a limited role in the economic development of this region.
We appreciate the opportunity that has been afforded us to publicly comment on plans for the facility. We now openly request all of our public officials to assist us in thinking through alternatives to the Brunswick West site that offer clear advantages for the development of Brunswick and the region.
We look forward to your help going forward. Let's get transportation and economic development right in Mid-Coast Maine!
Respectfully,
The Brunswick West Neighborhood Coalition
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