EDIC Presents Three Concept Plans For Development Of Falmouth Station Property
The Falmouth EDIC on Tuesday, January 18, presented three conceptual plans for the revitalization of the Falmouth Station property as part of the final stages of the Master Plan Study sponsored by MassDevelopment.
The three concept plans represent three options for the property—open space, single building workforce housing, and multi-building workforce housing—and come as the culmination of the five-month study done with MassDevelopment and other consultants. The concept plans were presented by consultants from Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. (VHB), and DREAM Collaborative, which are civil engineering and architectural companies, respectively.
The Master Plan Study—which began in September with a site visit and the review of previous studies and proposed developments for the area—included a stakeholders meeting. The meeting occurred in two sessions—one in-person and one virtual—and provided the consultants with information that VHB partner Ken Schwartz said was used in the development of the three concept plans.
The site visit allowed the consultants to take note of any areas of possible improvement.
Opportunities identified by the study as needing improvement were rerouting the single directional entrance and exit for bus circulation at the station, poor pavement and parking conditions, and inadequate signage, all of which were taken into consideration in the formation of the concept plans.
“We had some really good stakeholder meetings in the month of October,” he said. “Really good participation, really good input. Based upon the input that we received at those stakeholder meetings, we developed three different concept plans that tested different land uses on the site.”
Various opportunities for improvement of the site were identified after the stakeholders’ meeting by the board and its consultants. They include: the creation of a transportation hub for people, bikes, and buses; access to the ferry; attractive open space; emphasis on the historic significance of the site as it is a stop on tours of historic Falmouth; low-impact techniques such as solar and electric vehicle charging; enhanced connections to downtown for pedestrians and bikers.
After the plans were developed by the consultants, they were reviewed by both the board and MassDevelopment, refined, and are now ready to be seen by the public.
“I think the real potential and opportunity is the 1.75-acre wooded parcel that’s a potential development area [at the Station],” Mr. Schwartz said. “It does offer opportunities for looking at mixed-use workforce housing on that site; it’s currently forested but it is an area that has significant development potential.”
Greg Alban, a landscape architect with VHB, presented the three plans individually. He said that the plans were developed with the stakeholders’ input in mind and that the purpose of having three designs is to compare and contrast different development options.
The first plan would develop open space as a town attraction and would largely integrate the bike path.
“What we’ve done is taken the existing bike path that runs [through the property] and routed that bike path in and around this open space so it becomes that experience—when somebody’s on the bike [they can] experience both the station and the active park,” Mr. Alban said.
Another key component of this first concept design for open space is the improvement of access to the site for buses. Access would still be one-way but the addition of a bus staging area and shelter that is separate from the parking area would resolve vehicular congestion concerns for the property. The main entrance from Depot Avenue would be used by visitors of the park and Station Grill.
Mr. Alban also introduced the idea of a permanent historic railcar that would sit on the tracks adjacent to the Station Grill to bolster and highlight the historic significance of the property. Based on the shown character images for the concept, the idea of modeling the tracks and adjacent seating and activity area largely references he High Line Park in New York City, which sits on the former New York Central Railroad tracks.
Concept plan number two consists of a single workforce housing building in addition to improved bus routes, staging, and a scaled-down open space area that would be designated as a dog park.
In this plan, a three- to four-story workforce housing building would sit in what is now the wooded area of the parcel. The building would include between 63 and 77 micro-units which would likely be studios featuring a kitchenette and common spaces shared by residents.
Access to the housing area would be separate from the Station Grill and the bus entrances. Bus staging and parking would be included but buses would maintain single directional access to the station, entering from North Main Street and looping around the property toward the station and back out onto Depot Avenue. Additionally, the tracks would be transformed into a prominent, useful, and attractive space for visitors as mentioned in the open space plan.
“In a flat three-story scheme we’ve got 63 units, so we’re looking at the more transient housing and workforce housing on the site so that during the seasonal months and [with] the tourism industry, we can provide a place for people to stay and perhaps activate those small local businesses as a workforce during those busier months,” said Michael Paganetti, an architect from DREAM Collaborative, a minority-run architectural firm in Boston. “So with that, we wanted to look at providing amenities and really luring people to come take advantage of this opportunity for young people, specifically.”
Mr. Paganetti said that considerations for the building include a roof deck and a shared communal space on the ground floor. He also mentioned solar paneling on the roof for the building, as low-impact development techniques were one of the identified opportunities for improvement for the site.
The third concept plan considers the development of three workforce housing buildings.
“This is kind of breaking down the massing of the building and creating these three distinct buildings that would work very closely in conjunction with outdoor landscape spaces adjacent on the ground floor,” Mr. Alban said.
He highlighted an alternative bus route that would maintain the one-way entrance from North Main Street, but rather than divert it up to the station as in the single-building plan, it would divert to the south where the proposed staging and bus shelter would be. This is to avoid disruption of the residential and outdoor spaces proposed in this plan, Mr. Alban said. Access to the residential area and the Station Grill would be shared via Depot Avenue, but there would be a separate parking area for the housing complexes. Adjacent recreational space is also included in the plan, including a small dog park.
Another highlight of this plan is the maintenance of a portion of the tracks to highlight the site’s historical significance and the incorporation of the rest of the tracks into an open space area in front of the workforce housing. Mr. Alban also mentioned a proposed bike rental pavilion adjacent to the station to provide additional revenue.
Between the three residential workforce buildings, there would be 87 micro-units. Mr. Paganetti said that splitting the building into three gives them a smaller scale to work with on the site. One building would have communal space for the entire complex, Mr. Paganetti said, to congregate people in one area of one building rather than spread across all three.
He mentioned challenges with the grading of the site, a problem that could be solved by the proposed solution of barricading the service spaces in the rear of the main building and grading the pavement by the tracks up, so that the entrance is on the second floor. Perspective-wise, the main building would be two stories from the trackside.
He also highlighted opportunities for a roof deck and solar panels on the roof of the main building but also focused on how they can emphasize the ground floor as a communal space for residents. Suggestions on how to do that include a shared workspace, a function room, café, and communal kitchen. Mr. Paganetti said that the aspect of a communal kitchen allows for the idea that the units may not have a need for kitchenettes.
“Maybe you can make the argument that these units do or do not have kitchenettes; some of them do or some of them don’t,” he said. “If they don’t, there’s a place that people can go and cook communally and store food and have refrigerators.”
The units are very compact, measuring about 400 to 450 square feet. Because of the small nature of the units, opportunities to improve the complex as a whole with accessible amenities for all residents are key. Accessible outdoor space would be a great addition, Mr. Paganetti said, and an attractive contemporary interior is important to maintaining the draw of the property for month-to-month renters. Apartments would be move-in ready and furnished, which he said they hope incentivizes workers to live there.
After the presentation, the board’s discussion of the plans was minimal but overall positive. Thomas Feronti, EDIC board clerk, said that while he is a proponent of open space, it needs to be done in the right location. He asked Mr. Alban about the three plans, one of which consists of solely open space, and clarified that all of the proposed plans include some aspect of open space, just at a much more scaled-down level. Working with both residential and outdoor spaces, Mr. Feronti is hoping that the development will sufficiently address Falmouth’s housing crisis.
“We believe that this is an important site in our community,” said EDIC board member Michael Galasso. “And [it’s] an appropriate location, I feel, as an affordable housing developer, for an affordable housing component. The state and the governor have emphasized adding density housing around transit locations, and I think this meets the state and governor’s goal of doing that. There’s also a lot of funding that’s available for projects like this these days that both the state and federal government have.”
Mr. Galasso emphasized that this is just one more step in the process of developing the site and said that the EDIC wants to continue engaging with the community in all aspects on this matter. Next steps for the EDIC include gathering feedback from town government, departments, boards, and neighbors to further fine-tune the site plans and align them with community needs and the EDIC’s objective and mission.
The board and its consultants will present these plans to the community during a virtual session at 6:30 PM on Wednesday, January 26. The session will be recorded and uploaded to the EDIC website for public access, along with the presentation of the concept plans.