 Wow, attention to detail, Fletcher. Happy new year. I like it. What'd you say, Fletcher? Got new glasses over here, Erin. Yeah, I feel like a nerd, you know. Oh, no. Give me a compliment. Thank you. And I'm going to make you co-host as well, Jen. I think it's fair to say, Erin, if you're a nerd, you're in good company. At least for me. It's, yeah, all around compliment for sure. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Hi, everyone. Welcome to the Amherst Conservation Commission meeting January 12, 2022, first of the new calendar year. We have a pretty short agenda tonight, although there are some odds and ends that Erin has to catch us up on. So hopefully we can move through things quickly. Thank you, Roy, for running the last meeting before. The holidays and it sounds like we have Laura doing CPAC for us. So. That's great. I don't have any other comments. Dave, do you have any updates or input for us? I'm sure just a couple of quick updates. We are. Thanks to Stephanie, with some input from Erin and Brad, we're wrapping up the Robert Frost trail grant with the state. I think I mentioned this last time. It's so much paperwork for a $30,000 grant. I don't think I'll ever do one of these again, but the bottom line is Brad and his, his limited crew did get a lot done. There's a lot of new boardwalks and, you know, all permitted through the commission. So that work is, is done for the season and the grant is done. It's a $30,000 reimbursement. I mentioned new trucks. We were finally after years and years of advocating, we did get the capital funding for new trucks. One of them is here. And we were very lucky to get this one. I think, I think we have both on order, but given the backlog of vehicles in the, in the country and probably in the world, we're very lucky to get this. So those should be rolling out in the winter months and into spring. I'm not sure when we're going to get the second one. So that's exciting because the trucks, I think one of our trucks is 16 and one of them is 12. So they've, they've been a lot of miles and done a lot of work. These are working trucks. They don't just move people around. So it's great to support Brad in that way. The assistant land manager search is underway. There is a committee set up already to make, make recommendations to me on, on who to hire for the assistant land manager. I think we have a robust response. As you can imagine. Good, you know, good, good candidates who want to work for the town in that role. So I'm excited to, to get a new assistant land manager on board probably at this point, middle of February. So it's a great time to train and get somebody acclimated when we're not in the field season. We'll be doing a lot of project planning. I know Aaron. And I have already been talking about projects for the, for the new year bridges. You know, I won't say this too loudly, but there, I actually had funding. I've kind of amassed some funding for the first time, maybe in my time with Amherst to really make, make a dent in some of the backlog. Of deferred maintenance out there on some of our other bridges. So grants like the rubber frost rail grant and money from the Kestrel Trust is really important. And we're, we're thankful for that. And we've got capital money and CPA money. And we'll get going on that. In terms of project planning, part of that would be, of course, for Hickory Ridge. We, we have two potential pots of money there for major trail work at Hickory Ridge. One is a CBG funding that we got recommended through the city council. And the other one is the city council. And the other one is the city council, the city council manager to the state. And the other hopefully will be the CPAC funding that has already been recommended to the town council and hopefully will be approved in the spring. So in order to get going on those, we need to do notices of intent with you. So one or more, I'm not sure at this point, but I'll be working with Aaron and Brad and some of the planning staff on those. So. You know, I know it's funny. I've worked on these projects for so long, but I will say that I got the attorneys sent me this afternoon, the closing documents and basically what we need to close. So I've never felt more confident that we will close in the month of January. So I'm feeling good. And we will soon take ownership of Hickory. So I think what we're going to do is, you know, I think the real work begins is planning and a master plan and figuring out what parts of the project, what parts of the property are conserved, what parts of the property may be available for other uses. That have been identified in some of the, you know, the information sessions we've had. As you might guess, I keep on getting asked by people in my neighborhood about where it stands. I don't want to say when, when the closing occurs, I don't want to, you know, be, be that person who says it's happening, it's happening and it doesn't. So once it, once we close and it's recorded, we'll do a press release. I was over there the other day post snow and a lot of people using it across country skiing, still hiking. So it's nice to see the public using it. So. So those are my quick updates. I think that's about it. Good time for project planning in January and February. Thank you. Thanks, Dave. Aaron, did you have any items for your report or do you want to jump in? I would just love to jump into other business and I think it's going to be pretty smooth. So three emergency certs were issued since the last meeting. The first two very simple. Two of them were, were trees. They're all hazard trees. Two of them were sick trees that were checked by an arborist and they needed to be removed because they were more than half rotted out on the inside and they were hanging over a roadway and then the other were too small diameter dead trees that were near a roadway as well. So those were issued for the removals and then the last one was 263 college street, which if you give me just one second to transition, I was there today. They, so this one, it's kind of, this is another one of those and I know we're revising the by-law right now, but like these are things that would fall under minor activities under wetland protection act. And so we're, I'm, I've been a little bit more flexible about handling it as an emergency certification. This was a shed that was an emergency demo of a shed where the shed was basically caving in. They filed a permit with the building inspector because they, it was a safety hazard and they wanted to get it out of there. And so they filed as an emergency search to remove this small shed. So with that said, we basically would just need a motion to ratify each of the emergency certifications. I moved to ratify the emergency certification for 36, the hollow. Second. Voice vote, Fletcher. Hi. Larry. Hi. Leroy. Hi. Michelle. Hi. And I'm an eye. And we have to ratify the emergencies where we keep going. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry. Oh wait, I'll wait. Do we need to cover the rest of them? No, you're good, Michelle. Keep going. Okay. And we have to ratify emergency certification for 106 Pellum Road. Second. Jeopardy. Voice vote, Fletcher. Hi. Larry. Hi. Leroy. Hi. Michelle. Hi. And I'm I. We're not fighting against Anna. All right, my turn. I'll ratify. 263 college street demolition of a hazard. Oh wait, shed. No. Yeah, hazard shed. Second. Voice vote, Larry. Hi. Fletcher. Hi. Leroy. Michelle. Hi. And I'm an eye. All right. So this is probably one of the most simple administrative changes I've dealt with, but just for this, it was brought to my attention. And so I just wanted to bring it to your attention. Hickory Ridge. They're finalizing their easement documents for utility access. The utility corridor going to the right of the access road. And as they're actually mapping it out in the field, they're realizing they have to go on the left-hand side of the access road, which is West, the West side. So. Changing the location of the utility poles is basically all it is, but I wanted to make sure that you guys were on board with this as a minor administrative change. And if you are, if you are a minor administrative change to the order of conditions. I see no trouble with that. Anyone else? No problem. Is there a timeline for the solar installation? Or is that kind of still a black hole? I think it goes after acquisition, but I would defer to Dave on that. Oh yeah. Yeah. Great question. I was just reviewing the conservation management plan yesterday, which is a pretty massive document with lots of attachments. I, I do not see much happening. I think until probably fall of 22. And the reason for that is I think they have to do most of the work during a period when wood turtles are not as active. So I would think fall of 22 might be the first time we, you know, I'm not 100% sure on that, but reading the CMB, I think that's, that's what I, I gathered from it. So I think October, they say October to April, I think is it. October 15th. Yeah. October to October 15th ish to April 1st is, is an active time for wood turtles. So do we have to make a motion for this? Yeah. Please. I'll make a motion to our minor administrative change to the order of conditions and Hickory Ridge to move the utility poles from the right hand side to the left hand side of the access road. Second. Voice vote Fletcher. Hi. Larry. Hi. Roy. Michelle. Hi. And I'm an eye. Yeah, this is going fast. I'm going to have a hard time filling this up. Okay. So, um, Okay. Well, if we could, I'll talk about Canton have first because we have 15 minutes and that's probably the biggest discussion item amongst these sort of behind the scene projects. Um, So I've been having a lot of back and forth with, um, Um, Uh, Pete Wilson, uh, regarding, I'm just going to stop sharing for a second so I can see your faces. Um, A lot of back and forth discussion with Pete Wilson regarding, um, The status of the enforcement order, how he can complete and resolve the enforcement order. So that's kind of piece number one. Um, and the way that I've interpreted where we stand with that. Um, I think I've seen a lot of people that have been involved in this. Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um. And so the commission asked them for the plan to be revised a second time to include the stormwater and the house because the first time around just the house was included. They are not going to get. So that's kind of in a holding pattern until the plan can be revised by the engineer so there's that piece. Then I was asked basically for a pre construction meeting on the other lot so they could go in there and start clearing the trees on the other lot. And I didn't even know sort of where to go with that because there's the outstanding enforcement issue on the order of conditions and so I wanted to get a read from you guys as to the place to them was, I think that you're going to have to wait until you resolve the enforcement but I wanted to get a read from you guys on that. The only note on that is that the two sites are the same projects so they're the same permit, same for a separate permit. Yeah, so my two is this been ongoing. The enforcement issue. Since they permit they tried to permit. I believe that the enforcement. So the, the, the violation happened in the fall of 2019 and it was discovered in, I want to say the summer of 2020 we discovered it and issued enforcement order. So we've been trying to resolve the enforcement order since summer of 2020. And what was the date that the permanent expires and you know it. Oh, so this is the thing we just worked out and this is. This state created this this tolling tolling period for permits and so based on that incorporating the extension of the permit that would the state granted through that emergency legislation, it would be I want to say it's June 22 2022. So they've got to do the this thing in March and then come back to us. Well, so here's the other, the other complicated piece of this. So their permits due to expire in June, we're not going to be getting a revision from them at least until March, but we know that they're, they're not just going to be able to do this as a minor administrative change to the order of conditions, they're going to come back and the wetland has dramatically changed and they're going to have to dramatically change their design. And so from where I sit it's either going to be a new notice of intent when that when that plan set comes through or an amendment to the existing permit. So, regard, you know that there's going to be a change to the permit regardless of that expiration date. And then we'll have to make that decision once the plan design comes through how to handle it. You said they want to clear to get started on the next lot, isn't there, don't you have to, isn't there a crossing to get to all of it. Yeah, so my two cents on this I was going to say is that we should not permit moving forward with a second law giving given an active and first enforcement order and permit conditions that are like basically in flux. And our job is to protect that wetland and if we don't know what the wetland looks like right now it's hard to be sure that that we could be protecting the resource on the second lot now. But I'm open to discussion if people think that that's for some reason unreasonable. So Jen, but with a different reason I just if it's definitely the same permit. And there's currently enforcement against it. I don't see why it's even a question. Yeah, okay. Great. Okay. Oh yeah, that's, it's the same permit I totally. Okay, there's, yeah. Great. So, if it, if the permit goes out at June in June, say that can you run that by again you said some if it can't expire but they can amend it, they can. So they could file to amend the order of conditions if the commission felt that that was an okay thing to do. And that would mean they'd have to re notify about it's, I mean an amendment is very similar to a filing a new notice intent altogether the difference is that you can carry forward the DEP file number. So they could potentially keep their old DEP file number and once the amendment is issued, sometimes with amendments they. So like let's say, within six months to a year of getting their order of conditions they file an amendment. Sometimes the commission will say your expiration date is the same as your original permit, just to keep them on a tight track, but other times when the amendment is issued they can give them a three year window to complete the work so. That's kind of not on the table yet. Right. I like to have a revised plan set for that even to that decision point to even come in front of us. Just to be clear. So what are we looking for. I mean it sounds like we're, I think we're just know to the pre construction. Yeah, I just need to just clarifying for Aaron what our position is on or what our understanding is of the regulations for how to move forward. Okay, so until they've resolved the enforcement there won't be a pre construction meeting for work on the other lot. Exactly. Okay. Well that was easier than I thought it would be to sort out. They have to like, since the wetlands move that yeah they have to give us all new everything. I mean, the whole specifically storm water drainage issue. Right, because different from the last permit. I mean this this permit. Right, right. The detention basin was proposed basically exactly where the wetland has expanded to. So they'll have to find a new location for their detention basins. It's pretty tight in there. Pretty major. Yeah, it's very tight, very tight. It's not trivial. No. Okay, so quick update 1107 North Pleasant Street. I did send a letter to the owner and I finally was able to make phone contact with the owner of record that we had on file and I found out that the property was actually sold in late 2021. I contacted the assessor's office and got the new ownership information and have now sent a letter to the new owners. There was no phone number available for the new owners. So they were sent a certified letter, basically notifying them that the trees were cut in violation and that they need to file a request for determination and that was based on the commission's discussion at the last meeting. I'm just going to pull up photos so those of you who have not seen it can see what the cutting looks like along this little intermittent stream. And then there is some cut some clearing in the back as well. So I'm waiting to hear back from them. I basically asked them to get in touch with me immediately told them to cease and desist with cutting and that they needed to file a permit for the work. That's good. Just based on the timeline do we think it's the new owners or the old owners that it was the new owners. I spoke with the old owner and he said he had no knowledge of taking place that it had happened after the property had been transferred. I haven't been to the site but is there any, any brush or any wood and anything left to take it away. Now, and there's been a little bit of scuttle but as far as like, who is responsible for the cutting because you know it seems like any landscaping company in town would have known better than to do that and so that's one of the things I'd like to get confirmation of once we reach the owners is who did this job and we need to be in contact with them. I know with enforcement situations that sometimes contractors can get pulled into those but more so just to say you guys should know better and if this happens again that we're paying attention to the jobs that you're doing. And if it is who I think it is this has happened before. So, anyway, we will cross that bridge when we come to it. I love that there's so many wetland puns out there. Southeast Commons is moving forward we've been getting inspection reports. I did go out and inspected de watering area, although it was pretty cold I forgive me for sharing and then stopping I'm just switching back and forth between my photos. So you guys can see what the site actually look like. Very snowy when I was out there, but so far they've been very good about keeping me informed communications been really good on the site this is the deep watering basin, which looked good my only concern about it was its proximity to the wetland. Usually I would ask it to be a little further away but this is where they placed it. So basically they were advised that it's fine but if that if that de watering area over tops at any point that they're going to have to cease pumping into it until the water infiltrates. It's going to be an interesting one. It is going to be a very interesting one because it's a very wet site I mean right now it's just tables right there. Yeah. You say Southeast Commons isn't that up by broke nine. Am I thinking in the wrong place. It's right behind Florence savings bank. Yeah, that's that Southeast Commons that's why I was confused. Southeast Commons isn't that way down by, by Pomeroy. No. Yeah, street Commons. It's on Southeast Street. Common by station road. And that's the one I think of as a Southeast East Street. But that's, that's the Southeast coming this I think is the East Street Commons. It's right behind Florence bank. That's, I just, I was deferred because I thought it was farther south and I thought I knew where it was and I didn't know where it was. Okay. So what do we actually call the area near Harvey's house. I thought that was like kind of South Amherst Center. Yeah, I was called to the Southeast Commons. South Amherst Commons. Yeah. Okay. Oh, I'm finally catching on to what Larry's fourth of July. South Amherst Commons. Yeah, versus Southeast Commons. Yeah. I don't know. I think it's actually fitler fitler green or something green that that's that was named after the. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, okay. I've lived this town too long. So, so how does this dewatering work? So they put this basin in their pump and water into it has to filter it helps filter. But that's where the, the structure is going in that place. Right. Eventually. Yeah, so they're going to be going to get covered over like they're just, it's just, I mean, I understand how it works. They'll get the drainage and the stormwater all the site. The drainage for the stormwater management all worked out and then they'll fill back in. I'm really curious to see how it is. So those plans are really funky the way they did that stormwater drainage. It's going to be a lot like the site over you drive south where they built it up really high. So it'll be they'll they'll dewater the foundation footings to get the initial foundation footings in and then once the initial foundation footings and they're going to be bringing in a lot of fill and then they'll be doing more foundation work, raising it up. I think that the issue there was that they have to put the foundation footings very deep down because the geotechnical issues on the site probably pertaining to the water table because it's so high. It's a lot of flooded basements. Well, not if they do the drainage right. Yeah, we'll see. Yeah, yeah. Either that or it's going to just be dumping a lot of water. Offsite into the road. The stormwater drainage. Right. Yeah. Okay, so the last little thing I just wanted to make you guys aware of there. I was contacted about lot 57 conquered way. And I was out there with Anna from integrity builders. And we took a measurement actually on that specific lot it in the original order of conditions it was outside of jurisdiction. And we recently approved the Tafino boundary changes for lots. Five through eight. And just wanted to confirm that with the changes in the boundary that that lot 57 was still outside of conservation commission jurisdiction. So I went out there today with her with a measuring tape and did that. I just want to be very communicative with you guys about that particular location because there's, there are lots on that subdivision where there's, you know, they still need to file notices of intent for individual building lots, but that's just not one of them. So I just wanted to make sure I was clear on that. Great. There are like a number of lots still available in there to be built on. Besides all the ones we were, we've been dealing with. Yeah. So there's a couple more on like the end of Lyndon Ridge, there's like a cul-de-sac down there and then there are these lots five through eight which we approved which of those ones are very tight orders of conditions they're going to have a lot of monitoring and stuff to be done as part of those construction of those houses. And then lots one and two actually 10 Parker never came back with with a permit so after a period of time, I mean, I've kind of already sort of considered that to be those to be that he's going to have to refile for those if he comes back for anything. But yeah, there's a there's a lot of house lots there. There's a couple of lots that they've been filling in to try to bring up the green. Oh yeah. They aren't where their wetlands are they're just they're inside another road but they drop off the road quite a bit and they're trying to build them up so they can bring the house up to a level. Gotcha, gotcha. Well that's all I have for other business and we're right on time here a little five, four minutes late. Okay. Do you want to do the certificates of, should we are there to certificates of compliance. There, there is one certificate of compliance. Oh and thank you for reminding me about that because somehow it didn't make it into my PowerPoint. It actually was for 15 a listen drive and I did go out there and have a look at it. The site is nowhere near any wetlands it was a hold over from the Amherst Woods. And the conditions which was from like the early 90s and they've been the attorneys have been trying to clean up all those lots out there so there was no issues it's upland site, totally stable, they're doing a refinance and so they're just taking care of it. So I would be in favor of issuing a complete certificate of compliance for 15 a listen drive if somebody wants to make that motion. 15 a listen drive certified of certificate of certificate of compliance. All right, voice vote butcher. Hi, Larry. Hi, Michelle. Hi, Roy. I'm an eye. Okay, so that's everything except our hearing that we're running five minutes late. So I see Paul. I'm assuming I can bring in promote to panelists. What happened. There he is. Good. Paul we see that you're in the meeting but we can't hear you. Okay, can you hear me now. Yes, hello, welcome. Thank you for being here. So let me just open this hearing since it's a new permit filing. Yay. This public hearing is now. Call to order this hearing is being held as required by the provisions chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended and article 3.31 wetlands protection under the town of Amherst general bylaws. Let's remember how Brian he had that memorized. Yeah, that will never happen. Thank you for being here. So it sounds like we're here for discussion. I'm just going to make sure I get the project name right town of Amherst DPW for roadway and drainage improvements and rehab and improvements to a footpath bike path on Mill Lane. So I understand this connects south pleasant to graph park. Do you just want to briefly introduce yourself and then give us an overview of the proposed project. Sure. My name is Paul that year. I work at the Amherst DPW and engineering department. And actually is it possible for me to share my screen. Yes, if you yep, if you go down to the bottom of the zoom window you should see a green button that says share screen. So if you want to work for people, can you see it. Yep. Okay. Like I said, I'd like to begin with just a little history on on this project in this area. Back in 2017. The town began designing a multi use path that was going to extend from the Amherst Hadley town line on East Hadley Road and eventually end up at craft park. And we basically, the design of that path was the intent was then to follow the town's complete street policy and provide a network along East Hadley Road to craft park and that included road widening. The addition of bike lanes improvements to crosswalks and in handicap ramps and also the addition of bus stops. The portion of the path from Hadley to West, the West street intersection here at East Hadley Road was completed in 2020. So the project that's being proposed tonight actually is basically the extension from East Hadley Road to craft park, which is shown in actually the yellow, this section right here. If you can see the cursor. And what we want to do with this design is actually we want to leave ourselves opportunities to extend a future path to the north to go to the Novotic rail trail. And then also down here leave us connection south down to Pomeroy village. At craft park, we wanted to leave an area so we could continue a sidewalk to the playground and then a possible long time future plan for another path on Mill Lane. So that's kind of the overall project it's just this portion in yellow that we're talking about tonight. Change to the overall plan here. So on this plan I just wanted to point out we we did actually have Beth Wilson from our department go out and delineate the wetlands. She actually did the mean annual high watermark here on the Fort River on this side and a little bit on the other side. And that we, we actually put in our 100 foot repair in zone, which is the red line and then also the 200 foot. And on the south side, this is the 100. And this is the 200 shoe also delineated a BVW in this hatched area here. And then the green dash line is the 100 foot buffer zone for that. And then the dashed blue line is the 100 year floodplain line, which runs along here. So again, is everybody able to see that. Yep. Great. So, so for this section that we did on East Hadley Road. We actually had a 10 foot wide multi use path. So for this section, what we tried to do is adjust the width of the path based on a lot of the resource areas and the impacts that we have. So the project kind of begins at the this with this ramp was revised when we did the other project in 2020. So the project actually begins on the north side of the intersection where we would redo these handicap ramps and realign this crosswalk across West street. And then we would propose a 10 foot multi use path down to the existing pedestrian bridge. And we would stop at the bridge. We're not proposing any work on the bridge itself. But the work would then start up again on the south side of the bridge. And the sidewalk would run through an easement that the town has out to mill lane. And then it would turn northeast towards graph park. And it would be eight feet wide through this section to limit the impacts. Also proposed with this project is. Repaving mill lane from West street, which this would be the match line right here. And that would extend all the way up to just past the entrance of graph park. And also, in this project, what we would do is look at the existing drainage for mill lane. And when we redo the road we would have to rebuild some of the structures, adjust the rim elevations back up to grade. So I'm going notes here and just missed anything. Yeah, so the roadway elevation in this area is is basically 15 to 20 feet above the water elevation of the Fort River. So the 100 year flood line is actually on the bank of the Fort River it doesn't appear to ever come up into our project site where we're doing the work. The dashed line would be our straw waddles or our silt sock. So the site was mapped as priority and as estimated habitat for rare and endangered species. We did fill out the lease application and it got the letter back and I think that was included in the NOI submission. The soils on the site are really not that great they're hydrologic group C soils. So that does kind of limit what we can do in terms of proposing any infiltration on this site. And we're also very limited to the space that we have to work with because we're pretty much within the right of way, and then it's just surrounded by residential properties. We did, when we were working on the design we did actually try to limit our disturbance, we looked at reducing the width of the path from 10 to 8 feet. We also looked at the existing pavement width of Mill Lane. And in some areas, we're actually reducing it from 28 feet down to 24 feet wide. So we can eliminate some of the impervious surface. We still end up with it with a net gain and impervious surface when we're done because we're widening the path but we did make attempts to limit that amount. We're also proposing to eliminate a section of existing sidewalk that runs along here. And again just turn turn that back to grass. So we have a couple of other items that we're at that we'd like to add in. So the path again it. We're proposing a crosswalk here. So to make a connection to the south side of Mill Lane, and then the proposed path will run along the edge of the pavement, then it will turn north and actually run at the same location where the existing sidewalk is. We're trying to limit disturbance by just taking up the old sidewalk, doing a little widening three feet, and then putting in the new multi use path. We're also proposing an overlook in a level area near the river. And that would be stone dust area with with a couple benches and plantings around it. And again the path would extend up to the entrance of graph park. We're also proposing with this project to install to stormwater treatment chambers. And the first one would be installed on an existing pipe at the entrance of graph park. And that would actually take all the runoff that comes from the east down Mill Lane, and it would run through this new treatment chamber and then discharge through an existing pipe into the Fort River down in this area. And one would actually go down here. So all of Mill Lane basically flows from graph park down towards the low point down here. And then this would be installed on the existing pipe and that discharges south into a small stream that flows into the Fort River. This project is being proposed as a limited project and redevelopment. I think that pretty much sums it up. If you have any questions if there's anything I can clarify. That's great thanks Paul so I think the next move is I know Aaron you guys did a site visit so we should get a report out for you but just before we go into that can you just tell me what is the additional square footage of impervious inside 100 foot. Do you know the actual square footage Paul. I actually figured it out for inside the 200. Okay, I didn't I didn't figure it out separately. Okay, that's fine. So we had here. So it's 12,000. 12,000 square feet of the total work area within the 200. And the impervious is 0.051 acres. Increase. 2200 square feet. Yeah. Yep. 2200. Yeah. 2221 square feet. Yeah. Okay, thanks. Yeah, so commissioners will come back to questions for Paul. If it's okay with you guys, I just want to see photos from the site. Is it in any notes any, I don't know who was at the site visit this morning. Just you Aaron. Yeah, I wish it was me. Okay. Yeah. I want to just give us a little tour. Yeah, sure. So this is starting at grove park and then moving west along the river. This is the approximate location sort of behind this little stump. That's the approximate location of where the look off would be. That is another view of it. And that's Paul sort of standing where the look off would be. And then across the street, this is showing that this is the sidewalk that's proposed to be removed. And then this is a shot of the area that goes across in front of the old grist mill building and the pedestrian bridge over the forever. The location of where the existing sidewalk is and then it would be actually brought around between the the signal and the hydrant there for the for the change. And then this is just a shot down to the river. Shot across south pleasant street. So this is difficult to see, but this is actually the outlet of the existing stormwater structure into the Fort River. And this is kind of back more towards graph park the graph graph where graph park comes off of middle lane if you look down towards the river you can see it and you can see there's actually a pipe sort of floating in the middle of that little washout area. So this the stormwater outlet has scoured away this this area on the bank and portion of the pipe disconnected and so it's just sort of floating there. So that's where the outlet is located. So if you guys want to do questions for Paul first how or if you want me to kind of go into what my review was. Yeah so why does anyone have any questions based on Paul's presentation before we lose that detail. Just real quick about the viewing platform to the river doesn't you don't have anything. No vegetate. Are you planning on clearing vegetation for a better view of the river. I'm planning on it. It's actually a just a fairly level grass area. So we wouldn't be into any of the vegetation. Yeah, the vegetation on the bank I'm saying correct. Yeah, or a view because like in the summer you're not going to see anything because it's going to be leaf leaf out on the river on the trees on the bank so I was curious. If you had anything. We hadn't really talked about that I was under the assumption that we weren't going to do that. But that may be a question for Dave so Mac also. And then just a quick follow up with that I'm assuming that might be part of the reason why you want to have the sidewalk on that side. Rather than have a sidewalk. On the, what's at the door side. Well, sorry south side, south side. If actually if we put the sidewalk on the south side. We end up doing more grading and earthwork. And if we put it on the north side, all we're doing is taking up an existing sidewalk and just widening it a little bit towards the road. Gotcha. So that adds to crossings pretty much right because you'd have to get yes, yes. And then down this side and then cross back. Yes. But for me at the moment. Anyone else. Okay, and do you want to give us your guidance on this. Sure. So, I mean, I think that it's a great project. I think they did a great job with the design and I think there's a lot of improvements that are associated with this that'll overall be beneficial. Okay, the application was filed under a limited project limited projects are reserved for situations where design constraints can't meet the regulations. Having looked at and crunched all of Paul's numbers with regard to existing impervious versus proposed impervious. The only parcel that really I was at all concerned about was, and I'm not sure if you guys can see this map image, can you see this. Okay, the only parcel that I was even remotely concerned about because of the amount of alteration was the one basically that the viewing platforms on it's this long skinny piece. The existing sidewalk in red versus the proposed sidewalk and this is not exact by any case this is just my estimation I Joe, Joe coded the, the PDF plan and then digitized it so that we could see and then the 100 foot inner riparian line is located this dashed blind so you can see all of that work is located within 100 feet. And so that's really sort of the biggest area of concern for me. Under the regulations for riverfront. So and so this is looking at compliance with the regulations because, you know, just to give you a sense of what the regulations require alteration. Within the commission's discretion, you guys can allow alteration of 5000 square feet or 10% under the riverfront regulations on a lot created prior to August 6 1996 provided that the work is in the outer riparian 100 foot wide area of undisturbed vegetation. So, this lot is about 20,500 square feet it's owned by the recreation department. The current alteration on the lot is approximately 1650 square feet or about 8% of the lot proposed alteration. Because if you include the existing and then add the additional impervious that's being proposed it will put it at about 3136 square feet again this is approximate and bring the alteration on the lot to about 15.3%. So, again, it's under 5000 square feet, but it's over that 10% threshold. The all of the work in that area would be within the inner riparian zone. So, exceeding the 10% and it's within the inner riparian. You guys have the discretion to approve this as a limited project and allow that to happen. So, we've discussed the possibility of doing a small 1500 foot 1500 square foot mitigation area in graph park. Anybody who's familiar with graph park you know that long grassy strip that runs along the river sort of in the lower plateau below the parking area. And if you go all the way south on that little grassy area, it's, you know, it starts to get kind of mucky down there and you're at you know it's kind of spotty grassy. Lots of roots and stuff so it seemed like a logical place to do a restoration. That's an option for the board to consider. Generally speaking, the project is removing excess impervious within the. We've made an effort to remove excess impervious by removing portions of sidewalk to try to, you know, comply with the regulations which I think was a great thing. And there are storm water improvements being made with the project in the form of replacement of catch basins and the placement of storm septers to do some additional TSS removal. So that being said it's really discretionary for you guys and that's basically what my recommendation is I do have a draft motion here for you. Most of it is pretty standard I think that the the one final condition and Paul and I had talked about this in the fields or on the phone maybe was the private property. Because they're being pretty significantly impacted by this work. They are the DPW is I guess going to be doing a little bit of helping gosh sorry this is really difficult to navigate. I'm going to be doing some work to to grade the private driveway. You know, because it's rutted and whatever just to offer them sort of something in return for this work that's impacting them. And so my comment or condition was that the 100 year flood zone elevation should be field surveyed and identified in the field prior to that driveway work being done just so that no fill can be placed within the flood elevation. And those are my comments. Thanks Aaron. Thanks Paul. Just a really thing on that private lot that's to the north. That's like, you know, to the north side of where the trail will go between the old grass mill and the like parking area. We had gone through this whole thing they replaced their fence a couple years ago and we went through this whole thing they almost, I think they filed a permit for it, and we had a clearance off the ground, because we're worried about critters being able to get from the Fort River to wherever up in sight. So just keep that in mind if any fencing has to come down temporarily like that actual clearance of the fence off the property was something that we like put a lot of work into I'm sure the landowners will remember this but I'm glad you're maybe you remember that. So back to this project. So, I think this is great. I at first looking at it I was kind of like, Why are we putting a viewing platform there. It's like kind of a funny spot when people are going to be traveling on list, along this with like right now the ultimate destination of graph park. Why would they stop there, you know, like when there's this really nice pavilion that graph park etc. And then I was worried, like I looking at just this, the topo I was worried that it was going to be kind of too close to like what's a pretty steep bank so if there's any vegetation clearing I was worried about bank stability there for the Fort River. But like kind of a view a little bit, you know, it gets a lot of flashy flows in there so I worry about kind of how that creek is down is in sizing and banks are getting steeper and undercut so I just worry about bank stability along the Fort River there. But that said, I don't think that given now that I've seen the existing condition of where the viewing platform will go I don't know that it's going to really make a difference. So I guess I'm kind of and I also think like the proposed storm water improvements and overall improvement to like the sidewalk and, you know, water set storm water quality management as a result of this project is great. So I'm kind of split, I guess. So commissioners do you have any input on this or would you mind stopping sharing Aaron. Of course, absolutely. Yeah, no. Sorry, thank you for. Yeah, I like to look at people's faces. Yeah, so I don't know, Laurie, you look like you have some input. Yeah, overall I'm totally with you Jen, I love this project so I'm definitely done to approve it. I guess this might be a question for Paul or maybe even Dave. Yeah, that's my point and mostly you won't be able to see the river. I don't know how much we need this viewing platform at all. And I'm wondering I know that there's a lot of time put into these plans. But I'm wondering if we could get rid of that I mean it would save us a ton of impervious doesn't seem to be gaining much is a short distance to Jen's point. I don't know if people are really going to use it. I just would like to hear some thoughts me or Dave. I'll probably put Dave answer that unless you'd like me to answer. Yeah, no it's a great, it's a great point. You know, and I think it's kind of a, it's kind of a toss up so often. You know you do, you get projects, not an Amherst but in other places we've all visited where people actually clear the trees so that you get a view of the river or the pond or the lake. And I think I can go either way on it I appreciate that Paul and others put a great deal of time into the into the design of the whole sidewalk. I will say that, you know, for instance I do use the county refuge trail quite a bit and Hadley with with relatives and friends and, you know, once, once the leaves either before leaf out, or after the leaves have fallen, you get nice views of the river. So it's not like we wouldn't be able to see the Fort River there. The flip side of that is you can just go up to golf park, park, go down the hill, hundreds of actually thousands of feet of frontage and viewing because you can take the Emily Dickinson trail and see all you want to the Fort River so. Some people, they may not do that they just aren't comfortable because of ticks poison Ivy or have mobility challenges. So that's I think why we proposed it up there. mobility side but one of the things I was concerned when I looked at that is, hopefully people aren't going to park there and go over and do it. You know that they might get park along Mill Lane and then walk over to that. That's what graph park is for. I could go either way I see the arguments for reducing impervious as Leroy mentioned and others so all I think are you kind of in the similar place. Yeah, it honestly doesn't matter to me it is, you know it is ADA accessible. Again it's up to other people I was trying to think back if I had a photo that was taken during the summer. You see that that we do have just for reference. Yeah, I could you put up one from today with pollen and Aaron. Yes, I'll keep that up. Can you just one sec. I'm going to look for the other one also. I don't necessarily think the view would be completely obstructed because there's not. I don't know the rest of that riverfront there's not a ton of thick understory all the time. I don't think they walked like the Emily Emily Dickinson trail all the way down that way. This is downstream of the Emily Dickinson trail though Michelle this is like. Yeah, I know I know it's not. There's a lot of like shade and like probably honeysuckle, which isn't. Yeah, too thick. I'm thinking maybe bikers, especially if it ever gets connected to the rail trail might use it instead of being at like the craziness of the family park. Yeah, stay away from the kids. Yeah, it might be like a nice mellow enclave. An adult viewing area. Put a recycling bin on those beer cans then. I mean, I don't mind it. I mean, having that viewing shed is probably. I didn't mean to cut you off Michelle sorry. No, I was just making, you know, pitch for the view, like, you know, just throwing it out there. Not. Yeah. Yeah, so go ahead, Fletcher. I was just saying having a viewing shed is probably better than having turf. Yeah, mowing it. Yeah. And I don't know about great grading impacts, but the square footage of the viewing platform itself and I don't know what you came out with. I came out with like 350 square feet. Like it's not very big. Right. And actually calculate it, but that sounds probably about right. Yeah. I mean, you might as well just go all, go all in and do what they did in Sunderland on the Connecticut River. You see that. Maybe you guys seen that right on the viewing one on right on the river at the Sunderland bridge where the boat launches. Yes. Take all the trees out and have a perfect view, but we're not there. So I shouldn't say that. Anyway, I think this is probably a viewing shed actually here. It's something for people to have a little bit of respite, but it's not a bad idea. I just, I don't know. I think I don't know. Maybe can that, maybe can that restoration area be in this area too or something? I don't know. Was there plantings on the plan? Did I see that like shrub plantings around on the sides or yes. Let me see. That's an interesting idea. Yeah. I think it would be a good idea to design the restoration area with. The viewing platform. So you have like thoughtful, native plantings kind of around low lying. With more sun than it would be in that little enclave and more PR for the plants. Yeah. Little signs. Learning opportunity. Yeah. I will, if I could chime in, I mean. If the commission were. Moving toward a restoration area. I think what we were. In our brief conversation that Aaron and I had, what we were trying to do. Down below was. Two fold really was create an area. That is essentially naturally restored simply by not mowing it any longer. So, and trying to get that benefit down closest to the stream where. You know, more mowing, more trimming, more raking and leaf. Deposition from, you know, leaf blowing. Really isn't great. And for the, for the river and the riverfront, but also, you know, a small restoration area there, and it's not as much as it is. It's not as small as it is would cut down on the amount of a fossil fuels that DPW has to use to mow it and blow it and. And trim it. And also, you know, We just restore some of that. That habitat down there closest to the river where would turtles do their thing and, and all of that. I am a little hesitant to add more work for DPW up here. So I'm just putting it up that out there. So hard telling not knowing, but if the, if the. Multi-use path were to continue to grow off park, would it then be adjacent to what we're now proposing as a restoration area in which case would be. Kind of. I don't know what is there a benefit there in the future necessarily. I think there wouldn't be Paul correct me if I'm wrong. I think we envisioned the sidewalk on the. East side of the parking lot, not the west. Cross and then go down the side. Okay. We would want to, we would want to keep the sidewalk as far away from the river and. Okay. The riparian corridor as possible. Yes. So I'm getting a very mixed. I'm getting what I'm giving, which is a very kind of mixed review here. I think I feel like nobody feels super strongly either way. That makes me feel like. The WPW has. Made a pretty good effort to mitigate storm water in this project. It's a really well conceived project. I'm tempted not to add in. An additional restoration area. I guess that's where I land based on this. Discussion, but. Yeah. I think that's the right thing to do here. I hear you on the, on the additional protection down close to the river there, Dave, but I don't think it's. I think there's been a lot of effort elsewhere in the project to help improve. The storm water quality going to the river. So. That being a pretty impactful. I think that's the right thing to do. I think that's the right thing to do. Addition. Or result of this project. Commissioners, any other questions or comments? I think those boilerplates look great. That was going to be my other questionnaire. And just because they're so close to that steep bank. They're in construction, making sure that we're keeping an eye on it. Anyone else? Any other. Questions, comments. We're going to continue to check on public. I know that the owner of the gris milk was there when we site that or say that she was going to jump on, but I don't know if she's still on. So I don't. I see more keen on there. But more raise your hand if you have a comment or question with related to this hearing or any questions in general. Don't think that's the landowner there. Okay. All right. So it sounds like we're looking for this motion, commissioners. Hard to read. I move to to issue an order of conditions for DP file number. Oh, eight, nine, six, nine, five. We have a boiler place, state, local conditions. Well, with the following conditions, number one, boiler plate, state, local conditions, number two, monthly erosion control monitoring reports. Number three, erosion control inspection and and at the start of the project, number four, stabilization with mulch and seed on all exposed areas until vegetation is established. Number five, final inspection prior to removal of the controls. Number six, one hundred year flood elevation should be field surveyed prior to field being placed in the private driveway. No field can be placed within the flood elevation. Second. All right. Voice vote. Michelle. Hi. Larry. Hi. Leroy. Hi. Butcher. Hi. And I'm an eye. Thank you, Paul. I'm sorry we started five minutes late. Oh, that's all right. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it. Good luck with the project. Looking forward to it. OK, thank you. Who's funding that? That is being funded with CDBG funds, I believe. Yeah, I believe it's CDBG community development block grant funds. Cool. That's great. It's a big project. Can I just ask a question? This is a little late on on this, but are there guidelines for like the shrub plantings that are in Amherst project plans? Should be like that we plant native plants next to a river kind of thing. Yeah, they should be in the specs of these plans. I'm looking. Michelle, are you asking are their standard? Do do we do we, you know, I guess that's a double question. Yeah, like, is there a standard and is there plans for this particular project? It just didn't come up. But, you know, there's definitely already a lot of invasives there. So I was just wondering if we're going native shrub plantings. Ooh, that's a good point. DW normally does, but I don't know as we have approved or accepted standards. We should, frankly. I know, yeah. Sorry, Dave, just looking at the plans, the call out, they don't have it in the specs and they don't have a planting plan in the specs for this plan set. And the call out says proposed street tree plantings to be completed by town of Amherst proposed shrub plantings, so it doesn't give us the detail. Sorry to interrupt you, Dave. Yeah, they're definitely identified as being sort of pruned species as well. More like an ornamental, I think, around that little viewing platform, if that's the area we're talking about. But I'm not sure on the non natives. I mean, do you mind just following up and asking Paul, if there's any way to have natives in there? Yeah, I think that's a fair, a fair ask right up in here in closest. Yeah, of course, yeah. That's a good point, Michelle. I mean, yeah, and technically I'm a little late on it, but yeah, no, that's. Oh, I think of things at like 11 o'clock at night after these things. Like, I have to work through this for like hours. So Paul's still there and he's right away. Oh, Paul's trying to. I just promoted him back, Paul. If that's OK, you're not done yet, Paul. Sorry, Paul. I actually I was just listening in. What we did was we took the set of plants and actually had the tree warden look them over. And he gave me the locations of where he would like to plant street trees. And then we also were just showing the shrub plantings in that area. But we haven't actually selected any species yet. So if the commission would like something special or any type, just let us know and we can add that into the project plans when it goes out to bid. So. Excellent. Great. OK. Thank you, Paul. Right. See you caught it after all the trouble. Yeah, I'm just thinking that's, you know, probably going to be a fruiting shrub. Maybe lots of winter birds like flying up and down that riparian corridor, spreading whatever we plant. So you have an opportunity to. Not do harm at least. Yeah, like a cool winter barrier or something. The native ones. Yeah, the winter berries are so pretty this year. Oh my gosh. Yeah, yeah. So would you would you mind following up on that? And of course, yeah. No, definitely. When I send out the order of conditions, I will put a note in there that specifically we've requested that the shrub plantings be native varieties. Awesome. So I think that's all we had on the agenda. Yeah, I'm just giving it one quick pass. I I'm a little behind on minutes because we're doing the the bylaw review committee, which I've been meeting with the town attorney to do review and then doing the review myself and then meeting with Michelle and the Roy. So I'm going to try to catch up before our next meeting on the last couple sets of minutes and maybe get a couple others in. We'll see what I'll try to do like those like marathon, you know, approvals of the minutes where we have like five sets to do in a whack. We'll try to get it done that way. Sounds good. Yeah, and thank you guys for working on the bylaws. Yeah, that's yeah, that's it's going to be a tremendous improvement. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, looking they're looking already the first 10 pages just looking good. So as a point, looking back at the pictures from there on the the river for River, what's going to happen to that fence that's in there? It seems to me when I look at your pictures that there's a fence that goes along next to the road. Now, is that fence going to stay there? Well, I'm looking at picture number that's private land. Yeah, that's private property. That's the fence I was talking about that we permanent. That's what I thought. But that is that also close to where the area where the where the cutoff is with the walking area where the sitting area. So so Larry, there there was a couple things. So they're actually making the road. I'm just going to share this screen real quick because it's kind of a good view. Give me just one sec. They're they're reducing the width of the roadway here. So they're reducing the width and then that will give room to widen out that. The sidewalk and the sidewalk is actually going to be on the south side of that pole, so it's not going to impact the fence. I don't like like Jen said, they might take it out during construction, but I I mean, I think everything is going to be they're not taking the polls out. I know that because I asked that question. The utility poles are staying staying as is where they're located. So I don't think they're going to need to take the fence out. OK. And that's all I have for you this evening. So I think that's a wrap. So you're looking for a move to adjourn. So move that second. All right. Voice vote. Fletcher. Hi, Michelle. Hi, Roy. Hi, Larry. Hi, I'm an eye. And that's our team. Good job.