A new life science lab building and a park have been proposed to be built on the site of Doble Engineering in Watertown on Walnut Street. Developers will host a community meeting about the project on Sept. 16.
The proposed project is located at 85 Walnut Street and would be just east of the Gables apartment complex. The project also includes a parking garage on the site.
The park would go near Walnut Street, which is also an area adjacent to nearby homes. The lab/office building would be moved away from Walnut Street and toward Arsenal Street, thus would be farther from neighbors. Also, the parking garage would be built on the east side of the property, away from residential areas.
Drawings in the draft presentation for the project show a four story building.
Developers will host a meeting to discuss the project and get feedback. The community meeting is planned for Monday, Sept. 16 at 7 p.m. at Doble, 85 Walnut St., third floor.
See the documents submitted by developers to the Town about the proposed project by clicking here.
For questions or more information contact the owner, 10-85 Walnut Owner, LLC Matt Price at 617-532-7155.
Worth a drive down Walnut Street to take a look: the Walnut Street end of the property at 85 Walnut ALREADY IS a beautiful green space with beautiful park trees!
Kudos to the developers for their plan to expand this green space and provide it as a community park. But please be aware that big beautiful park trees that exist NOW in that green space would have to be destroyed to achieve the park design presented in this drawing.
Preservation of healthy urban trees like these is a vitally important component in the suite of strategies that cities must employ to protect their urban communities in the face of climate change.
Lose those big cooling canopies and extensive stormwater-handling root systems now, and it will take many years to replace them.
Every big urban tree counts. We need these important ecological services now, and will need them even more as the climate gets weirder.
Good observation Libby.
It is worth noting that the proposed driveway from this development goes out to Walnut street only. Since this is a larger building than is currently there that means there will be a significant increase of traffic on Walnut Street. This project should send at least 1/2 of the traffic to Arsenal Street. The neighbors of this project need to be vigilant to prevent this traffic increase.
And let’s consider connecting the Community Path from School Street down Walnut St on an enlarged sidewalk next to the greenery, through the old Doble property to the bike path behind the huge new apartment buildings. That path runs over to Irving Street behind the Elan development and could, just could, continue down the old RR right of way (now divided up) to the New Yorker Diner and over the planned bike path on Baptist Walk through the CVS town parking lot and the Path by the town mural to Waverly and over to the dog park on Pleasant and the board walk. We could go all that way and avoid cars most of the way. What a great recreational route–and I’ll guess some school kids and commuters would prefer that kind of route during rush hour, particularly since the Mt Auburn bike lane abruptly ends at Common. Let’s do the work of making this dream a reality. barbara ruskin