Letter: Traffic nightmares? Wait for MBTA Communities Act 

October 22, 2023

In response to Robert Andrews’s column of October 13: If anyone thinks that the currently proposed West Concord developments will create traffic nightmares, wait until the MBTA Communities Act kicks in. It mandates zoning for 1,094 new housing “units,” which at some three people per unit translates into an increase in the population of Concord of some 3,000+ people — and perhaps 2,000 automobiles. And no new infrastructure.  

A week earlier, there was a letter that urged us to just accept this imposition from The State on High. It reminded me of what the tourist guides in the old Soviet Union used to say: “It is arranged, you will enjoy.” (Wasn’t there an event back in the 1700s where the locals resisted such impositions from distant rulers…?) 

I would hope that for the sake of the next generations that there will be at least some resistance to this ‘fundamental transformation of Concord’ which, over the last few decades, alas, has already Newtonized and Wellesleyfied what used to be a semi-rural paradise. Not everyone wants to live in urban density.  

Lawrence Franko 

Silver Hill Road