Now that the MBTA community housing zoning requirement has been approved by town meeting, and there are no subdivision proposals on the agenda, the Planning Board is turning to priorities and goals for the new fiscal year.
The first three are easy, because they are already well underway. Planning Director Tony Fields is drafting a request for proposals for consultant services that will help the board prepare for the decennial revision of the town’s Comprehensive Plan. Meanwhile, the Barrett Planning Group has been engaged to recommend revisions to the zoning bylaw. If that work is done by the end of December, the changes should be on the 2025 Annual Town Meeting warrant. And a revised Planning Board handbook may be ready for approval at the board’s July meeting.
So what’s next? At their meeting on June 25, members agreed their next priority topics will be building height limits and housing inventory options.
Planning Director Tony Fields pointed out that Bedford’s commercial height limit is four stories; neighboring towns allow six. This means “architects have less room to play with,” he said, noting that biomedical use sometimes requires 20-and even 30-foot ceilings. The new Ultragenyx facility required a height variance for its two-story building, he noted.
“We can’t just willy-nilly increase heights by a couple of floors,” said member Jacinda Barbehenn. She called for learning what businesses want, and if there are long-term implications. Barbehenn commented that “the region is overbuilt on lab space. We need to understand what the next ‘thing’ is.”
“There might not be a need right now,” acknowledged board Chair Todd Crowley. “Maybe it will come back. But at least we can provide the options when there’s not a rush.” Board member Amy Lloyd said that office buildings and laboratories have different needs. Raising the limit would encourage commercial development but should not clear the way for “giant buildings.” “We have to look carefully at what we are going to allow.”
Member Steven Hagan pointed out that Bedford Fire Department equipment can access only up to five stories, and “that should be the ceiling.”
Turning to housing, member Chris Gittins advanced the concept of a “cottage court” development, small single-family detached units arranged around a shared court.
Lloyd noted that there are several cluster development allowances in the zoning bylaw; she called for grouping them, along with any new entries, under a single category. “You could broadly put that under the category of lowering the barriers to construction of ‘missing middle’ housing,” Gittins said. “There are myriad ways we could go about that.”
Gittins suggested that the process could be part of the Comprehensive Plan update and “identify what changes to the bylaw would make the most sense.”
Barbehenn cited the proliferation of non-conforming lots in the Residence C zone (the residential zone with the smallest minimum lot size of 25,000 square feet). “We are denying almost half of our town the right to do things with the properties they own that the other half can do,” she said. “It’s an arbitrary thing that needs to be cleaned up.” Crowley replied that this discussion also could fit under the Comprehensive Plan review.
Hagan brought up another housing option that he said needs expansion: boarding and rental rooms. Part-time workers on his family goat farm have to rent rooms in other towns, he said. “‘Missing middle’ housing doesn’t include low-paid workers,” he said. “You’re never going to help those people get a house, so expand the amount of renting and boarding available.”
He called for raising the limit for rentals from two to eight unrelated persons and added, “I also think we should allow mobile homes or pre-manufactured homes for accessory units. Then you’re getting down to true affordability.” Barbehenn agreed that raising “the number of unrelated people is a real no-brainer, an easy first step to alleviate some burdens.”
Barbehenn also advocated vetting “standard multi-unit designs as pre-approved architecture” to expedite the process. Crowley said this also could be folded into the comprehensive planning, though Lloyd predicted some “input against change,” as the board seeks community opinions. “If we try to address something that people feel negatively about, then it becomes a multiple problem. I would prefer to just start getting the ball rolling without controversy.”
“It’s important to not always assume that town meeting is going to be negative,” Barbehenn observed. “We have an increasing body of evidence to the contrary. There’s a lot more willingness among residents, and we need to stop catering to the few residents who say they don’t want these things.”
Hagan added, “We know how to do forums and surveys. Let’s press ahead with what we think is right for the town.” Lloyd replied, “I’m just saying to move a little more carefully instead of trying to tsunami everything.”
Also at the meeting, Fields informed the board that pending state legislation could compel the town to delete its requirement that the owner of a house with an accessory dwelling unit has to reside there. “Towns will have to allow a single-family house and ADU where both units can be rented,” he said, adding, “I expect that’s a change we will have to make next year.”
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