Warehouse project poses risks

Shrewsbury’s Planning Board is deciding whether to permit construction of two distribution warehouses in northwest Shrewsbury. Why should you care?

The warehouses’ combined square feet would equal 16 football fields, abut Shrewsbury/Boylston homes, rest atop Shrewsbury’s aquifer (the town’s only water source) and overlook wetlands and Newton Pond upstream from Lake Quinsigamond. Most of an estimated 544 trailer trucks daily would use the I-290 on/off ramps at Shrewsbury’s Main Street. They would proceed through Worcester’s Lincoln/Plantation Street area (impacting UMass Medical and Great Brook Valley traffic) en route to the warehouses at 142 Clinton St. (Route 70).

The risks are many. For example, already hazardous, the I-290/Main Street intersection is just around the corner from Shrewsbury High School and its young drivers. And diesel exhaust from 500 trucks a day will degrade air quality, endangering children in the area and people with respiratory problems.

Surely, you say, the Planning Board will assess all the risks. But at a March 7 public hearing, concerned citizens asked if studies would be done on risks associated with exhaust emissions and with the intersection near the high school. Surprisingly, the board replied that its permit decision could be made without such studies.

This project seems too big and too dangerous for this community. To see it for yourself, view the Shrewsbury Planning Board’s website under “Projects in Permitting,” then go to “142 Clinton Street” and the “1/4/2024” link. It’s a jaw-dropper.

Thomas Grisso, Shrewsbury