Cushing Village Developer To Accept Limits on Project

In an gesture that could herald a new impetus towards a final resolution, Belmont Town Hall sources indicate the developer of the proposed Cushing Village development has agreed to move forward with the multi-building retail and housing complex within restrictions demanded by the town’s Planning Board and abutters.  

The agreement will be announced at tonight’s Planning Board meeting at the Beech Street Center at 7 p.m.

In a letter sent to members of the Planning Board in the past week, developer Chris Starr and his team is in general acceptance of the limits placed on the project’s size, scale and mass the Board has recommended during the past eight months.

Starr has agreed not to withdraw the proposal located in the heart of Cushing Village at Common Street and Trapelo Road from the planning process and will continue to hone the project within those restrictions.

The board and neighbors have demanded strict setbacks and limits of three stories on most of the project.

At the Planning Board's last public meeting in August, Starr was ambivalent on the project’s future after the board expressed its displeasure to an additional floor of residential units in the building where the municipal parking lot is currently located.

But it appears Starr’s threat to build affordable housing on the two parcels he owns was not economical feasible.