| Return to Middlesex School Project Start Page |
Details:
RECENT NEWS ABOUT MIDDLESEX SCHOOL'S
UNFORTUNATE BUILDING PROJECT
IN ESTABROOK WOODS
|
* September 7, 2005. Middlesex School starts cutting its Estabrook Woods. Site clearance and tennis courts are under construction has started. Click here for photos of construction. Bulldozers are rolling 1200 feet into the woods. The trustees plan (for this initial phase) to use the existing causeway to build tennis courts and do additional extensive land clearance and grading. (The bridge and two soccer fields would be built next year, if funds can be obtained.) Thus, the amount of clearing and bridge width will double next year. To level the hillside site for soccer fields, an engineer advises they will need to blast and move 40,000 cubic yards of rock and soil. The orcs are in the Woods. And remember, thirty MORE acres of developable, zoning-free upland are owned by the school even deeper in the Woods. East of the soccer fields. Middlesex's plans for this parcel ("Area B") are unknown, but they will be ripe for the picking when current restrictions expire in a decade or so.
* Jan. 30, 2005. Again with Harvard’s support, the benefactors re-offered their $4.5 million gift to create a joint environmental science program with Harvard. The benefactors have also suggested that the first five years be a confidence-building trial period, funded by additional money, also in-hand. (Harvard’s responsible official supports this proposal and has said that he continues to work to dissuade Middlesex School from building in Estabrook Woods.) Again, the condition is that there be no building in the Woods. What a wonderful offer! Iy would have made Middlesex unique among preparatory schools. But, amazingly, the Middlesex School trustees again rejected the proposal. * For an fine set of project images on the first phase of the project (Area A) compiled by Jeff Walker, Middlesex Class of 2001, and other info, click http://wwwalker.net/estabrookwoods/ * Jan. 17, 2005. A Middlesex graduate has come forward to pledge $500,000 if the school halts development and protects its holdings in Estabrook Woods (both the A & B land). This donor wishes to remain anonymous, but it means we can truthfully state to other graduates that we already have, in addition to the $4.5 million proposal described below, substantial financial support for our cause. * Jan. 2005. Middlesex School's plans are almost finally approved. Soccer fields and tennis courts may be built more than a quarter mile into the woods with a further development zone extending off the photo to the right. The current Middlesex School campus is at left, with Bateman's Pond at the bottom. Click on image for a larger view (350K). A trustees' meeting is to be held at the end of January.
- The School's next step will be ask the Concord Planning Board for approval, though the Board has limited jurisdiction over school plans. * Late fall, 2004. It has been disclosed that, some months ago, anonymous benefactors offered to provide $4.5 million to create a joint educational program between Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology and Middlesex School, using Estabrook Woods as a teaching laboratory. The intent of the donors was to create a premier environmenal program at Middlesex School. A Harvard research fellowship or faculty appointment would be created with teaching responsibilities at Middlesex School. An endowed chair in environmental science would be created at Middlesex. Harvard MCZ officials were enthusiastic. The money was in hand. But a condition of this proposal was that Middlesex not develop its portion of the Estabrook Woods, and the school has not accepted the proposal, preferring plastic soccer fields. * Oct 20, 2004. Middlesex School now has its wetlands permit. Cost has prevented a further appeal. I am told that the school this week announced to its students that the trustees have reaffirmed plans to build in Estabrook Woods. Concord Planning Board approval is required but the town has only limited planning and zoning control over a school's building plans. Thus, it appears that 75+ acres of upland (not counting the CRs) deep within Estabrook Woods are about to be more vulnerable to current and future largely-zoning-free development. Ostensibly, the project is for athletic facilities (though faculty housing has also been proposed in the past), but objectors are skeptical and fear this expensive infrastructure will inevitably lead to greater development. This breaks faith with the community's understanding that the Estabrook Woods would be preserved. Click here for a useful map of the project. -- I am very grateful to those that have carried the burden of the lawsuit for these many years. During the proceedings, more people have been made aware of the issues involved and have expressed their dismay. And invasion of the woods has been delayed so that project proponents could have reconsidered, had they seen the light. I continue to hope that the educational values of the Estabrook Woods can be honored. April 18, 2004. Middlesex Graduates for Estabrook Woods announces the rebirth of the website: <http://www.estabrookwoods.org>. While many of the finishing touches still need to be applied, the site is up and running and will hopefully function as a resource for those in the Middlesex family who are concerned about the development of the woods. Please visit the site. * The January-February 2003 issue of "AMC Outdoors" (the "newsy" magazine of the Appalachian Mountain Club, has a full page article on page 96 about the Estabrook Woods. The article notes that the Club has been hiking in these woods for 110 years. It quotes praises about these woods from Thoreau and E.O.Wilson. It concludes, "Estabrook is in trouble. Neighboring Middlesex School wants to drive a wedge of development 1,600 feet into the heart of the woods. For a printable JPEG (117K), click here or on image below. In 2000, the AMC's journal Appalachia had run a long article praising the Estabrook Woods. * In September 2002, the Middlesex student organization Common Sense reiterated its support for Estabrook Woods and its opposition to the development project by sending a letter to the school trustees at their fall 2002 meeting. The students wrote, "We maintain that the proposal is ill-conceived. We believe that alternative building plans have been both poorly researched and prematurely rejected. The Estabrook Woods are too valuable a resource to dispense with so quickly and thoughtlessly." For full letter, click here. * In May 2002, Dr. Andrew Biewener, the director of Harvard's Concord Field Station wrote a letter expressing his concern about Middlesex School's proposed development, and his hope that Middlesex will be dissuaded. The Concord Field Station abuts Middlesex's proposed development. Biewener is also Harvard's Lyman Professor of Biology and is Chair of Harvard's Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology. * On April 22, 2002, a biodiversity bibliography was published on the Sudbury-Concord River Valley with 400 citations to the natural history of the valley, 65 of which are specific to the Estabrook woods. The area is a fine educational resource. It also has an annotated cover showing the 70 fragments of conservation land in the valley from Wayland to Bedford, totally more than 12,000 acres. It is a triumph but lacks protected corridors and has few unfragmented blocks. Click right for 90K valley map with Middlesex School project annotation.
And on Feb. 5, 2002, the first comprehensive bird list of Estabrook Woods was issued containing 159 species from 1966-2002
On Oct. 5, 2001, Massachusetts Secretary of Environmental Affairs declares that the entire Estabrook Woods is CORE HABITAT which should be preserved to save the state's biodiversity. The proposed Middlesex project intrudes deeply. To see a map of Estabrook and environs, with the Middlesex project annotated, click here or on thumbnail. * July 20, 2001: An architect, who is Middlesex graduate and parent, calls Estabrook development "a spectacularly bad idea." (New in November:) An environmental engineer, who is a Ph.D. Middlesex parent and Concord neighbor, wrote "I urge the Board to consider alternatives that would accomplish the School's objectives with less environmental risk and would be less divisive both inside and outside of the Middlesex community...." New student survey shows 70% opposed to bridge into Estabrook. New letters in opposition from Middlesex Graduates for Estabrook and other alumni. *April 2001: The rare Blue Spotted Salamander was found breeding at the site of Middlesex's proposed 300-foot bridge into Estabrook Woods. Estabrook Woods was named a Biodiversity Site in the "SuAsCo Biodiversity Protection and Conservation Plan" (2000), which was just published on the website of the Sudbury Valley Trustees <http://www.sudburyvalleytrustees.org>. The proposed Middlesex project makes the Estabrook biodiversity site skinny and vulnerable to edge effect. see map. |
|
Project news continued on page 2: click here.
| Or return to Middlesex School Project Start Page |