Wetlands identified on Reed Street property

Designers say motorcross track will not disturb sensitive area

By Jonathan Cook

Turley Publications Reporter

WARREN – For a Conservation Commission meeting on a driveway proposal, about a dozen interested people showed up.

After all, that driveway is planned to be the entrance of an off-road motorcross track on land between Reed St. and Brimfield Road.

Before RLA President Rob Levesque presented a map of identified wetlands on the property to the commissioners, Chairman Joyce Eichacker commented on what a track might do for the wetlands of the area.

She said off-road vehicles have increased by 300 percent in 10 years. “You all probably know there are people driving on your property with their ATV’s,” she said to the audience. “They’re driving through wetlands. They’re driving on conservation lands. There’s 300 miles of illegal path because of that.”

She added, “I’m just going to throw this out. (Property owner Keith Goyette’s) plan from a Conservation Commission is actually a good thing. And I know from a neighbor perspective, you may have a very different view, but Mr. Goyette can allow people to drive on his property and take them off of your private property and our conservation lands. We’ll be saving ourselves lots of damage. It’s a big problem. We’re losing wetlands like crazy due to off-road drivers.”

And the plan for a track, according to Levesque, will not need to come back to the Conservation Commission, because it will not encroach the wetlands’ 100 foot buffer zone. Nevertheless, he said they will update the commission as they go along.

Eichacker said, “Even though they were outside the 100 foot buffer zone, we did request that certain measures be put into place,” such as banking the track a certain way and putting rocks around the parking lot to discourage people from going off into areas that could be wetlands.

The wetlands were surveyed by both RLA and a consulting company for the commission. A 24-foot-wide gravel driveway leading to Goyett’s proposed home site will come close, but will not encroach on the 100 foot buffer of two wetlands.

Commissioner Ursula Wright suggested, as a condition of approval, the driveway not be enlarged.

Levesque said, while the plan would be to use Goyette’s driveway as an entrance to the track, there would not be a need make it wider.

While Eichacker said she was not required to take questions from the town, she did allow about 10 minutes for the audience to speak.

But little was said, because the track design was not available to be looked at. As Levesque said, “To be accurate and fair, we are still working on plans for a motocross track. It’s pending. The forum for a lot of your questions will be the Planning Board.”

One question asked was about the old Bay Path, which supposedly ran through the property at one time. Levesque said he was not aware of that possibility, but that he would research it for potential discussion before the Planning Board.