Dear Victory Field & Park Lovers & Advocates,
Patrick has asked me to circulate his remarks to the Watertown Community.
Please note the next meeting is Monday, July 10th at 7:00 pm in the Lower
Hearing Room at City Hall.
Yes, I know many of you are angry and disgusted that these meetings have
been scheduled during the summer. But damn it, your voices and involvement
are needed now!!!
Best, Elodia
___________________________________
*Victory Field Phase 2Remarks on the discourse so far*
Having sat in on the first two meetings of the Victory Field Renovations Ad
Hoc Committee and participated in the intervening site inspection, I’d like
to contribute to the discussion as follows.
1. Our current debate over the public open space associated with the track
oval and tennis courts exemplifies a fundamental economic law – the more
demand for a commodity increases, the more the commodity increases in
value. Highly valued already by its present users, our Phase 2 area stands
to attract increasing conflict with the addition of yet more users, as
proposed. Undoubtedly, some compromises can be effected as a result of this
committee’s good work. However, as an ecologist I feel obliged to remind
all stakeholders that any area has a carrying capacity, or ability to
support and effectively sustain its constituent life activities. Our debate
so far makes it clear to me that Phase 2 Victory Field is already at or
very near its carrying capacity. Given the drive to concentrate as many
organized school sports as possible at Victory Field, our one size simply
cannot fit all.
2. It’s understandable that school sports activities should indeed make the
Victory Field complex a priority location. I support that argument, subject
to the recognition that already there’s not enough room for every school
stakeholder, and that there are other stakeholders to accommodate as well.
In view of the strong demand for use of this strategically located open
space by Watertown residents, I recommend that whatever sports
organizations get to use it should serve exclusively our Watertown citizens.
3. Alternative open space exists in Watertown. The capacity of this
resource to provide additional organized sports services should be
considered along with current planning for the Victory Field complex.
Alternatives are the stuff of necessary compromise – and compromise is
needed here.
4. In contemplating the current Phase 2 plan, we would be remiss to
disregard the fourth dimension, time. I think that this plan does not
adequately stand alone, isolated as it is by fiscal constraints from Phase
3 considerations. For example, discussion of Phase 2 parking should be
conducted together with Phase 3 parking concepts in order to ensure the
best reconfiguration of field house and environs, especially a parking area
to serve both phases.
Another example of time’s importance to this debate is the fact that we all
grow old. At any one time only about a quarter of our households have
school-age children. Not all grow up and move away. The Town teems with
people in ripe old age. They thrive on unprogrammed outdoor recreation.
Adult lives matter!
On a somewhat longer timeline, consider that Watertown has just adopted the
Community Preservation Act, which requires us to invest part of our annual
CPA contribution in the acquisition and development or redevelopment of new
public open spaces for active as well as passive recreation. What we plan
for Phase 2 and Phase 3 is surely intended to hold good for at least fifty
years. Long before we get there, Watertown will have new open-space assets
to offer. Let’s not act now out of some sense of desperation to impose on
Victory Field a demand that can be more sensibly accommodated at some other
part of Town in the ensuing decade.
5. Finally, a word on parking, through ecological eyes. Everyone loves the
convenience of moving comfortably and quickly as close as possible to one’s
destination ; in proof of which, make more parking space available at
Victory Field, and it will quickly fill, and still not be enough. We are
already contemplating a Phase 2 plan that reduces green parkland by a
considerable amount. If anything, parking space should be reduced in
compensation, for the sake of those unsung but very real public benefits
that come to us from the natural world. Our precious ten-acre forest
adjoining Phase 2, Whitney Hill Park, serves as an outdoor laboratory for
long-term ecological studies by Watertown High School. The green open space
of Phase 2 Victory Field serves as a marginal support and buffer system for
the forest itself. The greener the better, as far as forest species (and
many people) are concerned. Parks Before Parking!
I previously mentioned the importance of time in the world of planning.
Nowhere does this consideration apply more forcefully than in the sphere of
automotive engineering. With the advent of self-driving, self-parking cars
that can be called up on-line for pick-ups and drop-offs at a moment’s
notice, the need for large open-space surface areas to station unused
vehicles will soon be manifestly much reduced. The Phase 2 planning
exercise should be conscious of a future that will become reality long
before Phase 2 reaches the end of its notional life span.
Patrick Fairbairn, Marcia Road
6 July 2017
*____________________*
*Elodia Thomas*
*67 Marion Road*
*Watertown, MA 02472*
*617.926.3952 <(617)%20926-3952>*
