It’s a very busy time for HRCC Councillors, staff and our community.
The Parking Management Plan feedback closed last week, the Community Vision closes 22 May and will feed into the Council Plan via the Community Panel over the next few weeks, and the Draft Budget is open for community comments.
These are all very important for the future of our community.
Many in the community have made comments that they don’t feel it’s worth commenting as they are not heard, but I can assure you, we are listening, so please put in your comments, ideas or dreams for our community. Many live here because of the “country” lifestyle with city benefits, but there are always improvements we can make, so chat to others and submit your thoughts, I look forward to reading them.
Review of Athol downtown zoning under way
Published: 4/4/2021 12:13:35 PM
Modified: 4/4/2021 12:13:34 PM
ATHOL Meagen Donoghue of the Montachusett Regional Planning Commission (MRPS) recently updated the Downtown Vitality Committee on the start of a review of current zoning regulations affecting downtown Athol.
“The Downtown,” Athol Planning and Development Director Eric Smith said, “for some reason, key parts of it are two zoning districts: central commercial and general commercial. Everything from Island Street the YMCA and that area down toward Exchange is all part of central commercial, and everything that kind of wraps around that is general commercial. And there are significant differences. One of those is that parking requirement inside of central commercial are waived outside of that you have to meet all the requirements, and the only way to get a waiver would be a variance. So those are the kinds of things that need to be looked at.”
A council spokesperson said the introduction of paid parking in both sections of the Brisbane Rd site was endorsed at its December meeting. In mid-2020, a decision was made to retain the temporary at-grade car park fronting Brisbane Road until future development, they said. Last year council signed a binding development agreement with KPAT Property for the delivery of a 160-room, fully serviced hotel at the site of the ground-level car park. In December KPAT Property owner and founder Kenneth Wagner said he hoped a development application would be lodged by April and for construction to start in the second half of 2022.
Aggieville Parking Garage construction launches following groundbreaking ceremony
Representatives of Olsson & BBN Architects design team, McCown-Gordon Construction, and the City of Manhattan joined together to lay the foundations that would light up Aggieville development on a otherwise dark, and overcast Friday.
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Laying the foundations from which the Aggieville parking garage will rise, Mayor Usha Reddi thanked the Riley County Commission, as well as USD 383 board members for dedicating Aggieville as a TIF district.
This permits the city to capture development in property valuation and accordingly, property charges over a long term period inside a set limit for public redevelopment purposes.