Video: Northampton Planning Board Rejects Cumberland Farms Proposal for Florence

Here is a YouTube video of the 12/8/11 meeting of Northampton’s Planning Board. This recording was made by Emily Odgers. As you can see from the news accounts below, the Planning Board denied a special permit for a proposed Cumberland Farms in downtown Florence. The hearing on the Cumberland Farms proposal begins at 0:49:18 on the video.



Here is the meeting’s agenda as posted:

Planning Board Agenda 12-08-2011

See also:

Gazette: “Planners reject Cumberland Farms in Florence” (12/9/11)
Planners gave a proposed Cumberland Farms and gasoline station in the heart of Florence a unanimous thumbs-down Thursday night, denying a special permit and site plan approval…

The Planning Board cited several problematic issues before voting, from lighting and pedestrian safety to snow removal and vehicular traffic patterns.

MassLive: “Proposed Cumberland Farms project in Florence not appropriate, Northampton planners say” (12/9/11)
Under the plan presented by the company, it would have closed the current Cumberland Farms a few blocks away and opened a bigger, 3,600-square-foot convenience store with six gas pumps at the corner of Main and Maple streets, the village’s main intersection. That site is currently the location of a Mobil gas station that has been closed for more than a year…

MacConnell told both boards that Cumberland Farms’ agreement to purchase the parcel runs out later this month. Maintaining that it was not a threat, MacConnell told the Planning Board that the result of its decision will be the reopening of a less-attractive gas station at the site.