Parking A Challenge For New Dedham Public Safety Building

DEDHAM, MA — The Planning Board is knee deep in trying to add a new public safety building to the town campus, the same lot that hosts the town hall and senior center.

At last Thursday's meeting, the biggest concern wasn't the logistics of the actual 49,000 square-foot buidling. How parking and traffic routing would work caused the most problems.

Town bylaws require the town's campus lot to have 370 parking spaces. There is only space for 212 spaces in the current plan. The developer is requesting a waiver.

The planning board reviewed the the parking space breakdown for the current proposed plan. The public safety building plan includes 86 spots for staff and 39 visitors. Some of those spots will probably be used for people going to the town hall, planning board members said.

Planning Board Chairman John Bethoney told Wicked Local a plan needs to work at all levels, so the limit parking was a concern for him, one that there isn't an easy workaround for.

According to the board, they were told by the developer that it's not possible to increase the number of parking spaces without constructing a bigger building.

The Public Safety Building hearing was continued to Nov. 8.

Photo via Dan Libon