Dunstan Corner

A neighborhood meeting was held on Tuesday, June 18th at the Dunstan School Restaurant.   Participants first identified their favorite places in the Dunstan Neighborhood.  These included natural features (trees, wildlife, water bodies, marsh, waterfalls), active recreation resources (Old Eastern Road, nature trails, ball fields, tennis courts), residential areas, historic features (homes, farms, Dunstan Landing, monument). Next, participants shared their visions of the future.  Click on the following notes for summaries of their vision.  Hopes for Dunstan's Future Fears for Dunstan's Future Traffic Update Great American Neighborhood Update Hope for Scarborough's Future

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• Hopes for Dunstan's Future
  • Make the village more walkable
  • Small mom & pop stores
  • Enhance/maintain village character
  • Promote Marsh stewardship
  • More accessible open space (i.e. eastern trail enhancement)
  • Neighborhood connectivity
  • Encourage turnpike use -- no to US 5-9
  • More recreation resources
  • Add playgrounds
  • Keep Village theme -- especially for pedestrian traffic
  • Preserve natural resources
  • No additional development
  • Positive business growth
  • Preserve historic attributes of Village
  • Sidewalks -- inter-connected to get to recreation and businesses
  • Add bicycle paths
  • Small local businesses
  • Clean air
  • Wildlife friendly
  • Quiet
  • Decreased traffic (with affordable mass transportation)
  • Activities for people of all ages (old Amvet building is nearby)
  • Clean marsh (sustainable ecosystem)
  • Future development/traffic patterns not negatively affect neighborhood quality of life
  • More sidewalks
  • Green space
  • Bike paths down Broadturn
  • Mitigate high traffic through public transportation
  • Buses, buses, buses
  • Noise ordinance
  • Traffic planning -- reduce Route 1 congestion, traffic backs up into Marshlands
  • Growth limited
  • Set esthetic standards for commercial development along Route 1 -- looks like Saugus, Mass., now.  Plant trees along Route 1, sidewalks too. 
  • Shuttle to Portland (alternative fuel)
  • Bike/foot friendly (path)
  • Eliminate dog restrictions on the beach June 1st - Sept 1st 9 - 3 p.m.
  • All-natural restaurant
  • Eliminate spraying
  • Implement natural mosquito repellents (mosquito magnet, bats, dragon fly)
  • Affordable housing; more culturally diverse
  • Lower property taxes!

   

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• Fears for Dunstan's Future
  • Big box commercial
  • Congestion (auto)
  • No room for homes
  • Lack of  pedestrian safety
  • Destruction of marsh
  • Loss of historical character
  • Habitat fragmentation
  • Widening of Route 1
  • Lack of planning for development and traffic
  • Pollution
  • Destruction/degradation of fragile environment
  • Fragmentation of sections of Scarborough
  • Over development
  • Too much traffic -- noise, pollution, ugly
  • Unrealistic high density neighborhoods will be built -- too many housing units -- car, people, students
  • Older people will be overtaken by the population increase
  • School system will continue to deteriorate
  • High prices of purchasing housing
  • Hard to walk and bike places
  • Water pollution from roads and lawns into the streams and marsh
  • Hiking areas will disappear
  • Too much traffic congestion
  • Lack of an overall plan
  • Over development overriding community input
  • Continuing sprawl
  • Loosing farmland
  • Traffic (cars)
  • Tax increases forcing lower income out of home
  • Marsh destruction
  • School overcrowding strip centers (increase)

   

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• Traffic Update
  • This has been an ongoing problem
  • Study was commissioned by the Town
  • Great American Neighborhood has commissioned its own study
  • Peak hour problem is Payne Road intersection
  • 25 years out will have more development in Broadturn area and most of the traffic will be looking to go that direction
  • Town's report looked at 5 scenarios -- both short term and long term solutions
  • Are any non-construction changes being done like synchronizing the lights?
  • Why aren't we synchronizing lights?
  • Problem is not Broadturn, its Pine Point.
  • Who should hear these complaints?
  • Moving Payne Road will not solve the solution.
  • Light synchronization.
  • Our neighborhoods are defined by not getting killed crossing Route 1.

   

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• Great American Neighborhood Update
  • We are at step 4 of 9
  • If approved tomorrow night we will begin step 5, which is the actual planning stages for the project

   

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• Hopes for Scarborough's Future
  • Mass transportation
  • Safe walking and bicycling
  • Beautiful scenery
  • Regulation improved for signage (less ugly) especially along Route 1
  • Nature preserved
  • Improved schools
  • Improved low impact recreation for all ages
  • Sustainable agriculture
  • Energy efficient building construction
  • Underground utilities
  • Affordable housing
  • Cohesive town council
  • Citizen oversight committee
  • 25% to 35% commercial
  • Lower taxes
  • Unity -- cooperation in public process private
  • Better watershed planning
  • YMCA
  • Extend eastern trail
  • Entry points more visible pleasing
  • Proper growth
  • Inclusion of summer people (tax payers)
  • No more development
  • Affordable housing
  • Proper planning listen to the voice of the people
  • Lower taxes
  • Preservation of wetlands, marshes, beaches
  • Solve Dunstan's traffic problem
  • Short term:  synchronize the lights