Pepperell Planning Board Opens Court-Ordered Hearing on 21-Lot Bemis Estates Subdivision

PEPPERELL — November 30, 2015 — Pepperell Planning Board opens court-ordered hearing on a 21-lot subdivision that has been in litigation since 2002. The board convened Monday under a Massachusetts Land Court judgment of remand issued October 22, 2015, by Judge Piper, restarting the public process for John Lorden Jr.'s Bemis Estates proposal — a 47-acre site between Bemis Road and Lawrence Street that sits within Zone 2 of the town's public water supply well field. Attorney Brian Levy and engineer Gary Shepard of David E. Ross Associates presented six waiver requests covering tree surveys, elevation benchmarks, intersection rounding, and road sight distances, while a packed room of abutters raised concerns about blasting liability, cut-through traffic, terrain steepness, septic system risks, and potential contamination of the town's drinking water. The Board of Health's written comments flagged missing soil-testing data for all 21 lots and a 440-gallon-per-day-per-lot septic loading cap; the Conservation Commission said it would comment after its December 1 meeting. The hearing was continued to December 14 at 7:15 p.m., with the board directing the applicant to return with color-keyed revised plans.