Housing Headlines

PEABODY --- A proposal by owner William Skouras to convert the former Peabody Coffee House into eight efficiency units for low-income and homeless was voted down by City Council by one vote. Although the council voted in favor of the plan 7-4, Skouras needed eight votes or a two-thirds super majority to get the special zoning permit.

LAWRENCE --- The Eagle Tribune's Keith Eddings takes a comprehensive look at Lawrence's population growth - up 10,000 in the last decade - and the squeeze it's putting on housing supply, not just in the trendy renovated lofts that are filling up with young professionals but also in Lawrence's neighborhoods of one- and two-family homes that attract couples with children.

FRAMINGHAM --- The Planning Board's decision to OK 129 senior units on a former 67-acre golf course is not sitting well with neighbors, who have filed a lawsuit claiming the project does not have permission to use a stormwater system and that nearby residents will bear the brunt of anticipated problems, which they characterize as construction and traffic noise, changes to the local ecosystem and the “visual effects of the excessive density” behind their properties.

WORCESTER --- "Phenomenal" is a word being used to describe the turnaround at the Albion, Worcester's most notorious boarding house. Since landlord Michael O'Rourke acquired the rooming house in 2016, city code violations have dropped from 84 to zero and the number of opioid overdoses dropped from 11 in 2017 to one last year.

PEABODY --- Owners who want to turn their chemical factory into 48 downtown apartments or condominiums may face stiff headwinds as the city councilor for the district seems lukewarm at best while the area has a history of not wanting to change the zoning to allow housing. The proposal has received an OK from the planning board but still needs approval by the city council.

As National Grid reaches tentative deal with gas workers who have been locked out since June, a real estate group says the backlog of projects waiting for gas hookups is "a crisis" that could take two years to address unless measures are put into place to speed up the work.