Site Is Unsuitable For Firehouse

To the Editor,

I have tremendous admiration, respect, and appreciation for the volunteer firefighters of Newtown Hook & Ladder Co. #1. However, I cannot understand the obsession with trying to build their new firehouse at 12-14 Sugar Street (Route 302), on a site that is so completely unsuitable. This site is just west of the intersection with Main Street. It is one of the busiest and most congested traffic areas in town as anyone who has to drive through here during the morning or afternoon rush hours knows. The prospect of the extra backups and risks created by emergency vehicles being thrust directly into this mess on a daily basis is scary.

Secondly, this site is 90 percent wetlands. Only one small corner of the site is buildable and to build there a large ten-foot-high retaining wall around most of the perimeter will have to be built to minimize destruction of wetlands, and then 400 truckloads of fill will have to be brought in to raise and level the building site. Then a huge 11,000-plus-square-foot, two-and-a-half- story firehouse, with six extra-large firehouse garage doors facing 302, would be erected. This enormous industrial-type building would be directly adjacent to, and would completely dwarf the houses of this otherwise completely residential area, and would be built on land given to the Land Trust to be kept as undeveloped open space. This building would completely change the character of the area.

If there was no other alternative, it might be necessary to try to make this very flawed site workable and put up with all the problems and endure the sacrifices required of all the neighbors. But there are two very good alternatives. The current firehouse location behind Edmond Town Hall would be a much better site for the replacement. The traffic patterns are already established and workable with a wider access street and no major intersection close by. There is ample room, much less site prep work would be needed, no wetlands would be adversely affected, and there would be no negatively impacted residential area.

It already is a commercial-municipal area which would be suited for the structure. It is more central in the fire district with easier access, so response times would be kept lower. And construction costs would be lower with the decreased site prep necessary. Or, the new firehouse could be built at Fairfield Hills where there is more than ample room, property already owned by the town and offered to the fire company, none of the traffic problems of the Sugar Street site, or adverse neighborhood or wetlands impact. The possible problem of being further from the northwest corner of the fire district could be overcome with either redistricting or maintaining a small satellite station behind Edmond Town Hall for faster response to that section. Either of these locations would make much more sense than trying to jam the firehouse into the extremely unsuitable Sugar Street site.

Sincerely,

Curt G. Riebeling, DC

21 Sugar Street, Newtown                                     November 17, 2010