Contacts
14th District State Representative
State Representative Simon Cataldo
14th Middlesex District
Office phone: (617) 722-2000 ext. 8676
Background:
His assistant made an effort to contact the Town about the road. During their conversation the Town told him the road work met their standards. No one at the Town had ever talked to me about what standards they're referring to, despite knowing the problems with my home. The items the Town gave his office to fix the problems on Main Street are the list below, which aren't relevant the issue of my house vibrating and loud boom noises heard inside of my home from the trucks hitting the defect. Within the SAME WEEK of Rep Cataldo's office calling the Town, the Town increased the speed limit in front of my home from 30mph to 35mph. Retaliation or a coincidence? I contacted the State Rep about my house shaking due to a defective road and commercial trucks speeding, but they wanted to talk about school crossings. I've yet to see any traffic enforcement on my street. This is the typical response by the Town to never address any REAL problems, they just give you enough to pacify so you stop calling them...
Installed a permanent speed board on Rt. 62.
Conducted a software-based speed study from January 4- January 11, 2023 to evaluate automotive speed in that area
Had previous conversations with MA DOT about setting proper speed controls in various areas of the Town of Concord
Adhere to high standards of general traffic and law enforcement
Employ a full-time crossing guard Main St at West St during the school year.
Deployed temporary speed and message boards to help slow and educate the motoring public.
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State of Massachusetts, MassDOT
Richard F. Wilson
State Traffic Regulations Engineer
MassDOT Highway Division
10 Park Plaza, Suite 7520
Boston, MA 02116
(857)368-9628
Richard.Wilson@dot.state.ma.us
StateTrafficEngineer@dot.state.ma.us
Background:
Mr Wilson has information about Reg-9 & Reg 9-A. The last time the road's regulations were updated was 1957.
"Route 62 in Concord is under the jurisdiction of the Town of Concord. It is a town way state numbered Route which is functionally classified as an Urban Principle Arterial or a Rural Minor Arterial. I’ve attached for your information Special Speed Regulation No. 9 (and an amendment SSR 9-A) for this roadway. Therefore, the Town maintains the speed limits, with State approval necessary for any changes to these limits. We must rely on enforcement of these speed limits by the Concord Police Department."
In addition, he told me Main Street's commercial traffic is not restricted to local deliveries, has no HAZMAT restrictions nor noise ordinances. It is open to all commercial traffic 24 hours a day.
Boston and Cambridge have strict HAZMAT routes, truck and noise restrictions.
Cambridge:
Boston:
Main Street meets the definition of "thickly settled" but they have not changed the speed limit to 20-25mph. Concord has adopted this this law and opted-in "Townwide".
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State of Massachusetts, MassDEP
Quan Tat
MassDEP | Northeast Regional Office
Bureau of Air and Waste
150 Presidential Way
Woburn, MA 01801
Phone: (978) 604-7309
quan.tat@state.ma.us
Background:
I contacted the MassDEP about the noise pollution. Mr Tat told me that the Department of Environmental Protection doesn't have jurisdiction over road noise. That would be the MassDOT and Concord Health Department. The noise is from heavy vehicles bouncing on the defective road, engine noise, speeding, honking and J braking.
I talked to someone at the MassDOT Highway Noise Abatement program but they said they don't have jurisdiction over the area in front of my house.
MassDOT Highway Noise Abatement:
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National Grid
Michael Canto
National Grid
Road Construction Supervisor
Michael.Canto@nationalgrid.com
617-293-6162
Background:
He supervises the contractors that worked on Main Street. I spoke with him once to explain the problems. He scheduled to meet with me at my house in Nov 2022, but never showed up.
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Town of Concord, Public Works
Alan Cathcart
Director of Concord Public Works
978-318-3206
Background:
He's very aware of the road issues and has asked National Grid to return to repave the defective patch several times. They issue the permits and measure the surface of the road to meet safety standards. They've had to request National Grid come back several times because the patched area was not code compliant. Even if their engineers deem it "code compliant", it likely doesn't factor in weight and speed of the 100's of semi passing over it daily and proximity of the houses next to the road.
It's rumored that "micro surfacing" Main Street is scheduled for 2024. This may not smooth out the current bumps in the road that causes the trucks to bounce and may not be accomplished per the preposed schedule.
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Town of Concord, Police Department
Thomas Mulcahy
Police Chief
978-318-3400
Background:
Due to the excessive speed by the trucks on Main Street, I submitted a Traffic Calming Policy form to him in December 2022. I requested an update in April 2023. Mr Mulcahy replied that he had to check with Public Works but I never heard back from him. I made numerous complaints about speeding and requested more traffic enforcement. The truck's rear axels bounce on the pavement, it shakes the ground and the entire truck within feet from the houses. All of this vibrates into our homes. We were hoping if the Town could enforce the speed limit, limit heavy commercial and HAZMAT trucks to local delivery only and ban them from 11pm-6am (like they do in Boston and Cambridge) perhaps it would alleviate most of the problems with noise and vibrations. It's not just a nuisance, it's extremely dangerous to have heavy commercial trucks (possibly carrying HAZMAT material) driving 40+ mph within a few feet from the houses. At a minimum they should be driving the speed limit of 30mph (but how could this be realistically enforced without additional measures?).
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Town of Concord, Police Department
Ronald Holsinger
Community Safety Officer
Background:
In March 2023, I made a complaint about speeding and requested traffic enforcement. He told me to respond to the community engagement "Transportation Study" instead. I never saw this offered by the Town. On July 15, I emailed him about this study. He responded on July 24... "The contract was recently awarded to Stantec Eng. It was agreed upon to start the engagement after the summer."
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Town of Concord, Town Manager
Kerry Lafleur
Town Manager
978-318-3000
Background:
Letters and emails were sent but she's never acknowledged or replied to anything.
There were two Town Managers (between 2017 - 2020) before her that were interested in helping but they left their positions before anything was accomplished.
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Town of Concord, Health Department
Melanie Dineen
Public Health Director
978-318-3275
Background:
Per the advice of MassDEP, I made a complaint to the Health Department. The Health Department never responded. I measured the noise in my house. It's up to 80+ decibles, therefore I can't open my windows anymore. Boston's maximum road noise during the day is 70 decibles and 50 decibles at night.
Excerpt I got from the State of MA as a policy template for Health Departments:
"Chronic or repeated exposure to excessive noise is recognized by public health experts as a hazard to both physical and mental health. It can cause a number of ailments including emotional stress, fatigue, high blood pressure and hearing loss.
Recognizing that people have a right to and should be ensured an environment free from excessive sound and vibration capable of jeopardizing their health or safety or welfare or of degrading their quality of life, this regulation is enacted to protect, preserve and promote the health, safety, welfare and quality of life for the citizens of _____________, Massachusetts, through the reduction, control and prevention of noise by establishing maximum noise levels upon and between premises, prohibiting certain noise-producing activities, providing for inspection, and defining of offenses and penalties.
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Neighbors
1813 Main Street - house is in front of the patched road.
1803 Main Street - condo unit is next to mine on the corner of Main Street and Harrington Avenue.
Please contact me for names and phone numbers.
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Here are the videos. You can see the bump in the road at night when the trucks lights shine on it (camera angle from the left). It can be felt when driving over it. Upon visual inspection during the day, it doesn't look bad... so the town employees and National Grid take one look at it, they tell me they don't see the problem. That's why I started recording...
https://twitter.com/Concord_MA
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Town of Concord, Transportation Advisory Committee
I haven't talked to these people, but someone told me they're a good resource.
https://concordma.gov/2722/Transportation-Advisory-Committee
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