Group Opposed to Supermarket Development Suffers Setback

WAKEFIELD, MA-Local residents overwhelmingly voted not to delay the development of a 56,000-sf Shaw’s supermarket in the historic Robie Mills industrial park. The decision deals a blow to a local activist group determined to keep the supermarket from being built in the area.

Created about a year ago, Wakefield Association to Keep Environments Under Protection or WAKE-UP!, put together a petition to require a special town meeting to force the town’s board of selectmen to undertake independent traffic, economic development and pollution studies. Paul Reavus, Wakefield’s planner tells GlobeSt.com that all three articles were defeated.

Both Wakefield’s zoning board of appeals and its conservation commission already approved a special permit for the facility, which was required because the site is located in an industrially zoned area. The park contains historic buildings and a number of them will need to come down to make way for the store–a move that WAKE UP! opposes.

But shovels can’t go in the ground just yet. The group has appealed the special permit in state court and to the state’s Department of Environmental Protection. Both cases are pending. Calls to WAKE UP! were not returned by deadline.