Start to Sound Barriers in Woburn

August 26, 2007

Today's Sunday Boston Globe included an update on Sound Barriers in Lexington and Woburn.

We are pleased to report that after being on the list of areas requiring sound barriers for nearly 20 years, a small section of Woburn along Route 93 will finally be receiving its sound barriers! We believe that the recent efforts of the Woburn and Burlington Sound Barrier Committees have helped to push MassHighway to begin constructing the barriers that they promised so many years ago. This is a significant accomplishment that we should all take great pride in.

Details on the specific location of these planned barriers are included in these letter and locus map links.

While we are pleased that MassHighway is taking some action for this small area, it unfortunately does not address the larger needs for Woburn and Burlington. We strongly believe that the noise studies conducted in the 1980's are out of date and we've had our concerns for other areas validated through independent and informal analysis, as well as reports from the 93/95 interchange task force.

We also continue to have our overall concerns with how MassHighway has been executing on its original plans - this area in Woburn was identified as requiring mitigation about 20 years ago and MassHighway is just starting to plan to build these sound barriers now. The reality is that we need sound barriers now for all of the areas in Burlington and Woburn that we're working for.

We are in the process of scheduling a meeting in September where we will get together to receive an update on the status of our funding request at the State House and to plan our next steps.

Please contact me if you have any questions, concerns or ideas. Thank you for your continued support and we are looking forward to seeing you in September.

Sincerely,

Chris Bortlik
Woburn Sound Barrier Committee
WoburnSoundBarriers@verizon.net
781-315-3889
http://www.WoburnSoundBarriers.com