DPW Adds Safety Measures At Route 1A Detour Site / Group Cites Need For New School-November 6, 1964

Massachusetts Department of Public Works Enhances Route 1 Warnings Following Fatal Crashes As Town Prepares for Special Town Meeting

Substantial traffic safety measures were installed this week in the area of a narrow Route 1 detour where one person died and eight others were seriously injured during a recent seven-day period. Massachusetts Department of Public Works crews installed the improvements after The Patriot Ledger highlighted the dangerous area between the intersection of Route 27 and the Pancake House, Sharon, in an illustrated article on Monday. The Patriot Ledger brought the matter to the attention of DPW Commissioner James Fitzgerald, who ordered a survey of the area in question by the district engineer’s office at Taunton. The results of that survey became evident yesterday. Just south of the Routes 1 and 27 intersection, where previously a single sign had been placed indicating one lane traffic ahead, the following measures have been taken:

Approximately ten 24-inch standing reflector signs outline the right-hand side of the curving detour, warning motorists away from a barricade which blocks what will become the southbound lane of Route 1. Double solid yellow lines that had previously led up to the barricade have been blacked out. New solid lines have been painted following the curve of the detour to the left away from the barricade. A white reflectorized edge line has been installed along the right-hand side of existing Route 1 and continues along the outer right-hand limits of the detour. Alonzo Edwards of the Taunton DPW office said yesterday the detour would be removed in two weeks when the new southbound lane of Route 1 is opened.

Reconstruction in this area was necessitated by the building of nearby Interstate Route 95. A spokesman at the Foxboro State Police Barracks said yesterday the safety measures installed Wednesday by DPW crews “have greatly improved the situation.” The spokesman said the safety precautions particularly had been noticeable to nighttime cruiser units from the barracks. Previously, any warning of four-lane traffic narrowing to two lanes and two-lane traffic narrowing to one lane had been unilluminated. Mr. Edwards said Commissioner Fitzgerald had requested District Engineer Joseph Cronin, accompanied by Edwards, to survey the detour area Tuesday. After viewing the location, they discussed the area with state police, he said. In the detour area, a Providence man was killed and four members of his family in addition to a North Attleboro woman were injured in a head-on crash. Three other persons were injured in a second fiery head-on collision.

Spokesmen for the referendum petitioners who are seeking the rejection of plans for an eight-room addition to the Cleveland School said yesterday that recent enrollment figures verify the need for a broader expansion program. Edmund Mulvehill, one of the spokesmen for the group, recalled that when the addition was authorized by the town meeting earlier this year, its proponents maintained that the Oldham School, the newest facility in the town, was accommodating less than a capacity student body. That was true at the time, Mr. Mulvehill said. But he said that the Oldham School, through redistricting processes and normal expansion, is now already overcrowded. This and related other facts “shed new light on the matter,” Mr. Mulvehill said.

The status of the Cleveland Addition Committee, however, is at this stage somewhat unclear in view of the referendum petition recently filed that would, if approved by the voters, overrule the addition plans. The referendum petitioners are seeking support for a more elaborate building program that would provide the town with a completely new 16-room school. Opponents of the drive maintain that the last-minute obstruction will cause a delay that will make double sessions at the Cleveland School inevitable next Fall. The final plans for the addition were approved at a special town meeting two weeks ago. The issue will be settled by the voters. The selectmen are slated to determine when the balloting will be held shortly.

Mr. Mulvehill emphasized that he and other petitioners were not “upset” and disturbed by the adverse reaction in some quarters to their referendum proposal. But, he added, the petitioners feel that it is their right to question the program at this stage. He said that one of the fundamental reasons that the group decided to challenge the building program stemmed from the opposition to an addition rather than a new school expressed at various times by varying school officials. He went on to urge that the town’s voters acquire whatever information they can on the issue to make a proper determination at the polls; in this regard, he said he hoped the townspeople would go directly to members of the school department and school committee if need be, “to find out what this is all about.”

Mr. Mulvehill again stressed that the petitioners’ central objective was the advancement of a school building program that would best meet immediate and long-term needs. “Our motives are completely honest and sincere,” he said. He said he felt a complete discussion of the merits of the alternate proposals would prove most useful and added that if the referendum is ultimately rejected the consequent delay of about two months would not prove crucial. Mr. Mulvehill said that he and others in the petitioning group hoped to meet as soon as possible with the school committee to discuss the issue in proper detail.

Two articles asking the representative assembly to confer authority on the Balch and Cleveland building committees will be numbered in the Nov. 12 special town meeting warrant. Town officials explained that the articles are actually formalities. They in effect ask that the two committees be granted the power to supervise construction of the two school wings. The Balch committee is headed by Alec Abdallah. Ernest Paciorkowski is the chairman of the Cleveland Addition Committee.

The major consideration at next Thursday’s special town meeting, the third session in the last three months, will be the proposed addition to the library. Two articles will be listed in the warrant on the library program. One will request that the building committee be given the authority to include alterations to the main structure in its building plans. The other will seek the $525,000 needed to construct the addition. The chairman of the library building committee is a former selectman, Daniel Callahan.

Three “money articles” will be numbered in the warrant in addition to the major proposal requesting about $525,000 for an addition to the Morrill Memorial Library. The three articles will respectively seek funds to supplement the police budget, add to the drainage account, and defray the cost of a proposed power extension. General Manager Walter Blasenak said yesterday that he had not yet prepared precise estimates of the three proposals. But he said that all three would be relatively small sums.

The electric power extension will be for the Walpole Street shopping center. The early stages of construction at the site are being attended to at this time. Developer John Alevizos of Newton hopes to have the work completed by next Easter. Mr. Blasenak explained that the complexity of the network of stores in the center has made it somewhat difficult to assess the cost of the proposed power extension. The proposed drainage work would be Meadow Brook in area. A similar article was deferred by the Oct. 22 special town meeting. This, in effect, will clear up the entanglements that caused the proposal to be dropped from the Oct. 22 special warrant at the last minute.

Archival Note: This article has been dynamically reconstructed from the original public record print archives of the Patriot Ledger