By Sara Withee
(Aug. 25, 2026) – The Planning Board continued its review of the proposed apartments at 26 & 30 Littleton Road on Tuesday night. The board is expected to re-open the hearing on Sept. 22nd.
In July, the owner of the Old Towne Village apartments submitted four applications seeking approvals to extend the proposed development and build a new 3-story building with 32 apartments along Littleton Road and Copeland Drive.
The two properties – the former Lazy Mary’s restaurant at 30 Littleton Road and a single-family home at 26 – were sold earlier this year. The Old Towne Village leasing office sits at 10 Littleton Road and the existing apartments are located nearby.
These lots represent about 1.22 acres. The proposal is to build a parking lot with 49 spaces in front of the building.
According to the public hearing notice, the developer is seeking four town approvals for “Site Plan, Special Permit, Stormwater and Inclusionary Housing applications.” The Planning Board opened the public hearing on Aug. 11th. The property owner, civil engineer and architect presented to the Planning Board.
This past week, the Planning Board met with the applicant again (on Tuesday, Aug. 25th) and reviewed some of the feedback from town departments. The Planning Board scheduled a Sept. 1st site walk for members to view the property and ask questions. It was mentioned the public hearing could re-open and close on Sept. 22nd, which will be the third meeting in the public hearing process. It’s been said the applicant has met with town departments.
Site Plan Review. There are many points related to the Site Plan Review application. Here are two points related to water.
First, the developer will connect to the town’s water and sewer utilities (and the DPW provided a rate calculation for this in the written meeting materials on the town website).
The developer had also proposed a permanent water irrigation system for all plants. Town departments provided written feedback and recommended the developer use more native plants which are naturally drought resistant.
This was addressed during the meeting. One of the project professionals said they had updated their plant list to include more native species and they would build a water irrigation system – to have the infrastructure in place – but turn this off when there’s a water restriction.
There have been significant drought conditions in Massachusetts. Yet water is a special consideration in Ayer.
PFAs was found in Ayer’s water supply in 2016. This was linked to firefighting foam used on Devens and the U.S. Army went onto fund construction of the Grove Pond PFAs treatment plant. While this has treated the PFAs, the system has limited the town’s water pumping capacity. This has impacted both residents and businesses, including the nearby beverage manufacturing company.
In 2026, the Town of Ayer has worked with the U.S. Army to build a Clearwall Storage Tank and Finished Pumping Station and bring this online to restore the water pumping capacity.
Stormwater Management Permit. We’re not going to highlight any points here.
Inclusionary Housing Bylaw. In Ayer, 10 percent of new housing has to be developed as affordable, per the town bylaw. We wrote about this in our first article.
There was no new information related to this shared at the Aug. 25th Planning Board meeting, except one of the members asked to have language highlighted on the projector screen.
Special Permit. The Lazy Mary’s property is zoned for general business and the developer is seeking a Special Permit to build multi-family housing on the property. What are the requirements?
This was mentioned at the Aug. 25th Planning Board meeting, but not discussed in detail. We went back later and asked the Planning Board office. We were directed to Section 320-3.4 of the zoning bylaws. This governs the town’s authority to issue special permits.
Unless designated otherwise, the Zoning Board of Appeals shall act as the special permitting authority. The Ayer Planning Board issues this special permit in this case. The section lists six criteria for granting special permits:
- Social, economic or community needs which are served by the proposal
- Traffic flow and safety, including parking and loading
- Adequacy of utilities and other public services
- Neighborhood characters and social structures
- Impacts on the natural environment
- Potential fiscal impact, including impact on Town services, tax base, and employment
In our first article, we reported that one of the consultants submitted paperwork proposing 3 affordable units with an average unit of 855 square feet. We have since updated our coverage and removed this point about the square footage.
During this week’s meeting, it was said many of the proposed units are under 750 square feet. The planner told the applicant to submit a letter related to this point.