A pair of old billboards slated for removal this past Saturday from the former Connelly Farms property likely will come down on Monday due to a problem with a trailer, according to an advocate for the billboards’ stay who was at the site Saturday morning.
“And they get to live another day,” stated Ed Harrow in a text to the Independent Saturday regarding the billboards located on Hayden Rowe Street just north of College Street. “A needed trailer had a problem.”
He noted that the site was waterlogged, hindering the removal process.
Harrow, the chair of the Open Space Preservation Commission and a Conservation Commission member, added that he spoke on Saturday to a representative from Clear Channel, the billboard company, who indicated that they likely will be removed Monday.
In addition to the billboards’ apparent nostalgic value, Harrow stressed to the Historical Commission on March 5 that billboard advertising potentially could have been a source of revenue for the OSPC. He pointed to a situation in Holliston where that community’s OSPC derived funds from cell towers on that town’s water tank as a precedent. At that meeting, the Historical Commission voted 4-1 that the billboards were not historically significant because their existence for at least 75 years could not be verified. Historical Commission chair Michael Roughan referred to them as “iconic” rather than historic.
In a comment on the Independent’s website, developer Craig Nation, who is involved in the process of donating the land to the OSPC as part of a subdivision plan, noted that he had “submitted photographic aerials from 1938” to Roughan at the March 5 meeting. There was an issue during the meeting where the photographs were not displayed. Nation said he showed commission members the picture from his phone.
The Commission didn’t believe the photos the developer provided? The billboards are nostalgic value to long-time Townies. Shouldn’t we decide if they should be taken down, not newcomers in the town who are on committees. Another case of town boards doing what they want and not what the community wants. If you want to change Hopkinton so much why did you move here? You have already ruined the quaint downtown area with monstrous sidewalk!! If you are so unhappy move to a city, we like our town!