Holliston Moves Closer to Buying New Rail Trail Land
Tom Connors
Nine months after the town signed the deal, freight carrier CSX Corp. this week signed a purchase and sale agreement to sell Holliston two tracts of rail bed, according to Trails Committee Chairman Robert Weidknecht.
This week's signing is the latest deal in 14 years of negotiations between CSX and the town, which has been buying and leasing land to construct a multi-use rail trail. The aim is to join the Upper Charles Rail Trail Project, which would connect Holliston with Ashland, Hopkinton, Milford and Sherborn.
The town and CSX agreed to the pricing and the details of the deal in December 2009 withHolliston's Board of Selectmen signing the pact in November 2010. The sale will be completed by November of this year at the latest, said Weidknecht.
Though Weidknecht did not say how much the town is paying for the land, Holliston had $600,000 left of an $800,000 grant from the Massachusetts Division of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) as of November 2010.
One of the parcels of land Holliston is looking to acquire stretches from Church Street to Cross Street. The other starts at Hopping Brook Road and runs 500 feet to the west, connecting with a plot of land already owned by the town.
That section, which was purchased from Fredap Realty Trust, continues west to South Street. Another plot connects to the Milford section of the Upper Charles Trail and will be donated to Holliston by a private entity.
Holliston will also be leasing two other plots from CSX: one starting at Hopping Brook Road and running east to Cross Street and the other heading east from Church Street to the Sherborn line.
Meanwhile, Sherborn is buying a section of abandoned railbed that runs east from the Holliston border to Whitney Street.
In related news, the Trails Committee will sponsor a rail trail cleanup on Saturday at 9 a.m. at Hopping Brook Road. The cleanup will prepare a 1,000-foot stretch running east from South Street for a machine that will smooth out the damage from the dirt bikes and ATV’s.
After that, Weidknecht said, the next step for the Trails Committee is to install a gravel base over the smoothed surface. Weidknecht also said that if Holliston can get a separate DCR grant, the town will install a stone dust surface from Hopping Brook Road to South Street.