As someone who drives or walks through the intersection of Pleasant, Warren, and Fruit Streets every weekday on the way to my job at the Walker Building on Fruit Street, I was disappointed by the Monitor’s account of the Concord Planning Board’s recent decision concerning that busy corner (“Planning Board approves new gas station across from Concord High,” 2/19).
In classic dog-bites-man fashion, you focused on the inevitable complaints from the skeptics. But you did not explain whether those skeptics prefer an abandoned, dilapidated gas station as the permanent centerpiece of this gateway intersection. Nor did you discuss how public safety was somehow maintained when the former gas station and convenience store on the site were last active, a mere three years ago. What would have been truly informative is something more than the cursory description you provided of what the Planning Board is requiring of the new, replacement gas station and convenience store, perhaps even with some graphics or illustration. The intersection is currently the biggest eyesore in the city. It would help if the Monitor provided a truly useful account of what the Planning Board is doing about the situation.
Donald Kreis
Concord