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Date: 11/3/2021
GRANVILLE — State Sen. John Velis and state Rep. Nicholas Boldyga will attend another site visit at the Cobble Mountain Reservoir next week in the hopes of getting a better understanding of why the area around it remains closed to the public.
They will be joined Nov. 8 by officials from the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission, which runs the reservoir. The area around the reservoir, including hiking trails and what had once been a public road, has been closed to public access since 2002, as a security measure following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
When asked why the land around the reservoir remains closed 20 years later, a spokesperson for the Water and Sewer Commission declined to comment.
Boldyga and Velis had each gone on separate site visits to the reservoir with Granville town officials in October. Select Board Chair Theodore R. Sussmann Jr. said during one of the visits that the closure of one of the roads that cuts through the reservoir’s land to connect Granville and Blandford presents a hazard when it comes to mutual emergency services aid between the two communities.
With gates blocking the road, the travel time between parts of the two communities has increased from approximately five minutes to about 25 minutes, Sussman said.
On top of the emergency services hazard, Zoning Board of Appeals member Mark Boardman emphasized to Boldyga during the site visit last month that the closure also bars the public from being able to use the scenic walking trails on reservoir property. He said that he has had several run-ins with Massachusetts State Police troopers patrolling the property while he was simply walking or driving through, with some of the troopers acting “aggressive” during the interaction.
Boardman questioned why state troopers need to be patrolling the area “eight hours a day.”