Plainville Planning Board Hears Hotel and Operations Facility Proposal on Washington Street

PLAINVILLE -- July 22, 2026, Plainville Planning Board takes up noisy Washington Street hotel and operations proposal. The board heard testimony July 22 on a development that would place a hotel, 6,000 square feet of office space, 24,000 square feet of warehouse and maintenance space, and a stump-processing yard on Washington Street, with normal operating hours proposed as 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. and around-the-clock snow removal operations as an acknowledged exception. The applicant has retained Kavanaugh-Tachi, described as one of two state-licensed sound study firms, which monitored equipment at an existing facility for roughly six hours; the completed report is not expected for approximately six weeks. Abutters challenged the study's methodology, arguing that noise from commercial stump grinders, rated at 110 to 115 decibels at the source, well above the 55-decibel residential standard, would be amplified rather than dampened as it travels across adjacent marshland and waterways toward residential properties. No vote was taken; the board cannot act on the noise issue until the Kavanaugh-Tachi report is in hand.