COBB BLOGS April 2024
Big Plans for Truro in 1969: Proposed Pamet Harbor Development
In 1969, Truro had received a federal grant from the Department of Housing and Urban Development to create a Master Plan – “To give the town the developmental and environmental standards that are so vital for the preservation, attractiveness, and distinction of Truro.”
At the time, Truro’s Planning Board featured local notables Lloyd Rose (former art teacher at the Central School and unsuccessful Selectman candidate during WWII), as well as Patricia Duarte (owner of the insurance and real estate agency in Downtown Pamet). A contract was awarded to Community Planning Services to help produce results. By year’s end, the Planning Board promised that “preliminary copies would be in the hands of the townspeople early in 1970”; and announced that “the Master Plan does not incorporate any definite proposals relating to changes in zoning”.
There was, of course, lots to be considered—town government and utilities, schools, police and fire, recreation and relations with the National Seashore etc. etc. And, of course, the “Plan” recommended that zoning be increased to one acre building lots. But its major proposals involved moving lots of Truro around.
At Beach Point, it was proposed to relocate 1925’s Rte. 6A closer to 1952’s Rte. 6—allowing motels room to expand “in anticipation of the thousands of visitors to the National Seashore.
At Pamet, the idea was to build a new Route 6, and reserve 1952’s bridge over the valley for local traffic headed towards Truro’s new town center at Pamet Harbor—remodeled into a marina, with finger piers and slips for a hundred boats; parking galore; commercial development on both sides or the harbor entrance; and a new road along the north shore of the valley leading to a brand-new Town Hall.
Community Planning Services printed a 12-page booklet to summarize the proposals and the Planning Board began public hearings. At 1970 Town meeting a request to further fund the project was voted down.
Ambitious as it was, the Master Plan failed to mention that 3 decades previously the hurricane of ’38 had flooded the state road at Downtown Pamet with 4 feet of storm surge. And, concluded Patricia Duarte, “Nobody liked it at all.”