Search

ee

Redevelopment

Retrofitting Major Corridors

Amherst St Corridor

Considered the most important
large-scale site for long-term
planning for Nashua, Imagine
Nashua proposes retrofitting
this major corridor to be more
attractive and coherent, and
promote local business activity.

Priority Redevelopment Site

Daniel Webster College

Integrate the Daniel Webster
College site into its surround-
ings by developing an appropri-
ately-scaled neighborhood.

Daniel Webster

. College
Enhancing Interchange Streets

Broad St

Leverage Broad Street’s strate-
gic location by considering
upzoning, improved urban
design and enhancing ground
floor retail.

Industrial Repositioning
Northeastern

Northeastern Blvd Bivd

Reposition the Northeastern
Boulevard commercial area by

encouraging higher density
development and appropriate
placemaking.

Focus Areas

IN \
4 AS st Hollis, St

Main St

pe Pe
oe

La Ya tis
I

. Lt
ty

?

Redevelopment Site

Beazer Site

Plan appropriate development
in the Beazer remediation site

with a phased strategy for
mixed use primarily focused on
medium-density single and
potential multifamily housing.

Building Cohesive Mixed-use
Districts + TOD

East Hollis St

Build East Hollis St area as
cohesive and vibrant mixed-use
district anchored by develop-
ment of future commuter rail
station on 25 Crown St.

Improving Public Realm

Main St
Facilitate public realm expan-

sion and improvement on Main
St to maintain downtown’s
commercial activity.

Retrofitting Major Corridors
+ TOD

Daniel Webster Hwy

Retrofit this major corridor by
making it more attractive and
coherent to promote local
business activity, though with a

much more tentative outlook
and timeline than Amherst St.

butcrsbt Nashua | https://imagine.nashuanh.gov

Introduction

12

14

20

28

32

What Is Imagine Nashua?
Comprehensive citywide plans
Balanced approach to development

Why Plan Now?

Need for growth

Addressing climate change
Embracing inclusivity and diversity
Measuring and defining success

Vision and Core Values
Equity, Resilience, Climate Protection

Planning Process and Framework

Timeline
How to use this plan

Comprehensive Master Plan

13

butcrsbt Nashua | https://imagine.nashuanh.gov

What Is Imagine
Nashua?

Imagine Nashua Is the City’s comprehensive
planning process—an initiative that combines
inclusive community engagement with major plans
created in the past 20 years to craft an innovative
vision for the future of Nashua. This master plan

reflects the voices of Nashua’s diverse communities,
and places a key focus on equity, resilience, and
climate protection as core values guiding growth and
clevelopment in the city.

In 2020, the City of Nashua
embarked on a year-long
comprehensive planning process
to update its citywide master
plan. In the midst of challenges
associated with the COVID-19
pandemic, critical narratives
centered around addressing racial
and social inequity in the country,
and larger concerns for climate
change impacts on our local and
regional ecosystems, the Imagine
Nashua planning process did not
take a step back, and felt it was
important to engage the Nashua
community—now more than ever—
in crafting a sustainable roadmap
for the future, one which places
equity, resilience and climate
protection at its core.

Comprehensive
Citywide Plans

Comprehensive citywide plans are
a primary tool for setting long-
term policy goals for a community,
most of which require sustained
effort beyond the career spans

of individual civil servants or
elected officials. For this reason,
comprehensive plans must be
rooted in engagement efforts, to

ensure that community consensus,

along with topical expertise, helps
direct the long-term vision. While
the plan is not, in itself, a binding
ordinance, many tools the City can
employ—most notably zoning—are
to be in accordance with sucha

master plan. A primary purpose
of this plan is to describe the
intent behind many of the policies
and programs the City of Nashua
intends to implement in the
coming years and decades.

The Imagine Nashua
Comprehensive Citywide Plan—
from here onwards referred to
simply as Imagine Nashua—places
a document-wide focus on equity,
resilience, and climate protection
as core values driving the vision
and framework of the plan. These
three core values bind the six plan
topic areas or elements important
to the Nashua community: land
use and development, economic
growth and development, housing,
mobility and transit, open space
and the environment, and arts and
culture.

p Goals

In-person library event showcasing the
Plan’s draft recommendations.

Comprehensive Master Plan

NH Citywide Master Plans

While not every plan topic is
required by statutory law to be
included in the master plan,

in New Hampshire, a land use
section—providing an overview
Colm 4ic1a [OFM Oo TA en OLNrsM-UaLe Mm aale)
proposed location, extent, and
intensity of future land use—is
an important and required
element of a master plan.

tustetanated Nashua |

Learn More

Read about the Imagine
Nashua vision and core values
on page 28.

Learn about priority areas for
targeted redevelopment and
actions for improvement on
page 60.

https://imagine.nashuanh.gov

At the core of Nashua are its people and this master plan aims to enrich
the quality of life for those who live, work, and visit the city through

thoughtful and strategic planning.

Many of the land use policies and
strategies outlined in this plan

will require zoning or regulatory
modifications. While, on its own,
this plan cannot enact these
changes, it does provide a
framework for what those changes
should be and the intent behind
them. Moreover, while this plan
does discuss a wide range of policy
and citywide objectives, at its core
this citywide plan is focused on
land use. Land use, via land use
regulation and a corresponding
zoning ordinance, is the primary
tool available to city planners to
achieve most of the goals set out
here. In that sense, the goals and
recommendations that are land-
use-focused can be seen as more
primary, with additional goals and
recommendations that fit into that
larger framework.

The Gate City

Nashua sits at a unique position,
geographically and economically
and it is not for no reason that
Nashua calls itself the “Gate City.”
While on the one hand, Nashua is
closely integrated into the New
Hampshire region and economy
and has strong ties to Manchester
to the north and other nearby
cities and towns, Nashua also
draws much of its employment
and commuting base from the
metropolitan Boston region to the
south. No mere sleeper commuter
suburb, Nashua also boasts a
robust economic base for its size,

and this combination of city unto
itself alongside a community
straddling the New Hampshire and
Massachusetts border is a quality
that Imagine Nashua’s planning
team expects must deeply inform
municipal policy going forward.

Balanced Approach
to Development

The future of growth and
redevelopment in the city

can be a contested topic for
residents, businesses, and other
stakeholders alike, but across
varying perspectives and opinions,
the Imagine Nashua planning
process provided a platform for
communities to come together
and form a shared understanding
of place, and a vision for future
policy objectives to effectively
advance equitable and sustainable
development in the city.

Imagine Nashua aims to take a
balanced approach to growth
and redevelopment, by directing
strategic land-use planning in
neighborhoods and districts

that will see the most positive
economic and community impact
while preserving those areas that
are already established or have
stable patterns of development.

The master plan takes a closer look
at eight priority redevelopment
areas identified by the City, and
provides near-term and long-term
actions for physical, economic,

environmental improvements and
community benefits. The visions
for these areas are a central
component of this plan, and
incorporate all topic elements:
land use, housing, economic
development, mobility and transit,
open space and the environment,
and arts and culture.

It is critical that while Nashua
plans for what future development
can look like in the next 20 years,
that the benefits of growth and
change are felt by all members

of the community. This means

that Imagine Nashua policy
recommendations must be
equitable, prioritizing eliminating
barriers to access to resources
and opportunities that community
members need to improve the
quality of their situation. Goals and
actions of this plan must strive to
make Nashua resilient, building
capacity within individuals,
communities, institutions,
businesses and systems to survive,
adapt and grow from the shocks
and stresses they experience.
Finally, any future plan, goal

or action for Nashua must be
committed to adapt to and mitigate
the effects of climate change
through promoting sustainable
development patterns.

Comprehensive Master Plan

Imagine Nashua Plan Topic Areas:

Land Use and Development

Existing conditions and the proposed location, extent,
and intensity of future land use, compatible with
Nashua’s character.

Mobility

Framework for providing adequate local
transportation needs in coordination with regional
and state transportation plans.

Housing

Assessment of local housing conditions and future
needs and recommendations for new housing policies
and programs.

Economic Development

Proposing action to support Nashua’s economic
goals, given its economic strengths and weaknesses
in the region.

Open Space and Environment

Identifying and continuing to protect critical natural
areas and preserve and expanding access to open
space and recreational resources.

Arts and Culture
Leverage arts and culture industries to provide direct
economic benefit to the community and enhance

Nashua’s role as an arts and culture destination.

tustetanated Nashua |

2000 Master Plan Successes

Conserving Natural Resources
and Open Space was a high
priority of the last Master Plan:
in 1999 the City had 230 acres
of conserved land, and as of
2017 we have 1297 acres of
permanently conserved land!

Encouraging and promoting
sidewalks, trails, and bicycle
lanes was a high priority of

the last Master Plan. Since
then, the City has added over
4 miles of conservation trails,
the Nashua River Rail Trail, the

Heritage Rail Trail East, and is
in the process of adding the
Heritage Rail Trail West, the
downtown Riverwalk, and new
and extended bicycle lanes,
and sidewalks.

Learn More

For a synopsis of past and
current citywide and topic-
area planning efforts, see
pages 184-185.

https://imagine.nashuanh.gov

The Master Plan is both the framework used to inform and guide future
policy decisions in the city, and the tool for evaluating how we reach

our goals and visions.

Building upon Past
Efforts and Current
Momentum

Since adoption of the city’s
previous master plan over 20
years ago, Nashua has been
growing and diversifying. The

City has worked diligently to
accommodate new residents and
businesses, while ensuring that
Nashua can be livable for future
generations to come. The 2017
Downtown Riverfront Master

Plan and ongoing Livable Nashua
efforts are testament to the city’s
commitment to creating a more
sustainable, resilient, and livable
community for Nashua residents
by advocating for and promoting
environmental stewardship,

and the protection of natural
resources. The city’s recent Bike
and Pedestrian Study and Housing
Study showcase significant efforts
towards enhancing quality of

life for residents and workers by
providing access to good housing,
transportation options, jobs, and
opportunities in the city.

Building upon these efforts

and more, the Imagine Nashua
planning process presented a
critical opportunity for the city to
take stock of its overarching visions
and goals, past successes, and
progress to date, and strategize
ways in which the city can respond
to current and future challenges
and opportunities ahead. Imagine
Nashua seeks to leverage Nashua’s
unique location geographically

and economically in the region,
and push for citizen-centered
achievable outcomes which ensure
that the benefits of future growth
and development are felt by all
Nashua residents and workers. The
master plan is both the framework
used to inform and guide future
policy decisions in the city, and the
tool for evaluating how we reach
our goals and visions.