Above: Amazon Prime Air is promoting a forum on their plans to deliver by drones out of Westborough. A recently presented map shows most of Southborough as in the zone that could soon receive flown deliveries. (images from Facebook and Westborough TV video)
Last month, representatives from Amazon presented to the Westborough Select Board about their plans to launch drone deliveries in our area — with hopes to begin this year — out of their 64 Otis Street facility. Their presentation included a service area map that covered most of Southborough.
Next week, the public is invited a community forum put on by Prime Air where they can learn more and ask questions.
The Community Advocate’s coverage of the meeting (and a separate discussion among Shrewsbury Select Board members) initially flew under my radar, since the stories don’t mention our town.
In the August 18th meeting of the Westborough Select Board, a member of Amazon’s Economic Development team described that the Amazon’s Prime Air was still working through the regulatory process for the drone service. The company was simultaneously pursuing land use approvals from the Town for using the Westborough to launch drones. Amazon’s Tareq Wafaie expressed an optimistic goal that they could get all of the approvals in time “to achieve great things here by the end of the year”.
Westborough’s Planning Board hearing was scheduled to open last night. I checked with Westborough Planning and was told the hearing was continued to October 6th.
Wafaie’s presentation to Westborough’s Select Board included a service delivery area map (right) for the Otis Street “SMA1” facility. Referring to it, he described the map as including:
a lot of those other communities that we are also talking to. If we haven’t already talked to them, those meetings are taking place now and are in the works. We have a lot of stakeholder outreach to do and I want that to be the main message.
(As of earlier today, neither the Southborough Select Board or Southborough Police had been contacted yet by Amazon. I did notify the Select Board Chair and Town Administrator about the upcoming public forum in Westborough.)
The presentation to Westborough’s Select Board included details on how delivery would work, and noise levels (described as, at their peak, less noisy as their large trucks and about the same as a delivery van). Wafaie specified that items delivered by drone would be limited to products less than 5 pounds and that can fit in a shoebox, and are available for the rapid delivery. Deliveries by drone would be only to customers who select the option (at an additional fee for the 1-hour service). Customers would also have to work with Prime Air to identify a landing spot:
we work with you to establish those landing areas on your property to make sure that you’ve got basically a 100 foot tall, 18 ft wide cylinder that would allow us to safely descend vertically and drop the package for you.
According to a slide in the presentation, before the item is “dropped” the drone would scan the delivery area “for humans, pets, & obstacles”.
You can watch Amazon’s entire presentation here.
In an August meeting of the Shrewsbury Select Board, the Town Manager alerted that board that their town was alerted by “regional law enforcement” about Amazon’s plans to make the drone deliveries. He told the board that they don’t have much authority as a local government since air traffic and drones fall under federal aviation rules. He specified “We can’t control flight altitude or delivery corridors the routes that they take.”
The board did have a preliminary discussion about potentially pursuing some related zoning enforcement for the land end of the use. (See slide right.)
Next week’s public community forum is advertised by Prime Air on Facebook here. The “Amazon Drone Delivery Community Meet and Greet” is on Wednesday, September 23rd, 5:00 – 7:00 pm in the Doubletree by Hilton’s Viking Room (5400 Computer Drive, Westborough).
The Facebook event invites:
join us at our community meeting to learn about our reimagined shopping experience with drone delivery and how it will serve your community.
As part of this information session, our team will:
- Present an overview of Amazon’s drone delivery program
- Share details about how the service works and its benefits to the community
- Provide an opportunity to ask questions and share feedback
