The parking area on Mass. Ave that is proposed to be torn up. (Photo by Lisa Aciukewicz)

The Reuben Reed conservation land sits as close to Harvard's town center as it could possibly be. Most people may not even realize it is conservation land. But a debate is shaping up over whether the paved parking area there should be torn up or allowed to remain.

Drivers headed south on 111 stopping at the light can see the Reed land just across the intersection on the left. It is the small, park-like area between the intersection and the Harvard Realty office. The area is split by a short stretch of pavement sometimes called the "no-name road."

Reuben Reed, who had been a partner in the General Store during the 1950s, sold that grassy area to the Trustees of the Conservation Land Fund (now the Conservation Commission) in July 1968. The following month, three trustees of the Land Fund—Homer F. Harmon, Joseph T. Bollard, and Wilbert A. Watt—presented the property as conservation land to the town of Harvard.

Currently, part of the Reed land along Massachusetts Avenue (Route 111) is being used for parking. The original deed to the town contains several stipulations, the first of which reads, "The property is not to be used as a parking lot or parking area for any type of public or private vehicle."

According to Conservation Commission chairman Paul Willard, the commission plans to remove the paved parking area and convert the area to grass, so as to comply with the terms of the deed. Willard said there was no specific timetable for the project, although the logical time to make the change might be when the town sewer project requires work on that stretch of road.

"It would not be an expensive project," Willard said.

Asked what had brought the issue to the commission's attention, Willard said, "If anything, we may have been negligent in dealing with this gift" by not enforcing the original provisions. Willard said he is concerned that potential land donors might be discouraged from making gifts to the town if they see that the terms of previous gifts are not being honored.

Harvard Realty owner Rhonda Sprague, whose office abuts the Reed land, said the Conservation Commission's plan had come without warning. She said that the area had been used as parking for as long as she could recall, first as a rutted, unpaved space and later with blacktop.

"They just determined this after 40 years?" she asked. "It's absurd to rip up the blacktop… If it were my opinion, I would expand it."

Sprague noted that the seven or eight parking spaces are heavily used by all the businesses in the center, not just her own. The spaces are also full, she said, whenever events like the Apple Festival are taking place on the common or when children are being picked up for summer day camps in the center.

"This will affect the center of town that people want to be more vital and vibrant…We should all root for the businesses in the town," Sprague said, including Harvard Cleaners, the Fiber Loft, and the General Store.

The Conservation Commission is not concerned about the "no-name" road. It is shown on the plot plan of the Reed land, and the deed stipulates that "additional" roadways are not to be constructed on the project. Other stipulations say that no permanent structures are to be erected on the land; the shade trees are to remain in place; and the land is not to be divided, leased, conveyed, or used as a leaching field.