Greens Farms means many things, to many people.
It’s filled with rolling hills, old homes, a small beach, a friendly train station and post office, and a stately elementary school.
That school sits on the northern edge of the neighborhood. It’s an area that residents feel is under siege.
Just across the Post Road, a 94-unit apartment building is quickly filling up. Twelve apartments have been constructed on the site of the former Geiger’s property, with 32 assisted living apartments being built next door.
The bank/office complex at the Post Road/North Morningside corner has just been sold. That too may be converted into apartments.
Now 19 townhouses have been proposed for 20-26 South Morningside — the Historic District directly opposite Greens Farms Elementary School.
Green’s Farms United created this map to show recent and planned housing developments near Greens Farms School.
A group called Green’s Farms United has had enough.
Energized families created a website and GoFundMe page. They’re on Facebook and Instagram. They organized an email list, alerting Westporters about upcoming hearings.
They hired an environmental engineer. And a lawyer.
They’re mad as hell, and they’re not going to take it anymore.
They want everyone to know what’s coming up — and what’s come before.
They’ve seen the effects after the Morningside South developer removed trees near Muddy Brook in 2017: soil erosion and flooding increased.
But something else happened.
“We started as a group of Greens Farms families, concerned about the 20-26 Morningside Drive South future,” says one of the organizers, Aurea de Souza.
“We are now a group of friends and neighbors fighting for a cause, while enjoying and appreciating meeting so many incredible people on the way.”
They take heart from neighbors on the other side of town, who are battling the proposed 6-story, 81-unit apartment complex between Lincoln and Cross Streets, off Post Road West.
They are Green’s Farms United.
That’s more than just their name.
It’s their neighborhood.
And their lives.
The current view of 20-26 Morningside Drive South (left), directly opposite Greens Farms Elementary School, and an overlay of where the proposed 19 townhouses would be built.
