Westborough’s Zoning Board of Appeals will hear the residents’ appeal against Amazon’s Prime Air drone launch pad on Monday, November 2, at 7:05 p.m. in the Forbes Municipal Building, according to an agenda the town posted on Friday, October 9. That is the hearing DroneXL told readers to watch for on October 3 in Amazon’s Westborough Drone Launch Now Hinges on a Zoning Appeal, and it lands eight days before the Planning Board’s November 10 date for the site plan itself.
The town votes on a second front first. A Special Town Meeting on Monday, October 19, takes up a new general bylaw on unmanned aircraft, and the Select Board meets Tuesday, October 13, to decide whether to back it and whether to write to the congressional delegation and the FAA. Worcester, whose council asked for a legal report on its own powers on October 6, is covered in Worcester Asks If It Can Stop Amazon Drones. Shrewsbury Says It Can’t, where Shrewsbury Town Manager Kevin Mizikar said local regulation of the flights is preempted.
The warrant says the bylaw’s draft will be placed on file with the Town Clerk and handed out at the meeting, and the warrant itself carries no text. It also says any bylaw on this topic must be approved by the Massachusetts Attorney General and the MassDOT Aeronautics Division.
Residents Filed the Appeal on the Last Day the Law Allowed
Several residents appealed the building commissioner’s August 26 letter on September 25, the town’s Prime Air page says, the 30th and last day Section 15 of Chapter 40A allows. The ZBA has 65 days from receiving notice to open the hearing, November 29 if notice arrived on the filing day.
The November 2 agenda lists the case as “Rod Jane – Appeals Application – 64 Otis Street,” at 7:05 p.m. in the Great Hall at 45 West Main Street. The meeting opens at 7 with a 10-minute open forum, and the agenda calls all times approximate. The board then has 100 days from the filing to decide, January 3, 2027, unless the appellants and the board agree in writing to extend either clock. The commissioner’s letter classified the pad as an accessory use of the fulfillment center on the same lot, which the zoning bylaw allows as of right as a manufacturing, processing and warehouse use. That ruling is what put the pad in front of the Planning Board for site-plan review instead of a special permit.
If the ZBA finds the commissioner wrong, the town page says Amazon would need the approvals the bylaw then requires, which could include a special permit and site plan through the ZBA rather than the Planning Board. Select Board member Patrick Welch has asked the ZBA to decide whether the drones are “aircraft” under the bylaw, the Community Advocate reported, because, Welch said, a use classed as an “airport” may need a special permit where an accessory use does not. Westborough’s bylaw defines an accessory use as an incidental or insubstantial part of the activity on a lot, and an airport as any area on a lot used for the landing and takeoff of aircraft on a regular or intermittent basis, as DroneXL reported on October 3. Planning Board vice chair John Gelcich said at the September 15 hearing that the board is “almost required to approve it,” as DroneXL reported on October 2.
Amazon Asked for Its Own Delay Three Days After the Appeal Was Filed
Amazon told the town on September 28 that it wanted its Planning Board hearing continued until after the ZBA considers the appeal, the town’s page says. The Planning Board voted on October 6 to continue to November 10. The town expects that date to fall after the ZBA’s decision.
The October 6 agenda had carried the request without a reason when DroneXL reported it in Amazon Asks Westborough to Delay Drone Pad Vote as Board Says No.
September 28 was also the date on the letter from state Sen. Michael Moore and Reps. Hannah Kane and Kate Donaghue asking Amazon to pause, covered in Amazon Drone Hub Faces Pause Call From Lawmakers as State Sues FAA. The town page says Amazon is now seeking the site-specific FAA approvals it needs to fly from 64 Otis Street. The MK30 it would fly weighs 77.9 pounds (35.5 kilograms) empty and carries no parachute, as DroneXL reported in Amazon’s 83-Pound MK30 Heads To 500 Cities.
Town Meeting Votes October 19 on a Drone Bylaw the Warrant Left Blank
Article 8 of the Special Town Meeting warrant, signed October 1 by five Select Board members, asks voters to add Article 34, “Aircraft, Unmanned,” to the bylaws by majority vote. The board was still developing the text, and the bylaw may address privacy, public safety, noise and enforcement.
The Select Board’s October 13 agenda, revised October 9, has the board voting on whether to support Articles 7 and 8 at 7:25 p.m. and taking up a communication to the congressional delegation and the FAA on unmanned aircraft at 8:25 p.m. The Community Advocate says the bylaw follows North Reading’s 2017 example. DroneXL argued on October 2 that such a bylaw would bind the hobbyist next door and not a Part 135 carrier, and a federal judge struck down parts of Newton’s drone bylaw in 2017.
“The risk does not match the want,” Westborough resident Jen Parent said at one of the town’s public meetings, MassLive reported, adding, “We do not need 30-minute deliveries for any reason.” Castle Rock, Colorado, pulled a different lever and froze drone hub applications for six months, as DroneXL covered in Castle Rock Froze Walmart’s Drone Hub 7-0. The Drone Delivery Tracker lists the Westborough hub as in review.
Residents can call Amazon at 1-888-280-4331 and say it is about drone delivery, or open the customer-service chat and pick “Something Else,” then “Amazon Drone Delivery.” DroneXL’s guide for residents covers what a town can still do once a hub is proposed, and the tracker’s Westborough page carries the local dates.
DroneXL’s Take
In my view the appeal the ZBA opens on November 2 is the only local proceeding that can stop this pad, and as I read the two agendas, most of the town’s energy is going into October 19. A town bylaw on unmanned aircraft has to survive the Attorney General, MassDOT Aeronautics and the same federal preemption argument that beat Newton in 2017, and the warrant asks voters to approve a text it does not contain. The ZBA question is narrower, and I think harder for Amazon to attack in court: whether a fenced lot built to launch aircraft is accessory to a warehouse under Westborough’s own definitions. My read is that it is not, and that a special-permit track gives the town the vote Gelcich says the Planning Board does not have.
I’d want a drone bringing medication flown the way Zipline flies its P2, which lowers the package on a tether from altitude, and I’m against a 77.9-pound aircraft with no parachute carrying consumer orders over Westborough’s homes. Amazon’s own request to wait for the ZBA tells me the company treats this appeal as one that can change its permit path, not as a formality. If the ZBA upholds the commissioner, the Planning Board’s power on November 10 shrinks, as I read Prudential v. Westwood, to attaching conditions, and Westborough’s fight ends where Mizikar said it would.
Sources: Town of Westborough, Prime Air Drone Delivery Service Application page, Zoning Board of Appeals agenda, November 2, 2026, Select Board agenda, October 13, 2026, 2026 Special Town Meeting warrant, M.G.L. c. 40A, § 15, Community Advocate, MassLive.
DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo. Read our editorial standards.
