Gordon Terrace

Gordon Terrace is a short curving street in the south part of Billerica connecting Lexington Road with Ox Road, near the Vining School. It was laid out on the Middlesex Subdivision, a neighborhood of house lots of about 15,000 to 21,000 square feet between Lexington Road, School Lane and land of Billerica Homes Inc. Fred A. Joyce, surveyor, of Belmont drew the "Middlesex Subdivision, Billerica, Mass." in five sheets dated July 21, 1954, for its owner, B and G Realty Trust of 4 Ivy Circle, Arlington. The Planning Board approved it on September 24, 1954, subject to a certificate filed with the plan, and it was recorded on September 30, 1954 (Plan Book 84, Plan 155). Sheet 1 shows Gordon Terrace leaving Lexington Road between lots 10 and 11 and curving north to Ox Road. The street guide of 1957 lists "Gordon Terrace From Lexington rd to Ox rd," and the assessors date its houses to about 1955.

The plan does not explain the name. The Planning Board that approved the plan in 1954 was chaired by Gordon C. Brainerd and included Howard A. Doyle, who had been elected to the board that year, along with Kenrick Barnes, Morris Arakelian and Chester C. Sandberg. No record found says the street was named for Brainerd, whose first name it shares.

The warrant for the annual meeting of 1958 asked the town to improve Gordon Terrace "a distance of approximately 340 feet at a sum not to exceed $1,925.00 under the Betterment Act"; the street does not appear among the betterment streets voted that year. On an article of the Board of Public Works asking acceptance "per the layout of the Board of Selectmen," the annual town meeting of 1968, at its session of April 3, 1968, "VOTED to accept Gordon Terrace as a public way" (Article 110), together with Martin Drive. The street was hot topped with bituminous concrete in 1974 and overlaid under the town's roadway contract of 2001.

References

1. Annual Report 1954: Planning Board report, Gordon C. Brainerd chairman, Howard A. Doyle elected to the board
2. Warrant for 1958: Arts. 65-67, improve Doyle Avenue, Martin Drive and Gordon Terrace under the Betterment Act
3. Warrant for 1968: Arts. 110-111, accept Gordon Terrace and Martin Drive as public ways (Board of Public Works)
4. Annual Report 1968: April 3, 1968 session, Art. 110 Gordon Terrace and Art. 111 Martin Drive accepted as public ways
5. Annual Report 1974: Highway Department, Gordon Terrace hot topped with bituminous concrete
6. Annual Report 2001: roadway Contract 01-R01 overlay list with Gordon Terrace, Doyle Avenue, Martin Drive