Swan Lane

Swan Lane is a short street on the north side of Nuttings Lake in Nuttings Lake Park, running about 670 feet south from Friendship Street across Stewart Street to Apollo Avenue. It was laid out as Pine Street on C. A. Thayer's "Nuttings Lake Park Ext D" of November 1914 (Plan Book 32, Plan 49), the extension plan that added Friendship Street and more small cottage lots behind the north shore. The assessors date the oldest houses on it to about 1940.

The northern part of the street became a town way in 1950. The annual town meeting of February 11, 1950 voted under Article 54 to accept the laying out of Pine Street "from Friendship Street to Stuart Street, a distance of 250 feet," and a special town meeting on July 17, 1950 voted again, under Article 12, to accept "Pines Street, Nuttings Lake, from Friendship Street to Stuart Street for a distance of 250 feet as or for a public highway." The water department laid 317 feet of main in "Pine Street (Lake)" the same year. In 1964 the town voted $8,500 for a drain system "in the Pine Street - Central Street - Rhodes Street section of Nuttings Lake."

Billerica had several Pine Streets, and the selectmen renamed this one Swan Lane, "From Friendship Street to Central Street," by a vote of March 21, 1988 that took effect on June 1, 1988, in their program to remove duplicate street names; the same series of votes turned Pine Avenue at Nuttings Lake into Perreault Avenue and Pine Street in North Billerica into Alpine Street. Central Street is now Apollo Avenue. The reason for the name Swan was not recorded. The southern part, from Stewart Street to Apollo Avenue, has stayed a private way: it was on the list of streets offered for acceptance at the fall town meeting of 2001 as "Swan Lane 250 ft S. of Friendship St to Apollo Ave 417" feet, but that article was dismissed on October 2, 2001, and it was left out of the streets accepted on May 14, 2002.

References

1. Annual Report 1950: Feb. 11, 1950 Art. 54 accepted, Pine Street from Friendship Street to Stuart Street, 250 ft
2. Annual Report 1950: special town meeting warrant Art. 12, Pines Street, Nuttings Lake, Friendship to Stuart Street
3. Annual Report 1950: July 17, 1950 Art. 12 voted, Pines Street accepted as a public highway
4. Annual Report 1950: water main extensions, Pine Street (Lake) 317 ft
5. Annual Report 1956: Streets Accepted by the Town, Pine St. from Friendship to Stuart St. 250 ft, 2-4-50 and 7-17-50
6. Annual Report 1964: $8,500 drain for the Pine Street - Central Street - Rhodes Street section of Nuttings Lake
7. Annual Report 1988: street name changes, Pine Street (Precinct 7) to Swan Lane, Friendship Street to Central Street
8. Annual Report 2002: fall 2001 warrant Art. 25 list, Swan Lane 250 ft S. of Friendship St to Apollo Ave, 417 ft
9. Annual Report 2002: Art. 25 (street acceptances) dismissed, Oct. 2, 2001
10. Annual Report 2002: May 14, 2002 Art. 19 streets accepted (Swan Lane not among them)