The Globe’s article on the mandatory zoning for MBTA communities (“Pushback against new law to spur housing”, April 24) misses important parts of the controversy. I spent days reading public comments on this program, and it is not just small towns that complain that they lack wastewater treatment or road and school infrastructure to handle the growth the new zoning would generate. Larger communities also raise objections. For example, Medford does not want to change its “dense suburban” character to “dense urban.” Brookline observes that the proposed zoning will have the effect of “mandating already dense communities to become much denser [while]…allowing low density communities to maintain their low density.”

 
Housing advocates claim that local officials’ fears are “overblown.” However, the zoning change creates a template for development in 175 cities and towns, and once adopted, it will be hard to modify. To suggest that the objections reflect a desire to restrict affordable housing is disingenuous since the most frequent criticism of the legislation is that it fails to encourage affordable housing and its main impact will be more market rate housing.
Instead of antagonizing cities and towns with a one-size-fits-all zoning mandate, the state should identify new sources of revenue to subsidize housing for people locked out of the housing market.