Nahant wins legal bid to block Northeastern’s campus expansion on undeveloped land

The state’s highest court has ruled against Northeastern University’s bid to expand its Marine Science Center on coastal land in Nahant, saying the town was within its rights to use eminent domain to block the development.

The ruling by the Supreme Judicial Court last week reversed a 2024 appeals court decision in favor of Northeastern, which found that the town had “no reasonable expectation” the university would ultimately dedicate land for public use as an ecological preserve.

“It is for a town to decide if and when to take property for proper conservation and open space purposes, and such a taking may not appear warranted so long as a private landowner leaves open space undeveloped,” Supreme Judicial Court Justice Elizabeth Dewar wrote in the decision released Thursday.

The ruling also ends an eight-year legal battle between the North Shore town and the university, which has operated its marine research center there since the 1960s.

Town officials in Nahant celebrated the ruling, which they said would preserve the land’s open character and its recreation and conservation uses.

“The Town looks forward to moving forward with this process,” town administrator Alison Nieto said in a statement.

Renata Nyul, a university spokesperson, said that Northeastern was “deeply disappointed” by the decision, “given the evidence of improper motive.” She added that, should the land be taken, there could be a “devastating impact” on the university’s ability to conduct “cutting-edge research” to benefit Nahant and other coastal communities.

“We hope today’s judgment will prompt town officials to pursue a collaborative path forward before Nahant taxpayers bear the steep cost of eminent domain,” she said last week.

The university first announced plans to expand its marine science center in 2018 by building a 55,000-square-foot addition on an undeveloped part of the property. The decision drew fierce opposition from local advocates, who argued it would ruin the natural beauty of the town’s East Point peninsula; Northeastern owns most of the area, while the town owns the easternmost tip.

In 2021, the town’s Board of Selectmen moved to take 12.5 acres of undeveloped land on East Point by eminent domain, in an effort to block the construction project. Northeastern filed a legal challenge, arguing that the land was being taken in bad faith.

But in Thursday’s ruling, Dewar wrote that “the town’s stated purpose for the taking is a proper public purpose.”

“Contrary to Northeastern’s argument, preserving or enhancing the scenic character of an area is a valid public purpose,” she wrote.

Northeastern also argued that the taking of land was influenced by private actors in the town who stood to benefit from blocking the campus expansion. But the court cited a deference to the select board’s “legislative judgments.”

“As we have already discussed, a town’s exercise of its eminent domain authority is a legislative act and as such is entitled to a presumption of validity,” Dewar wrote.

The court also found that Nahant’s use of eminent domain was not merely a pretext for other action — unlike a previous case cited by Northeastern — because even before the dispute, the town had long expressed its intention to keep the land in question undeveloped.

“There is no material dispute that the taking in fact will be used for the town’s stated public purpose,” Dewar wrote.

In the 1960s, Northeastern acquired about 20 acres that had been used for military purposes since World War II and into the late 1950s. In 1964, Nahant residents voted against buying the main parcel, but in the 1970s they obtained more than eight acres of former military property that is now Henry Cabot Lodge Park.

In 1966, Northeastern opened the marine research center and in 2018 announced plans to expand it by 55,000 square feet, drawing sharp opposition. Opponents, including the preservation trust and the town, took the case to court, arguing the university was legally obligated to manage the land as a nature preserve or open space.