The age-old battle: Natick vs. Framingham

After gacking her way through a Globe report on the orgasmically wonderful Natick Mall (which will feature "a rolling gold sign that is inspired, designers say, by the folds of a women's skirt") and all the things it's doing for Natick, Sharon Machlis Gartenberg wonders when anybody's going to start thinking about the new mega-mall's impact on neighboring Framingham:

... Traffic will obviously affect Framingham roads, unless all the SUVs and other vehicles coming from points west are helicoptered in. Residents and workers getting on and off Mass Pike exit 13 will deal with the extra traffic as much as those in Natick. If there is an impact on local merchants, it will be felt in downtown Framingham and Framingham Center as well as Natick. ...

Ah, yes, the eternal struggle. Sometimes it seems like these two towns are a pair of bickering siblings.

Fun fact: Flutie Pass, the connector between the Rte. 9 prison Shoppers World and the Natick Mall was held up for 10 years by disputes between Natick and Framingham officials.

Probably the best moment of my Natick reporting career was a special Town Meeting after some hurricane that had brought down zillions of tree limbs in both towns. Framingham's public works department had announced it would send trucks around to pick them up, but Natick said it couldn't afford to do that. A Natick Town Meeting Member stood up and thundered:

If we can beat Framingham on the football field, the least we can do is provide the same level of trash pickup!

Needless to say, Town Meeting directed the town to pick up the damn tree limbs.