Just Don’t Open the Windows

Build the school, just make sure you shut out the diesel fumes. So concluded an aldermanic committee, approving an order for the city to buy land near the highways in Wooster Square to build a home for the Metropolitan Business Academy magnet high school.

At a joint meeting of the Community Development and Education Committees Tuesday evening, aldermen approved an order for the city to buy two parcels of land in the Wooster Square area for a permanent home for the Academy.

The high school, now housed at 495 Blake St., plans to expand from 200 to 400 students. The $36 million, 75,000 square-foot project would be built at 111 – 119 Water St., where June’s bar and a vacant warehouse now sit. Click here for background on where and why the site was chosen.

Most agree the site’s ideal in many ways “” close to downtown, close to highways to transport suburban students, and near businesses at which the students will do internships. It just so happens that the lot also sits below one of the largest confluences of vehicle exhaust in the city “” the I‑95/ I‑91 interchange.

With all the trucks zooming (or crawling, as often occurs) above, and the Route 34 connector nearby, the site sits in a diesel hot zone “” an area where diesel exhaust poses a hazard to health.

Anstress Farwell, president of the Urban Design League, came to the meeting prepared to convince the committee the air was toxic, and could worsen asthma rates.

Committee chair and East Rock Alderman Ed Mattison stopped her: ​“I don’t think you need to persuade us.” The city and contractors have acknowledged the diesel hot zone. The question, said Mattison, is whether the school can properly filter the air so that soot stays outside.

School construction chief Susan Weisselberg was confident kids could be kept safe, for a few reasons: There will be no outdoor athletic fields. Kids will play sports in an inner gymnasium, or else play for teams at other schools closer to where they’re from. There will be no operable windows. And intake valves for filtration systems will be placed out of the path of winds blowing diesel from the highway and port.

Mattison, who headed a school project with ventilation difficulties before, remained skeptical. Air filters keeping particulates outside require upkeep, and sometimes ​“filters don’t get cleaned as much as they should.” National air quality standards are low, and even going 30 percent above those standards, as the city proposes, may still not be enough, he said.

Wooster Square Alderman Michael Smart stood behind the project, as did a math teacher and her husband, Noelle and Brice Shipley, who incidentally live nearby on Wooster Street.

Rev. Boise Kimber (pictured standing up at right) showed up to represent his client, Topper Luciani, who owns two properties on either side of the proposed site. Kimber is trying to convince the city to buy at least one parcel and use it build another parking lot. ​“Certainly, suburbians [students] are going to be driving, ​‘cause sometimes Mommy and Daddy don’t want to drive them to school.”

The school won’t need it: About 30 percent of the magnet school’s students come from out of district, but no student drives to school, responded MBA Principal Alan Frishman.

“When you talk about a third of the kids out of the neighborhood,” they will be ​“parking in my lots,” insisted Luciani. Kimber and his client did not appear to convince anyone.

“If they’re parking in your lots, then you tow them,” said Westville Alderwoman Ina Silverman.

One committee member, Hill Alderwoman Jackie James, did find the proposed 75-space parking lot too small.

Others doubted a traffic study claiming ​“minimal impact” on the neighborhood, especially as massive reconstruction of the I‑95/I‑91 interchange takes place between 2009 to 2014.

In the end, Silverman said the question came down to parents’ priorities. ​“Is it more important that you be in a convenient spot near highways, or that you be in a more pristine spot?”

Principal Frishman said he thought ​“proximity to area businesses would trump” the desire for cleaner air.

In the end, East Rock Alderman Roland Lemar summed the pros and cons. ​“There are so few opportunities to build these schools in a site “¬¶ that doesn’t involve years and years of negotiation,” or kicking a lot of businesses out. ​“It would be ideal,” except for three concerns: parking, air quality and making sure the design fits with the neighborhood, specifically a nearby housing complex. ​“Developing mitigating plans for those three [concerns] at this point should be the focus.”

The committee voted unanimously to approve the acquisition (whose price has not yet been settled), with orders for the Board of Ed to consider Lemar’s three points. The order next passes to the City Plan Commission Wednesday, then to the full Board of Aldermen.