Smithfield planning board continues Windsor School senior-housing proposal after traffic, neighborhood concerns

The Smithfield Planning Board on Sept. 18 continued review of a proposed senior-housing redevelopment at the former Windsor School, directing the applicant to run additional traffic modeling and to meet with the town’s technical review committee before the board’s Oct. 16 meeting.

The board heard a presentation from Charice Miller, executive director of Gemini Housing Corp. and Smithfield Housing Authority, which plans to convert the vacant school into senior housing and add new units on the site. “We currently have 240 households on the waiting list for senior affordable housing,” Miller told the board.

The proposal calls for renovating the existing school building and adding a new structure behind it; architect Mark Secocio said the existing school contains 29 units — “28 one-bedroom, and 1 two-bedroom” — and the new building would be designed to match the scale and appearance of the original school. The applicant said it has adjusted dumpster placement, added a stockade fence along the property line, and plans designated outdoor smoking areas after resident concerns raised at a recent neighborhood informational meeting.

Traffic became the central technical issue. Jacqueline Centracchio, the town’s peer reviewer, told the board her team found the applicant’s traffic report incomplete in several respects and recommended a microsimulation (“SIMTraffic”) analysis to capture queuing and spillback at the nearby signalized intersections. Centracchio said reviewers asked for additions including intersection coverage, sight-distance analysis using the appropriate design speed and clarifying which future-year build scenario the analysis used.

“In our initial review, we had 10 comments,” Centracchio said. She said sight-distance calculations in the applicant’s response relied on a 35 mph design speed and the minimum stopping sight distance of about 250 feet, but that for a four-lane section the practical sight-distance requirement is longer.

Applicant traffic engineer Paul Bannon of Questman Engineering told the board the team had responded to the peer-review comments and could run the requested simulation. “We responded to the comments. They’re all minor in nature. It’s not gonna change the results of any of the findings or recommendations,” he said, adding that the SIMTraffic run could be provided as backup to the existing Synchro analysis.

Board members and many nearby residents said they live daily with extensive queues on Putnam Pike (Route 44) and worried that even a modest addition of vehicles could increase risk at the site’s driveway. Resident Jessica Ogram, who lives on nearby West Cottage Avenue, said converting the school to apartments is reasonable but that adding a second building “feels excessive and out of scale with the neighborhood.” Ogram and other neighbors cited safety, privacy, trash, snow-storage, and parking impacts if the plan moves forward.

Developers and engineers said they had tried to incorporate neighborhood feedback: Secocio said the dumpster was moved farther from abutters, extra plantings will be added, and the firm would work with the town and DOT on driveway configuration. Civil engineer David D’Amico said the team will design lighting to avoid illumination across property lines and that much of the rear grass area would remain.

Board direction and next steps: the board voted to continue the Windsor Apartments public hearing to Oct. 16, required the applicant to convene the town’s technical review committee (TRC), asked the applicant and peer reviewer to coordinate off-line to reach technical agreement where possible, and asked the applicant to run a SIMTraffic microsimulation and to provide a revised traffic report in time for the October meeting. The board also directed staff to notify abutters of the continuance. No final approvals were made.

The continuation keeps the project at the preliminary-review stage; permitting still will require state wetlands approvals, Smithfield Water and sewer sign-offs and other technical permits. The board said it expects the applicant and peer reviewer to produce a final traffic submission that directly addresses the reviewer’s outstanding items before any vote on the project.