Commission approves 144,000‑sq‑ft middle school on Hoover campus after traffic and runoff debate

The North Canton Special Planning Commission on April 22 approved development review application DPLN-25-2 to build a new two-story middle school on the Hoover High School campus.

Jordan Lewis of Soul Air Architecture, presenting for the school district, described a 144,000-square-foot building to serve grades six through eight, with about 1,000 students and 125 staff. "The proposed middle school... it's 144,000 square ft. Two stories. It'll serve sixth, seventh and eighth grade," Lewis said, explaining that academics would face Seventh Street and event activities would be concentrated on the north side of the site.

Designers and staff outlined circulation and crowd-management plans intended to reduce neighborhood impacts. The plan uses the Dogwood pool parking lot under agreement with the city to queue roughly 75 parent vehicles off-street; a new Chapel Hill campus connection (with gates closed outside school hours) would provide an additional entry to disperse traffic. The school proposed separating bus circulation on an east drive and locating staff parking (about 125 spaces) west of the new middle school; the bus loop was described as doubling for roughly 80–90 event parking spaces.

The city’s traffic reviewer (GPD) summarized the traffic-impact study and recommended signal-timing changes for AM/PM peaks at nearby signalized intersections and making the 7th/Dogwood intersection a three‑way stop to reduce queuing. GPD said it did not see intersection operations reaching a failing grade under the proposed design and recommended timing adjustments at peaks to improve southbound left-turn capacity.

Residents raised concerns during public comment. Cliff Lee said the Chapel Hill alignment crosses a wetland and involves a steep elevation drop, asking how stormwater and construction runoff would be managed to avoid increasing flow into a creek behind his property. "It's a wetland and there's about a 30 foot elevation drop within 50 ft," Lee said. City staff and the applicants responded that stormwater controls will be installed and that the project must undergo soil-and-water review (Stark County Soil and Water was mentioned) and engineering permitting.

Christina Whittenberger and other neighbors described difficulty exiting driveways during existing high‑school drop-off and urged additional traffic control (for example, reconsidering four‑way stop warrants). Staff said they had already expanded public notice to a 500‑foot radius because of traffic impacts and that a warrant study had been done previously for the 10th/Dogwood intersection (it did not meet a four‑way stop warrant at the time); staff remained open to revisiting counts and changes if patterns warrant.

Motion and vote: A commissioner moved to approve DPLN-25-2; the motion was seconded and roll-call votes were recorded in favor (commissioners recorded as voting yes), and the project was approved.

What happens next: The project will proceed to detailed engineering and permitting, including required stormwater and building-code reviews. Staff noted the city engineer and other departments had reviewed the plans during pre-application; specific construction mitigation (stormwater systems, gates with posted hours, signage) will be finalized in engineering and permit submittals.