Rendering of planned dorm.
The hill on Canner Street, down which removed soils will be trucked, is one of the steepest in the city. Check your brakes, and watch out the vehicle convoys don’t interfere with school drop-offs and pick-ups.
With those modest warnings expressed, City Plan Commissioners voted unanimously Wednesday night to approve a site plan review and erosion control review for the Yale Divinity School’s proposed new environmentally ambitious graduate student dormitory off Prospect Street.
The site plan review was combined with a public hearing that focused on details of how 46,500 cubic yards of soil and other stuff will be carted away and handled in the proposed construction of a new U‑shaped, three-story, 45,000 square-foot dorm to house 49 graduate students.
Last month the Yale team received a warm reception from the East Rock Community Management Team as it previewed the general plan of turning the school’s main surface parking area adjacent to the main quadrangle into a three-story dorm that meets the Living Building Challenge standards for sustainability.
Those standards, which will be a first at Yale and in the city, require buildings to be carbon-neutral, constructed from sustainable materials, completely powered by built-in solar panels, self-reliant for water and waste management, and educational to the broader public
The architecture must not only avoid environmental harm, but also contribute positively to the ecosystem. Click here to read more details about the proposed dorm building, which will complement the three existing dorms, Bellamy, Fisher, and Curtis halls, all on the north side of the campus.
Wednesday night’s hearing and review focused primarily on how the environmental challenges will be initially met in the preparation of the site for building — specifically grading and excavation and removal of asphalt and dirt from the high-sloped parking lot site that is surrounded by residential neighborhoods.
Nicole Holmes of Nitsch Engineering said the submitted plans meet the city’s erosion and sediment control standards, including perimeter controls, stabilization of the steep slopes, and in general a major improvement: “By redeveloping the surface parking, we reduce the parking with reduction in peak runoff, optimization of infiltration … and with all the vehicular pavement (including a new entry roadway that loops north around the new building) with porous asphalt.”
Commissioner and aldermanic rep Adam Marchand asked for a summary of how much of the parking area asphalt and other material and soil is to be kept on site, or if carted elsewhere, where. He also asked about he trucking routes.
“A certain amount is being excavated on site and then reused on site,” said the lawyer for the project, Joseph Hammer. “That’s one component. Another is excavated and removed.”
Norwalk-based Shawmut Design and Construction’s William Sweeney, who will be in charge of the construction, elaborated: “For the most part, material will leave the site. Soils returning will be temporarily stored and contained by erosion controls off site.”
Marchand pressed for where those temporary piles might be. Sweeney said he did not yet know.
“That responsibility will be to our subcontractor, but every effort will be made to keep soil on site. That’s the least expensive option, and this project is all about sustainability,” he said.
He said the trucking plan has vehicles entering the site from Prospect, leaving onto Canner and traveling a short distance to I‑91 en route to drop off points (locations and uses yet to be determined).
“One of the steepest streets in all New Haven is Canner,” Marchand offered a caution. “You probably already know that, but if you have a loaded truck down the steep grade, be mindful. You want your trucks to have very good brakes.”
Urban Design League President Anstress Farwell added her concurrence and reminded the project team that there are Connecticut Transit and Yale Transit stops on Canner as well. “It’s a place therefore to take special care.”
“We all want the project to be safe as possible and least impact on the community,” Sweeney replied. He said his company has experience in the area from having worked on constructing Yale’s nearby Greenberg Conference Center ten years ago.
“Regarding [truck] frequency, it will vary” during the course of the 19-month project, Sweeney said, with perhaps two to three trucks per day in the initial phase, and considerably higher frequency during the middle seven months, from February to September next year. “But with a frequency never more than 32 per day, which is one truck per 15 minutes,” he added.
Farwell then added another reminder that school buses are numerous in the area during drop-off and pick-up times. She made an appeal for extra caution and to mind engine idling.
Sweeney promised there would be no truck queuing on Canner. He said he e was appreciative of the reminders, and concluded that he is “pretty confident we’ll have a soft impact.”
Hammer told the commissioners that the city’s traffic & parking experts had reviewed the application’s haul route and had requested no changes, “but we’ll try to be responsive as the project evolves.”
As the meeting concluded, City Engineer Giovanni Zinn shifted to two other inquiries: the height of the proposed light poles on the site’s walking and vehicular paths and the quality of the drainage and catch basin systems.
Project architect Gretchen Neeley, Boston-based Bruner/Cott Architects, replied that they vary from 12 to 15 feet and all point downward to avoid nighttime light pollution. That elicited a “great” from Zinn.
Not so great was Nicole Nitsch’s report that the drainage rate on the site is a relatively poor half inch per hour, requiring that even the catch basins and bioswales have back-up “under-drains.”
“I tend to hate under-drains in natural systems like this,” Zinn said.
“We are up on this high point,” Nitsch explained, “and we did encounter some areas of bedrock, some tight layers, it’s not pure sand, so we do need a back-up plan, and by spreading it out, we can get the draw-down.”
“All right, thank you,” Zinn replied.
With previous approvals including a recent aldermanic vote that the eliminated 99 parking spots will be absorbed into Yale’s overall parking plan, and with Wednesday’s unanimous vote, the project is set to begin later this year and to conclude in the summer of 2024.