How Might 1,500 Students at Wheelock Site Affect Medfield Water?

Imagine 21 full-sized school buses, staff and parent vehicles, and a 10-year projection of 1,500* students in grades 1-5 housed in two large school buildings -- all on property that has restrictions designed to protect Medfield water supply.

So while a grade 3-5 re-configuration for a new Dale Street school on Elm Street, along with a proposal to move grade 1 into Wheelock may be viewed as the preferred game plan, if all five grades end up on the site, what is the risk to the town's natural resources?

Given 10-year enrollment* and bus projections, plus the size of the current Wheelock building, the size of a second, new building on the property would likely need to be at least twice the size of the existing Wheelock School to accommodate a projected 860 students in grades 3-5. With grades 1 and 2 planned for Wheelock as well, that would add roughly 500 more students. Even other school building professionals have viewed just an 860-student building as challenging.

Complicating matters:

• Wheelock School property is in both a state-designated well-protection and watershed-protection district specifically to guard town water supply (click on "layers" to get to designations) -- and especially from contamination that can be caused by any number of things, such as cleaning and snow-melting chemicals, sewer line breaks, etc. (Some initial concern has been expressed about town sewer line capacity for such a large school population at Wheelock.)

• The Wheelock well-protection zone is also marked with a "400’ no construction radius” on Geographic Information System maps, regularly used by town planners, conservation commissions and other entities. (See image.)

• Full-size buses cannot currently travel on the upper section of Elm Street (less than a mile from the school) due to a 3-ton weight limit on the bridge that crosses Mine Brook (a school bus is about 12.5 tons). As a result, some school buses will either need to be re-routed onto other streets, mini-buses would need to be employed, and/or parents would be forced to provide transportation.

• The routing of grade 1-5 buses to and from Wheelock could heavily impact South Street traffic, and may overlap with Blake and MHS traffic, even though the secondary schools start about 45 minutes earlier. Traffic and busing issues could make it even more challenging to adopt later start times for the high school if they align too closely with the elementary schools.

In preliminary assessments of the Dale Street property and Wheelock property as most likely school sites, none of the five working group members gave unfavorable ratings to the Wheelock site for environmental conditions; all gave neutral ratings. The five members weighing in so far were Michael Quinlan (committee chair), Jeffrey Marsden (superintendent), Michael LaFrancesca (finance/operations director) and Steve Grenham (Dale Street principal). Of the five, Quinlan and LaFrancesca are Medfield residents. The remaining nine Dale School Building Committee members are expected to submit their ratings by Feb. 1 according to LeftField project manager Lynn Stapleton; of those members, seven are Medfield residents.

Stapleton noted in an e-mail that the site selection matrix is an "information gathering tool that will help to inform as to how the two sites and grade configurations subjectively measure up to the criteria developed for the school site" and that it will continue to evolve as responses come in.

Last year, when the Dale Street Building Committee was reviewing project manager proposals, two firms shared their views on possible challenges:

• Daedalus: "860 kids in one building (grades 3-5) is a big challenge. Becomes a sea of parking."
• NV5: One of its civil engineers "had already visited the Wheelock site and observed well restraints, further noting that the firm saw "potential challenges regarding site choice and conservation land."

The current Dale Street building is not without its challenges, including the presence of asbestos and its location also in a water-protection district, which by itself cannot stop a building project, noted Quinlan at the last committee meeting. However, more public information has been shared about the documented condition of the Dale building and the site overall, especially as part of the process to get accepted into the MSBA program; not much has been publicly shared about the pros and cons of the Wheelock property.

* The projected 1,500 total is not only based on enrollment projections, but the Dale Building Committee is estimating 21 buses would be needed; most full-size school buses have 72 seats.

* Two versions of detailed enrollment projections have not been posted to the Dale Street Project site, but the latest one from the Nov. 14 School Committee meeting can be found here.