LYNN — The Pickering School Building Committee announced that it would recommend Magnolia Park for the site of the new Pickering Middle School at a public hearing Monday night.
On Wednesday, Dec. 21, the committee will present their top three site selections to the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA). Though sites on Rockdale Avenue and Broadway remain on the committee’s radar, the project’s lead architect Gene Raymond said Magnolia Park would be its first choice.
“Our recommendation to the School Building Authority [is] that they further explore options on Magnolia Park,” Raymond said.
Raymond said that the site’s central location and proximity to bus lines make it the best option out of the three site considerations.
“It is the most centrally located site in the city,” Raymond said. “The city is going to have to rebalance its middle school population and bring some more pupils up into whatever site the school ends up at.”
Both the sites on Rockdale Avenue and Broadway sit on thick layers of bedrock, which, Raymond said, would take the city at least an extra year of work just to construct a single parking lot.
Although Magnolia Park, unlike its competing sites, has a soil topography, the city would have to maneuver around the park’s Article 97 protections through the legislature to begin construction. Additionally, the project would have to circumnavigate a Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) line that runs beneath the park.
When the committee concluded its presentation and opened the meeting for public discussion, one resident asked how the committee planned to prevent the possibility of flooding, or sinking, in the area.
“When we moved there and then 1958 there was no Magnolia Park, it was a swamp,” she said. “I don’t know if you remember the Mother’s Day when we had sluice flow all the way down to the park. Water from Flax continued flowing out onto Western Ave. I just want to make sure that if you are building later, you do it correctly, so there will be no issues like there were at Classical [High School].”
Raymond responded that the school, if built at Magnolia Park, would sit on a pile foundation similar to that of Thurgood Marshall Middle School, which would alleviate the risk of the building sinking.
“We’re going to use the same exact foundation and floor stock system that was used at Thurgood Marshall,” Raymond said. “It’s a different structural system than what ended up getting used at crossroads. So there’ll be no issues as far as anything like Classical.”
Another resident asked the committee how the construction of an 1,100-pupil school would rebalance Breed and Thurgood Marshall students into Pickering. Raymond responded that the school committee would likely examine redistricting in the future. Regardless, he said, the city’s middle schools are over capacity.
“Thurgood Marshall was built for 1,100 pupils but there are many more. There are 1,300 pupils there now. That’s what we would call ‘over capacity,’ and that impacts the educational system,” Raymond said. “The same is true at Breed.”
When a virtual audience member asked how the city would address an expected influx of students as a result of the Lynnway housing development, Mayor Jared Nicholson said that the project would reduce crowding across the community.
“This is going to help us address issues in our crowded Pickering, and really throughout the city because of a way that we’re adding classroom capacity,” Nicholson said. “ Whether it be on the Lynnway, or in Ward One, or in any part of the city, we’re adding classrooms that will benefit the entire community.”
The committee aims to complete construction of the new Pickering Middle School by September 2026. The MSBA and the city plan to finalize their site selection on Wednesday, Dec. 21.
