St. Polycarp (Phase 2 and 3) Somerville, MA Project: 33 Units Multi-Family Residential Development Client: DSA/Somerville Community House Challenges and Opportunities: DZI provided the site planning, civil engineering and landscape architectural services for this new multi-family housing project located in a dense urban neighborhood of the former St. Polycarp School. DZI has worked to create a site plan that connects the various phases of developments. The Multi-family housing development contains three buildings all interconnected by a common covered sidewalk. The creation of passive and active recreation interior courtyard spaces containing a rain garden mitigates the entire storm water from the buildings. This recreation area also contains grills, benches and a connection to the developments community room. The storm water mitigation system has been designed to accommodate future development so no more open space will have to be used for this purpose in the future. Associated with this project was improvements to the existing city streets so that accessible pedestrian access can circumnavigate the entire site and the future development can benefit from a newly widened intersection and upgraded city parking as well as the decommissioning of an underutilized street which can now be used for open space. This project supports a sustainable approach to design by utilizing rain gardens, underground detention and extensive pedestrian access.