WESTBROOK – About 20 people spent a beautiful fall morning last Saturday traversing the 48-acre farmland of the former Clarke Farm off Spring Street in Westbrook, and they made the effort for different reasons.

For Rene Daniel and the rest of the Westbrook Planning Board, the walk was necessary in order to get a firm grasp on the project that will bring 180 housing units into the area, and to answer questions specific to the layout and design of the property.

For Tom Clarke, whose family had owned the property, and a few others, the walk was made to find out what’s in store for the land that has been open fields for years, and its eventual transformation into Westbrook’s largest subdivision project in decades.

However, given the size of the development and its potential impact, resident turnout was small.

Scarborough-based Risbara Bros. Construction bought the 32-acre farm property in January, and after acquiring 16 additional acres from an abutter, unveiled an expanded subdivision plan that includes 50 homes, 98 market-rate, multi-family rental units in seven buildings, and 32 condominium units in eight buildings.

Nancy St. Clair of the civil engineering firm St. Clair Associates first gathered the group in an old barn situated behind the former Clarke farmhouse. The house was owned by longtime Westbrook City Clerk William Clarke, and will be renovated into two apartment units. However, the old barn will come down.

The Clarke home was built in 1910 by William Bragdon, a former Westbrook mayor, and the Clarkes lived at the property since the 1920s, running the Blue Spruce dairy farm until the late 1980s.

“You’re standing in the middle of one of the Blue Spruce Farm apartment buildings,” St. Clair said in the barn.

The two Blue Spruce Farm apartment buildings will house 12 units each.

Leading the group through the property were St. Clair and Rocco and Bill Risbara. The rolling fields had already been marked with stakes with orange and pink flags, orange for the center line of the two roads that will spiral through the property, and pink for the property location of each building.

A road running through the parcel, named Jacqueline Way, for the late Jacqueline Clarke, will also have two additional 12-unit apartment buildings. On another portion of land, nearing the Stroudwater River, two 24-unit buildings will make up the Waterside Apartments. Responding to critiques the Planning Board made to the initial plan, these buildings have been pulled back 250 feet from the Stroudwater River.

Throughout the walk, Planning Board members had questions about drainage, tree removal and grading, as some of the hilly areas of the field are difficult to imagine with houses. While the farmland has no trees, the additional acreage acquired is mostly wooded, and Rocco Risbara didn’t want to sugarcoat their plans.

“There’s a fair amount of wood that’s going to go,” he said, adding that even with fairly small lots, his experience has been that with a driveway and small yard, not many trees stay, unless it’s a cluster of trees on the back property line.

As for grading, St. Clair said some cuts will have to be made to the major knolls in the parcel, which will help even out the grade across the property. Risbara imagined the cut would most likely be between four and five feet.

“They’re not going to be a dramatic change,” she said of the grading, adding that all the grades will be included in a final site plan.

The Blue Spruce Farm development would be accessed by public streets that would intersect with Spring Street in two locations.

The property straddles the Stroudwater River, and no development is proposed on the south side of the river. In fact, the condominium buildings, which run closest to the river, are still set back 250 feet.

“We’re not proposing any parking or buildings between here and the river,” St. Clair said, pointing at a pink stake.

The Risbaras are proud of talks that have already occurred with Portland Trails, to establish a trail system along the river.

“We envision all along the river will be a trail that’s walkable, or fit to ride a bicycle on,” Risbara said.

The trail system already runs along the river on the other side of Spring Street.

“The thought is that this is a logical link to allow connection to trails that go up into some of the other neighborhoods,” St. Clair said.

In the back of the property is another large parcel owned by Daniel Chick. While the Risbaras said they have never spoken to him about the land, one of their existing lots could serve as a access road to the parcel if it were ever acquired for development.

Also on hand Saturday was Dean Flanagan, director of operations for the Westbrook School Department. This subdivision, as well as any other future housing development in Westbrook, is of interest to the school department because a recent study predicts a boost in enrollments at schools that are already deemed “at capacity.”

Flanagan said Saturday that the site walk is a great way to understand the scope of the project.

At the Planning Board’s last meeting, member Cory Fleming pointed out some concerns, including the need for mixed-use development on the parcel that could provide retail outlets to the neighborhood, as well as the need for a transit connection for residents to have a bus service, given the size of the development.

City Planner Molly Just said Saturday that the site walk gave participants “a sense of scale” of a large future neighborhood that will be its own community. Just also asked about the potential of a “corner store” kind of commercial use in one of the front apartment buildings.

“If the market demanded it, you could retro-fit a commercial space in there,” she said.

Bill Risbara said that if planning officials saw the need for a commercial space, the design could and should happen now.

Rocco Risbara said the company will most likely come before the Planning Board again in January, this time with a final site plan. He said the next immediate steps are approvals from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection and site plan approval, after which the company can break ground. Risbara expects the build-out to occur over a three- to five-year period.

The project is Risbara’s largest to date.

Some 20 people trekked across the former Clarke Farm property off Spring Street last Saturday during the Westbrook Planning Board’s site walk for the proposed Blue Spruce Farm subdivision. It would feature a mix of homes, condominiums and apartment buildings in 180 units.