According to the Providence Journal, a City Council appointed commission has concluded that the city’s new animal shelter should not be built along the main road leading into the Port of Providence because “it would be too stressful an environment for the animals.”

But the council’s animal shelter commission argues that the new site poses a safety hazard for the animals, since it is in a flood zone and in a heavily industrialized area.

The high volume of truck traffic on the road where the shelter would be located, as well as two rail lines nearby, would contribute to a stressful environment for the animals, commission members say.

“I don’t think that anyone would argue that this is a utopia,” said State Veterinarian Scott N. Marshall, who is a member of the council commission. “It’s not a place you’d want to visit.”

E.J. Finocchio, president of the Rhode Island Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and another commission member, was even blunter: “You couldn’t find a worse site than what is being proposed. It’s just no place to have an animal shelter.”

There’s plenty of 24 hour truck traffic and loud noise all along the Allens Ave. industrial working waterfront, most of which is also in a flood zone.  While the City Council’s commission doesn’t think the area is fit for animals, the Providence Planning Department is still pushing zoning changes that would allow for a hotel directly in-between an oil terminal, an asphalt plant, and a marine repair shipyard.

Apparently city officials believe that hotel guests will never complain about the loud noises, bright lights, and truck traffic that is typical in the marine-industrial neighborhood?  Not fit for the animals but no problem for hotel guests?