Triple Decker Housing
Many of the triple-deckers on Oakland Avenue are listed on the National Register of Historic Places because of their significance to social history. Common in Smith Hill, Providence and urban New England, these homes were mostly built between 1890 and 1920 as a low-cost way to house the newly arrived immigrants who worked in the factories surrounding the neighborhood. Their construction marked the end of Smith Hill’s agricultural ties, the appearance of a highly functional architectural form and the start of building codes and city planning.