Developer pitches Stamford high-rise to replace industrial South End lot: ‘The area is changing’
STAMFORD — A real estate developer wants to turn the dregs
of the South End’s industrial past into the area’s latest high-rise at 441
Canal St.
“We think of it as a site that is a gateway to the South
End,” the developer’s attorney William Hennessey told the Zoning Board Monday.
Heyman Properties proposed 401 apartments in all, with 429
corresponding parking spaces. On the ground floor, 441 Canal will feature over
7,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space. Hennessey said the hope is to
attract a small eatery, something convenient for residents “while at the same
being attractive to the public.”
A few blocks north, other buildings have executed similar
efforts. Luxury apartment building Urby houses the coffee shop Roost, and
attached to the Ferguson Library is Winfield Street Coffee. Both spots serve
beer and wine on top of the typical cafe fares, and Hennessey described a
similar vision for the perspective building.
The parcel fronts Dock Street to the north, John Street to
the west and Canal Street to the east. It sits half a mile away from the
Stamford Transportation Center, putting it within the bounds of Stamford’s
transit-oriented development district.
While the proposal is for one structure on four consolidated
lots, the building presents itself as two. In the mockups, the tower starts out
stout and shrouded by trees. A public plaza sits on one side. After the eighth
floor, it splits into two sections — each 18 stories high.
The “highly stylized” retail space, as Hennessey described
it, and the proposed public plaza in front are both functions of the location.
Because it is within walking distance of the train station and in such a
visible place, making the streetscape as appealing as possible became a
priority, Hennessey said.
The South End’s main streets all coverage at the proposed
development site, Hennessey explained, which he said underscored the
developer’s “responsibility on the site to do something that is a little bit
different.” He also doubled down on 441 Canal as a “gateway” parcel for the
community.
Gateways are nothing new for the neighborhood. The word
became synonymous with development in the South End more than 10 years ago,
when developer Building and Land Technology sought approvals to build the long-debated
Gateway site, now the Stamford home for Charter Communications.
Negative impact or ‘much-needed improvement’?
Though Heyman Properties sees prime real estate,
manufacturers have traditionally defined this area — like much of the South
End. The site was once used as a lumber yard. Steel-framed buildings housed a
bank, plus an antique gallery and homewares store in more recent years. Nearby,
industrial uses persist.
“A few hundred feet down Canal Street is the junkyard and
transfer station and asphalt plant, and across the canal is the city’s sewage
treatment plant,” pointed out South End activist Sue Halpern during the public
comment session Monday. Halpern argued that the nearby uses posed threats to
future residents. The environmental remediation necessary to build on the 441
Canal site, she said, would negatively impact the air quality for current ones.
But where Halpern saw the dangers of industry, other South
Enders saw an opportunity to clean it up.
City Rep. Terry Adams, D-3, called the proposal “a
much-needed improvement” over the antique sellers that crowded the block before
and could facilitate a pedestrian connection between Downtown and his
constituency. And though fellow South End activist Sheila Barney expressed
concerns over the overall state of development in the neighborhood, she agreed
that the Canal project could bring forth a new era for the community.
“The area is changing,” Barney said. She noted that
industrial companies like trash hauler B&S Carting had left the
neighborhood as development encroached. Maybe more residential construction in
places like 441 Canal could bring about a cleaner South End, she said.
If approved, Hennessey said he expects construction to take
around 30 months, pushing the completion date at a minimum into late 2024.
The Zoning Board will discuss the proposal for 441 Canal St.
and the corresponding zoning map proposed by the developer again at its May 9
meeting.
Norwalk plans $600K sidewalk project near three schools
NORWALK — Two schools along Highland Avenue are set to
receive sidewalk makeovers before the fall.
Last month, the city released a Request for Proposals for a
company to complete the curbing and sidewalks along Highland Avenue, in front
of three of the city’s public schools.
With the bidding period closed Monday, the city received
three bids on the project, Transportation, Parking and Mobility Department
Director Jim Travers said.
The project is estimated to cost between $600,000 and
$650,000, as part of the federal Safe Routes to School transportation program,
Travers said.
“This has been a priority for the administration and
department for some time. For several years, we proportionally requested
capital funding and each year the department requested $225,000 for Safe Routes
to School,” Travers said. “We look for these funds to look at improved
sidewalks to schools, other infrastructure investments, whether that be
flashing signs, better crossings.”
For three years, the $225,000 appropriated for Safe Routes
to School was saved to be used on the Highland Avenue sidewalk project, Travers
said.
Safe Routes to School is a program run by the U.S.
Department of Transportation that encourages infrastructure changes that make
it easier for students to walk to and from school each day, increasing
childhood health and decreasing environmental impact, according to the
U.S. DOT.
With the Bike/Walk Commission, Travers and his department
viewed Highland Avenue as a priority for repaving.
Along 1 mile of Highland Avenue, there is Brookside
Elementary School, Brien McMahon High School and Roton Middle School. The
sidewalks connecting the three schools will be repaved.
The new sidewalks will run from the intersection of Meredith
Court and Highland Avenue to the intersection of Charcoal Road and Highland
Avenue, ending shortly before Roton Middle School, according to the RFP.
The sidewalk in front of Roton was not included in the
project as new sidewalk was installed on that strip a few years ago, Travers
said.
“So, it’ll be one continuous stretch of new sidewalk. More
importantly for Highland, it’s connecting three schools on the street,” Travers
said.
The curbing and sidewalk work will be conducted between June
20 and Aug. 19, in time for the start of the 2022-23 school year, according to
the RFP.
The city will ensure an entrance to each school will be
available during the construction, Travers said.
“We have been in contact with all three schools to let them
know. We are coordinating the day when school is out,” Travers said. “If we do
sidewalks through schools, we will do half at a time to never block access into
school. We will work with every property owner and schools for anything. We
don’t want this to be massively disruptive, but we really believe the benefit
will be worth it.”
The new sidewalk and curb designs will include updated
accessibility ramps and pavement signage preventing drivers from blocking ramps
and crosswalks, Travers said.
Bike lanes along the avenue will be widened as well, making
for safer sidewalks as distance is added between drivers and the sidewalk,
Travers said.
The project was in the works for a while before Travers and
his team completed the design and brought the project to fruition, city
spokesperson Michelle Woods Matthews said.
Winsted Town Manager presents road plan to zoning commission
WINSTED — Town Manager Josh Kelly presented an 8-24
application to the Planning & Zoning Commission Monday, bringing the town’s
$15.3 million road improvement project one step closer to starting later this
year.
The commission unanimously approved Kelly’s 8-24
application, which is part of the process to apply for loans and a requirement
for municipal projects.
Kelly and Public Works Director Jim Rollins first
presented the road improvement plan in January. The plan at that time
also included an additional $3 million to be borrowed for drainage improvements
around Highland Lake and a new ladder truck for the Winsted Fire Department.
Since then, after receiving borrowing advice from the town’s
bond counsel, Kelly changed the plan to bond the road projects and presented a
new one that includes Winsted’s $6 million Hinsdale School renovation project,
which the town begins repaying this year.
The total $24.7 million bonding proposal was
approved by the Board of Selectmen April 18 and is going to a town
meeting and referendum in May.
“We need an 8-24 review done by your board tonight, and have
it sent back to the Board of Selectmen,” Kelly said. “If you don’t approve it
tonight, we’ll have to reschedule our town meeting (on May 24) and referendum.”
“We’ll have a full panel of individuals who know these
projects, to discuss them at the town meeting. That will adjourn to a
referendum,” Kelly said. “Hopefully the referendum will be part of the town
budget (vote) on May 28. But if you think you need more time, we’ll have to
reschedule.”
Kelly reminded the commission that the road improvement
project was first brought to the selectmen in December, but that former town
manager Robert Geiger had talked about it for at least four years. Kelly began
his role as town manager last August, after Geiger retired.
“Our first presentation was about investment in our roads,
and on average, Winsted has invested under $800,000 annually in road work. If
we continue with our current approach, it will take a very long time,” Kelly
said. “But if we borrow, we can get a lot more done.”
Rollins also reviewed the list of roads to be repaired,
which have been devided into five separate projects.
The areas to be included in the road improvement plan are
western Winsted, including Hannafin and Upland roads and Hubbard and Marshal
streets. In the Main Street corridor area, they include Case Avenue, the Case
Avenue bridge, Elm and Spring streets.
For Highland Lake, the roads in need of repair include West
Wakefield Blvd., Lake Street and the Taylor Brook bridge. Winchester Center’s
roads included are the Mad River bridge, Grantville, Newfield, South and Wahnee
Roads. In eastern Winsted, the roads listed are Holabird, Moore and Oakdale
avenues, and Whiting Street. Kelly said the list totals 9.47 miles, or 12
percent of Winsted’s roads.
“We had to start with a roadway’s condition, safety
conditions, its liability to the town, and what specific problems it has, like
drainage failure,” Rollins said. “We don’t want to use capital project money
for this kind of work. It’s too much for our operating budget.”
Norwich school renovation project options being considered
Norwich — A plan to overhaul the city’s schools
— with three existing elementary schools being considered for renovation
and expansion, along with a possible fourth, new school — is starting to
come into focus.
The School Building Committee earlier this month
narrowed its focus on two possible options for elementary schools, which
were presented to residents at a public forum Tuesday. One would renovate
and expand the John B. Stanton Elementary, Moriarty Environmental Sciences
Magnet and Uncas Elementary schools, each to house about 700 students
in preschool through fifth grade. A second option would keep those three
schools and build one new elementary school, with all four housing
about 550 students each.
The Veterans Memorial and Thomas W. Mahan elementary schools
would be closed. Administrative offices would be moved to the historical Samuel
Huntington School, and the Wequonnoc School in Taftville could be retained as a
virtual learning center but would need major renovations to meet federal accessibility
standards for people with disabilities.
As the committee was prepared to vote at its April 19
meeting to direct architectural firm Drummey Rosane Anderson Inc., or DRA Architects, to focus on the two possible
scenarios, members decided to delay the vote until Tuesday’s public forum to
hear residents’ input. The committee also looked at keeping all seven existing
elementary school buildings with about 300 students each.
About 15 people attended Tuesday’s forum and workshop —
most of them building committee and City Council members, along with some
school staff and parents.
James Barrett, principal of DRA, said the team toured all
schools last summer, assessed their condition, renovation needs and feasibility
of keeping those buildings. He said the group is collecting all that
information and is beginning to form the plan. Within the next two months, the
firm will finalize its recommendations and lay out options for the School
Building Committee.
DRA’s evaluation of population age groups in Norwich showed
enrollment is expected to remain stable for the next 10 years. High levels of
enrollment in past decades have left the city with more building capacity than
students, Barrett said.
Poster boards lined the Kelly Middle School community room
for Tuesday’s forum, one with photos and information for each of the district’s
14 buildings and others with city demographic information, enrollment and
responses to surveys of students and teachers.
In evaluating the buildings, the group studied exterior
condition, access, traffic flow and parking, while with interiors, DRA
officials evaluated mechanics, classroom size, layout, cafeteria space and
technology.
During the workshop portion of Tuesday’s forum, participants
were asked their own assessments of the school building needs.
Parent Mary Pollard said she is familiar with almost all
city school buildings, and “getting kids in and out of the schools” can be a
nightmare, especially at Moriarty and Wequonnoc schools. Pollard said she loves
how the Wequonnoc School is so tied to the Taftville neighborhood, with many
walkers and parents and students walking to school events together. But she
said it’s dangerous with so many children crossing busy Providence Street.
Parent Jessica Quay said the building committee should not
forget the outdated and rundown playgrounds at all schools that need upgrades.
Alderman Derell Wilson said districtwide, compliance with
the Americans with Disabilities Act is critical in all school buildings,
especially those with upper floors.
The committee hopes to present a proposed plan to overhaul
the city’s schools to the City Council for approval and be ready in time to
place a referendum question on the ballot for the Nov. 8 election. But
committee members said Tuesday the group likely will not be ready in time to
meet that goal.
Brownfields draw more attention as industrial development options dwindle
olluted by more than a century of metal manufacturing, the
17.4-acre former Anamet manufacturing campus near the center of Waterbury has
sat abandoned and decaying for nearly two decades, visited mostly by homeless
individuals, drug users and vandals.
The city of Waterbury and state have poured more than $5
million into cleaning and preparing the property for reuse, much of it going
into demolition of crumbling buildings. An additional $4 million in state
brownfield grants has been earmarked for continued cleanup.
The city issued a request for proposals April 11, seeking a
user or developer to buy or lease the property. Waterbury Mayor Neil O’Leary
said he believes the state’s hot industrial market, coupled with tight
statewide inventory, will draw more investor interest to brownfield sites like
Anamet.
“We think there is a significant amount of interest on that
piece [of land],” even though it has a long way to go before it can be
redeveloped, O’Leary said.
Industrial real estate brokers and others say they are
seeing a greater willingness from developers to look at brownfield properties,
but they remain a challenge.
“Developers — and end users to a degree — but developers
specifically are taking a harder look at these types of properties,” said Kyle
Roberts, first vice president of brokerage firm CBRE.
Roberts said CBRE is currently floating potential brownfield
redevelopments to Scannell Properties, the Indiana-based industrial builder and
investor that has been one of the most active logistics space developers around
Greater Hartford.
The shrinking number of industrial development sites left
throughout the Northeast is further exacerbated by the growing reluctance of
some communities to allow further warehouse development, Roberts noted.
But brownfield remediation costs are so high, they typically
must be borne by someone other than the developer or end user to make a project
feasible, Roberts said. That hasn’t changed.
Urban opportunities
At Waterbury’s Anamet site, the city will leave standing a
single, 220,000-square-foot industrial building with 40-foot-high ceilings.
Local taxpayers invested $2.7 million repairing the roof to preserve the
building for reuse.
The city is seeking a developer, even as it continues the
remaining cleanup, to speed up the redevelopment timeline, said Thomas Hyde,
interim director of the Waterbury Development Corp. and CEO of the Naugatuck
Valley Development Corp.
Several would-be users and developers have toured the site,
including a couple that flew in to see it, Hyde said.
Developer interest grew, he added, after Amazon recently
announced plans to locate nearby a massive regional distribution center on a
roughly 150-acre site straddling the Waterbury and Naugatuck town line. Located
at the crossroads of Interstates 84 and Route 8, Waterbury is closer to the
Port of New York and New Jersey than northern Connecticut towns that have been
the focus of logistics development in recent years.
Much of that Greater Hartford activity has been spurred by
the availability of affordable, flat agricultural land that has no past
industrial pollution.
With officials and residents in some Greater Hartford towns
now contemplate stronger restrictions on logistics projects, O’Leary said he
believes developers might look for alternatives in places like Waterbury.
Waterbury and other Connecticut cities have long struggled
with the specters of their manufacturing pasts; large properties otherwise ripe
with industrial potential often sit idle for years, or even decades, due to the
costs of clearing pollution. The state has responded with significant cleanup
subsidies, but the cost uncertainties continue to serve as a disincentive to
brownfield investment, experts said.
Cleanup costs
Frank H. Hird, vice president of O,R&L Commercial in
Rocky Hill, said the hot industrial market has “absolutely” spurred more
interest in environmentally-challenged sites.
“I can’t give you a percentage, but it is absolutely
increasing,” Hird said.
Cities generally allow denser development, a higher
building-to-land coverage ratio and greater access to sewer and water service
than suburban sites, Hird noted.
Hird said he recently had a single buyer lay claim to two
large industrial properties, leaving him with little inventory left to offer.
Art Ross, senior managing director of the industrial
practice group for Newmark, agreed tight industrial inventory is bound to
increase interest in brownfield sites.
Ross said he recently narrowly missed a brownfield
redevelopment deal in Connecticut. He said the transaction faltered when the
past owner and prospective buyer couldn’t agree on how to divide roughly $10
million in known cleanup costs. The developer was willing to take on future
unknown liabilities, Ross noted.
Ross said Connecticut’s Transfer Act, which requires
property sellers to confirm that there have been no prior hazardous waste
spills on-site, remains a powerful disincentive to reuse sites with pollution
histories. However, Connecticut policymakers have set into motion a process to
ease those environmental restrictions.
Alexandra Daum, deputy commissioner of the Connecticut
Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD), noted state lawmakers
and the administration have authorized spending $50 million on brownfield
grants over the next two fiscal years.
“That is representative of how committed we are — both DECD
and the administration in general — to brownfields remediation as a tool of
economic development,” Daum said.
Past cleanups have resulted in an array of uses, Daum said.
Industrial uses are “a great option” because the cleanup standards are lighter
than other types of development, she said. State economic development
authorities haven’t been deluged with additional interest in brownfield
redevelopments, but builders are more willing to consider these sites, she
said.
“Previously it was: ‘I want a clean site, I want perfect
highway access, I want a huge site, utilities perfectly connected –
everything,’ ” Daum said. “That’s still the first call people make, … but I
think we are seeing a bit more flexibility and open-mindedness about
considering sites that aren’t perfect.”
Brownfields still have challenges and limitations,
especially in terms of project complexity, time and cost, Daum acknowledged.
The state’s brownfield programs offer cleanup subsidies of up to $4 million, but
each funding round is limited to $2 million grants.
That means developers or municipalities need to apply
through at least two different grant funding rounds to get the maximum award.
It also takes time, and great expense, to identify areas of pollution, get
cleanup plans approved and then certify it has been done correctly.
“If you have a tenant that needs to be in [a location] in
six months, a brownfield is probably not the right site,” Daum said. “But there
are a lot of enterprising, risk-taking investors out there who might want to
clean up a site knowing there will be a use for that tenant they are confident
will exist three years from now.”