Winstanley targets early 2024 launch of $135M Enfield warehouse project
With a court challenge settled, Massachusetts developer
Winstanley Enterprises plans to launch construction of an 819,000-square-foot
warehouse in Enfield early in 2024.
Winstanley plans to partner with Kansas City-based
NorthPoint Development on the roughly $135 million project, at 35 Bacon Road,
which will be undertaken on speculation.
That means the project doesn’t yet have a signed tenant.
Adam Winstanley, a principal of his family’s company, is
confident tenants will be interested given ongoing demand for logistics space
between Hartford and Springfield.
Winstanley received local approvals last year to build on a
roughly 188-acre parcel that was previously part of greeting card maker
Hallmark’s Enfield campus.
Area residents concerned about potential impacts to two
adjacent lakes filed court challenges. Winstanley announced this week a
settlement had been reached with neighbors that will allow the project to go
forward in the first quarter of 2024.
Details of the settlement were not released. Winstanley
described it as an “amicable” agreement reached after repeated meetings with
area residents.
“I have worked very closely with the plaintiffs to work
through our differences,” Winstanley said. “And we are on a good footing at
this point.”
Both sides released a joint statement announcing a
settlement.
“The settlement allows the development by WE 35 Bacon Road
LLC of the properties and endeavors to balance the interests and concerns of
all of the parties with respect to their neighboring properties and the
community,” reads a portion of the statement.
Winstanley had previously agreed to donate 22 undeveloped acres to Enfield as a
conservation buffer.
The settlement makes no changes to previously approved
development plans, which will see half of the site left undisturbed. Winstanley
expects to complete construction within 15 months of its launch.
Winstanley said the project is likely to result in more than
$1 million in annual tax revenue for the town and would support more than 400
construction jobs. The number of permanent jobs will depend on the eventual
tenants, he said.
Winstanley has been active in Enfield since 2015, when it
paid $12 million for Hallmark’s former 1-million-square-foot distribution
complex and 324 associated acres.
Winstanley refurbished two Hallmark buildings at a cost of
$41 million, filling them with three tenant companies in 2018. Winstanley also
carved off the site that is the subject of the 819,000-square-foot development
plan.
Winstanley operates several logistics spaces for rent in
Enfield, including a 500,000-square-foot distribution center leased to Advanced
Auto Parts; a 600,000-square-foot office, warehouse and distribution facility
leased to Lego and Coca-Cola Bottling; as well as a recently completed 500,000-square-foot
warehouse on North Maple Street occupied by Agri-Mark dairy products and
life-science company Eppendorf.
Winstanley stressed his company has an ongoing involvement
with Enfield, contributing to a nonprofit opera group, Independence Day
fireworks and providing job opportunities. Being a good neighbor is important,
he said.
“We are part of the community,” Winstanley said. “I want to
do a good project. We are not a build-and-flip company that forgets about the
projects it leaves behind. We are a build-and-operate company.”
New London to select firm for residential lead pipe replacement project
John Penney
New London ― The City Council on Monday is slated to discuss
and possibly award a nearly $5 million contract to a Stratford-based company to
conduct the first phase of a long-awaited residential drinking water line replacement
project.
Councilors are being asked to approve a $4.94 million
contract with the Burns Construction Company for the removal and replacement of approximately 600
lead-lined water pipes in the northern and downtown areas of the city.
The council will meet at 7 p.m. at City Hall.
The lines will be simultaneously replaced with copper-lined
versions, part of an overall $32 million, multi-phase plan to eventually
replace 3,300 such pipes across the city.
The Burns company, which submitted the lowest project bid,
was selected as the preferred bidder by the city’s Water & Water Pollution
Control Authority and project consultant Arcadis.
In addition to the Burns application, the city received
three other project bids: $5.3 million from the Wiese Construction Company;
$5.8 million from Gerber Construction; and $10 million from the C.J. Fucci
firm, according to an Arcadis memorandum.
A construction cost opinion by Arcadis pegged the probable
cost of the work at $6.6 million.
In the run-up to Arcadis’ recommendation, Burns’ officials
provided information on their company’s bonding capacity, safety record and
anticipated work schedule. The company cited previously completed water-line
replacement projects, including ones in Berlin and Southington.
“They have recent experience replacing water service lines
on private property using trenchless technologies,” the Arcadis memo states.
City public utilities’ officials previously said the least
expensive and disruptive way to replace the existing lines is via a “pulling
pit” method in which the lead pipes are yanked out as new copper versions are
slid through at the same time.
In New London, the service lines that run from water mains
consist of sections owned by a customer and the city. The mains, not made of
lead, ferry drinking water to service lines — many of which do contain lead —
and into a dwelling where they feed sinks, shower heads and toilets.
The council on Sept. 18 approved bonding $35.6 million for
the three-phase line overhaul to be paid with a combination of state subsidies,
low-interest loans and a municipal surcharge fund.
The inaugural portion of construction work, dubbed “Phase
1A,” will likely begin in the spring, to be followed by “Phase 2A,” which will
address another 600 or so lines, Public Utilities Director Joseph Lanzafame
said.
“We’ll conduct our preliminary investigations this year,
including checking basements and any in-road issues,” he said.
He said the last two phases would concentrate on 2,100
residences in the city’s western and southern sections with the first wave of
bid notices to be sent out after July 1, 2024 and again a year later.
New $151M bag screening facility at CT Bradley airport to free up space for more gates, concessions
Luther Turmelle
WINDSOR LOCKS — Anyone who has flown out of Bradley International Airport since
April has likely noticed the flurry of construction on the airplane side of the
terminal, opposite the Sheraton Hotel.
Those staying at the hotel have had a prime view of the
project where the Connecticut
Airport Authority is building a standalone inline baggage screening space. Construction
of the $151 million facility started in April and is expected to be
completed sometime in the fall of 2025.
Checked luggage is now screened by large machines adjacent
to the ticket counters for the airlines that fly out of Bradley. Travelers get
their boarding passes, have their suitcases weighed, and then take them to the
station where U.S. Transportation Security Administration officers feed the
luggage into the large Computer Tomography X-ray machines for screening.
Once construction of the new screening building is
completed, passengers will simply hand their checked bags to the ticketing
agent who will tag and place them on a conveyer belt for routing through the
new facility. That will involve the use of over one mile of conveyer belt
systems, airport officials say.
Moving the security screening functions from what is
essentially the airport's lobby areas has multiple benefits, they add. They
primary benefit is creating more usable space at Bradley.
"Both this (construction of the freestanding baggage
facility) and the vertical circulation projects are done to improve
passenger flow, maximize current terminal use, and allow for additional
growth," said Alisa Sisic, airport authority spokeswoman.
By moving the baggage function from the front of the
terminal building to the air side, Sisic said, it allows for the
future construction of new gates and concession space. The relocations will
result in a net increase of two new boarding gates at the airport, she said.
The airport's vertical circulation project will expand the
terminal by an additional 22,000 square feet to accommodate new elevators and
escalators at both ends of the building entrance. The additions will provide
passenger egress points directly at the end of each concourse, rather than sending
passengers through a single, centrally located exit lane.
The circulation project will also allow for a significant
expansion of the existing TSA security checkpoint lines area.
Sisic said Authority officials are uncertain how many other
airports have stand alone baggage security facilities. But she said Bradley
"is one of the few medium-sized airports that processes baggage screening
the way we currently do it."
Michael Boyd, president of a Colorado-based aviation
consulting firm, said "making it easier for passengers to get around
in airports" is a current mantra for the commercial travel business right
now.
"The airport is right in the middle of a real growth
area with people moving out of New York City and Boston," Boyd said.
"This is a wise move because that airport is a real treasure."
Failed plans, many owners, contaminants: The UConn-West Hartford campus' long road to redevelopment
WEST HARTFORD — The redevelopment of the former University
of Connecticut campus in town has been traveling down a long path, with bumps
in the road — including failed plans and the site's wetlands and contaminant
conditions — keeping the property vacant, rundown, and overgrown for over the
last six years.
But with the most concrete proposal for the property on the
table — West Hartford 1 LLC wants to turn the former college campus into a
mixed-use residential and retail development featuring 620 units of housing, a
grocery store, a restaurant and more — a decision on the site's future
is looming.
It's been one
year since the developers first proposed their plans for the deserted
site and there are hurdles yet to clear, including an upcoming Town
Planning and Zoning and Inland Wetlands and Watercourse Agency meeting, future
public hearings and Town Council debate, before a plan is finalized and shovels
on what developers are calling
Oakwood Park can go in the ground.
UConn's history in West Hartford
The University of Connecticut eventually opening a campus
along Asylum Avenue and Trout Brook Drive in West Hartford can be traced
back to World War II, when the university opened a Hartford campus that helped
accommodate members of the military returning home, according
to a 2016 article published by UConn Today.
The Hartford campus opened in 1946 and would eventually call
six different locations home, including the West Hartford campus. As
enrollment continued to rise in the 1960s, trustees approved a campus
relocation to the Asylum Avenue location in 1962. According to UConn Today,
delays in design and construction kept the site from opening until 1970.
In 2013, looking to return to Hartford, the university
explored potential sites, eventually landing on the former Hartford Times
building, which
opened for class in 2017. That left the West Hartford campus behind. After
47 years of educating students in town, UConn had no purpose for the campus or
its buildings and began to seek suitors willing to give the site a second
life.
West Hartford approves, then declines purchase of the campus
In 2016, before the university actually moved teachers,
students, and staff out of West Hartford, UConn offered the town a first chance
to buy the 58-acre property consisting of both 1700 and 1800 Asylum Ave.
The site, nestled in the middle of a neighborhood and close
to both the University of Saint Joseph and Bishops Corner, is key a parcel of
land in West Hartford and remains one of the largest undeveloped sites in town.
The proposal was a popular one for elected leaders at the
time. At a
June 28, 2016, meeting, Town Council members voted 8-0 to approve the town
purchasing the property. The deal? The town would pay a $250,000 deposit and
receive a 90-day due diligence period. After that, the town would pay $750,000,
before needing to hand over $4 million to complete the sale by the closing
date.
In the year that followed that optimistic Town Council
meeting, the town's desire to go through with the initial purchase that would
have cost a total of $5 million began to wane. During its due diligence period,
the town found PCB contaminants on the site and discovered
financial challenges due to state budget challenges.
Eventually, in April 2017, UConn's Board of Trustees voted
to approve a revised deal, lowering
the price of the campus to $1 million "in light of potential
environmental issues at the site and the town’s budget challenges,"
according to a press release from the university. The town agreed to that deal.
But that deal would also come undone. In December 2017, 18
months after the initial agreement, the town
officially decided to pass on buying the campus.
"Given the uncertain and potentially significant cost
of remediating the UConn property, stepping away from the current purchase
agreement is the right decision," said Dallas Dodge in 2017, who was a
Town Council member at the time and is currently the town's corporation
counsel.
It's a decision that is still resonating today, as the
town's decision to not purchase the property was brought up at a
recent Town Council candidate debate held on Oct. 4 by the League of
Women Voters of Greater Hartford.
Aaron Sarwar, a Republican candidate for Town Council, said
it was a mistake for the Democrat-controlled Town Council to not buy the
campus, which is now at the center of a town-wide debate over its development
six years later.
"The biggest blunder in our town has been this UConn
property," Sarwar said. "The decision that the Town Council made to
not purchase the property for $1 million from the state — that in itself was a
blunder. What you should really think is how did we get ourselves in this
position? And that was because of the decisions by the Town Council."
Ben Wenograd, a Democrat who has been on the Town Council
since 2015 and is running for reelection, responded to Sarwar's claim, saying
that his party was in favor of buying the campus, but decided it would be too
costly for the town to remediate into a functional space.
"The Democratic Party was in favor of purchasing the
property for quite awhile," Wenograd said. "It went back and forth,
but eventually the environmental issues just became too great. While it was for
sale for $1 million, our estimates were that it'd be up to $10 or $11 million
to clean it up, plus we had reports that PCBs were found in the water, which
would have to be remedied with no limit on how much that might cost."
Two more buyers are found
In July 2018, UConn
announced it had found another buyer for the troubled parcel in a
high-tech Chinese company called the Seven Stars Cloud Group, which would later
change its name to Ideanomics. The company had ambitious
plans to create what they were calling a technology campus named Fintech
Village, which would have been an investment of hundreds of millions of
dollars to the site.
Ideanomics agreed to buy the property for $5.2 million and
would be required for all environmental cleanup. In one last offer out of
courtesy, UConn gave West Hartford one more chance to buy the property, but not
for the $1 million discounted price it had previously offered. At a July 19,
2018, special Town Council meeting, the town voted to
deny buying the property, paving way for Ideanomics
to close on the property in October 2018.
But their plans to build the technology campus and relocate
its global headquarters into West Hartford fell apart and were abandoned. The
property again sat in limbo until the end of 2021,
when Ideanomics sold the property at a loss. West Hartford 1 LLC, the
current owners, bought the property for $2.75 million, leading to where the
project stands today.
Plans have morphed since
they were first proposed in October 2022, when the developers pitched the
general concept it has landed on today: a "neighborhood" type village
that combines multifamily housing with retail, restaurants, and more. In the
year since, developers have appeared at numerous Design Review Advisory
Committee meetings, using feedback to shape designs to where they stand now
— 620
units of housing split between apartments, townhouses, and assisted living,
all existing alongside space for retail, a restaurant, a grocery store, a cafe,
and more.
Building on wetlands
It's possible that the campus will be the topic of
discussion at a special Oct. 23 Town Planning and Zoning and Inland Wetlands
and Watercourse Agency meeting, but no agenda has been posted yet and Todd
Dumais, the West Hartford town planner, has not responded to a request for
comment confirming that.
Whenever it appears on that committee's agenda, though, it
will likely face some resident pushback. In September, after a summer of heavy
rains that left some neighborhoods dealing with flooding time and again,
residents living near the Asylum Avenue property started
a petition they hope will halt or at least change the plans for the site.
Many of the logged complaints, residents said, included the
fact that the site sits on around 12 acres of wetlands. Residents have said
they are worried that developing the land will make flooding worse. The town
does have long-term plans to alleviate stormwater flooding through the
installation of larger pipes, replacing culverts and by creating access to new
outfall areas, but those plans could take a decade to finish.
West Hartford's own wetlands soil scientist consultant, SLR
International Corp., submitted
a document to the town dated Sept. 19 detailing some of what developers
currently have to contend with. The report was then forwarded to the
development group on Sept. 22.
At the site, around 20 percent of the 58-acre property being
considered wetlands, consisting of two perennial stream reaches, two freshwater
ponds, lawn wetlands, and forested wetlands. The property also has special
flood hazards, including 100-year floodplain, a regulatory floodway and a
500-year floodplain.
SLR said in its report that it has so far reviewed site
drawings on three occasions and while they noted some improvements, some
concerns still remain.
"These comments pertain to the substantial increase in
impervious area in the (upland review area), lack of wetland buffers, minimal
low-impact design components, increase in disturbance up to and within the
wetland boundary, a reliance on wetlands for the site’s recreational program,
and inconsistency or lack of detail on the plan sets," the report said.
"Collectively, these elements do not allow for a complete understanding of
the proposed work’s potential impacts on the physical characteristics of the
wetland and watercourse systems."
Megan Raymond, a principal scientist and wetlands and
waterways lead with the firm, concluded their September report saying
more detail would be needed to gauge the impact on wetlands the
development would have. But as it stands now, Raymond wrote the proposed
project would have a "deleterious" effect on the wetlands.
"At this point, given the information provided, it is
my opinion that the applicant lacks sufficient detail to establish no adverse
impacts to wetland systems," Raymond reported to the town. "Without
additional detail and substantiation, it is likely that — given the significant
increase of impervious area and intensification of use, the activation of
wetlands for recreation and elementary stormwater management approach — the
proposed project will have a deleterious effect on the site’s wetlands and
watercourses."
The developers had previously said in a statement provided
to CT Insider that they have "received thoughtful comments from the town’s
wetland consultant which we continue to address through plan changes." The
group also said they do expect to have a wetlands review in October, which they
added will help them finalize their plans for the site.
Pete Harrison, the director of the organization Desegregate
CT, has seen numerous housing proposals at odds with wetlands. And while he
does think the worries that residents have are in good faith, he said it
shouldn't be a reason to not develop the land.
"If we care about runoff water and flooding, that’s a
big problem and it’s going to get worse," Harrison said. "But the
answer to that is not freezing communities and not building more. The answer is
holy crap we need more revenue to build infrastructure to meet that. Flooding
is already happening. That’s already there, not because you built apartments,
it's because climate change ... is driving a lot of this. Flooding is going to
happen if we never build another thing in West Hartford."
Next steps
At times, the UConn campus in West Hartford served over a
thousand undergraduate students throughout the day during its near five decades
in town. And while it has remained vacant since the university moved to
downtown Hartford six years ago, it appears that the parcel of land does have a
future in sight, though final plans remain to be seen.
If the proposal clears its wetland hurdle anytime soon, the
project will eventually move to the Town Council, where developers will receive
feedback on everything from the scale of the project — which includes the
construction of 10 buildings, plus townhouses — to how it impacts traffic on
Trout Brook Drive and Asylum Avenue. The development, if approved, would be the
largest of its kind in West Hartford since Blue Back Square.
Residents, too, will get their say at various public
hearings, which will be scheduled once the project is ready for that stage of
feedback.
Work has resumed at Lafayette Street site of June 2 partial building collapse in New Haven
NEW HAVEN — Construction has resumed at 188 Lafayette
St., the
site of a June 2 partial collapse of a seven-story, 112-unit apartment building under
construction. Involving
more than 4 million pounds of concrete, the collapse injured eight workers,
two critically.
All of the injured workers were released from area hospitals
within a few days of the accident, although "I think there's two who are
not fully recovered," said Rick Fontana, the city's emergency operations
director.
An investigation by the federal Occupational Safety and
Health Administration is continuing and no information or reports have yet been
released, said Edmund Fitzgerald, a spokesman in OSHA's Boston office.
"I can confirm that OSHA opened
an inspection of Seven Concrete LLC on June 2, 2023, after the
Lafayette Street incident," Fitzgerald said. "The inspection is ongoing,"
he said.
"OSHA doesn’t discuss the specifics of ongoing
inspections," Fitzgerald said.
OSHA has up to six months from the start of the inspection
to complete its investigation. "It’s too early to estimate a completion
date for this inspection," Fitzgerald said.
Lenny Alvarez, principal of Seven Concrete, LLC of Orange,
the non-union concrete subcontractor that OSHA is investigating, declined to
comment.
Workers were pouring more than 4 million pounds of concrete
when a building under construction on Lafayette Street collapsed Friday,
injuring eight, Fontana previously said.
They had poured about three-quarters of a total of 4.2
million pounds of concrete on a second-floor slab when the floor collapsed into
the first floor and basement, trapping several workers. The amount of work they
completed had an accumulated weight of about 3.2 million pounds, Fontana
said.
City Building Official Robert Dillion said he has not
heard anything yet from OSHA, "and I have not had any inquiries."
But at this point, "We are going forward with the
project," Dillion said.
"They have a building permit," he said. "They
have a demolition permit to do the repair. It's all designed and
engineered."
The project is near the corner of Lafayette Street and
Church Street South.
"We opened the site back up after Labor
Day," Dillion said. "They went in, they jackhammered ... to get
back to the good point."
"They've made the repair to the slab and they poured
the concrete for repairs," Dillion said.
The building is owned by RMS Companies. and is on land
owned by Yale University, Mayor Justin Elicker said at the time of the
collapse.
When it's complete, the building is slated to have seven
stories with 112 residential units, two underground garage floors and an
above-ground garage floor, officials have said.
There were 36 people at the building site, with some pouring
concrete, when the second floor collapsed into the first floor and the basement
around 12:30 p.m. on June 2, New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker said at the
time.
The collapse left eight people injured. Firefighters saved
workers by lifting them from unstable conditions, according to Fire Chief
John Alston.
Three people were partially buried in the
rubble, Alston said the day of the collapse. “Victims had to be lifted out
before the concrete hardened."
Allston said he thought the concrete might have pooled
faster than workers could smooth it out, causing the collapse.
It took roughly 45 minutes from the time of the collapse to
when the last victim was extricated, Alston said at the time.
More units planned for massive Newfield multifamily development in Middletown
ANew-Jersey based developer who is building a massive
Middletown multifamily housing complex with more than 400 apartments planned,
is looking to add another 72 units on the property.
Bob Dale and Newfield Residential LLC already had plans
approved by the city Planning and Zoning Commission for 15 multifamily
buildings with 414 units on two parcels totalling 50 acres of vacant land at
530-534 Newfield St., built over two phases.
Newfield’s development team in late September submitted an
application to city land use boards for a third phase, which would include an
additional 72 units and parking on a 7.5-acre parcel that was not previously
included in the Newfield Residential development site, bringing the total
number of residential units up to 486.
The new lot is landlocked between the parcels on which
phases one and two are planned.
“In effect, it is a hole in the center of the development
site,” according to the project’s engineering firm Fuss & O’Neill. Newfield
recently bought the smaller parcel for additional multifamily development, the
project team said.
Phase three will include two 36-unit, three-story buildings
and a walking trail, and additional parking for 95 vehicles, bringing the total
number of spaces for the complex up to 841, with some covered garage areas and
electric vehicle charging stations.
Units will have a mix of one, two and three bedrooms.
Buildings in phases one and two are three and four stories, and will have
anywhere from eight to 44 units each. Some units will be two floors.
The campus will also include three clubhouse buildings with
a great room, outdoor grilling area, fitness center, swimming pool, pickleball
courts and other recreational spaces, sidewalks and storage space.
Struggling CT malls eye multifamily housing to fill empty retail space
Two Connecticut mall operators are seeking to convert part
of their properties to multifamily housing, as they join the nationwide
struggle to reinvent large indoor shopping centers suffering from high retail
vacancies.
Redeveloping mall space into apartments is a growing concept
that industry experts say can help turnaround struggling retail centers, and
boost the limited housing stock throughout Connecticut, which is grappling with
a shortage of nearly 90,000 affordable rental units, according to the National
Low Income Housing Coalition.
The owner of Danbury Fair Mall, California-based real estate
investment firm Macerich, has proposed a zoning change that would allow it to
convert the 116-acre property into mixed-use, including residential. Other
non-retail options that have been floated include an adult day care center,
assembly hall, college campus, or even an ice rink.
The redevelopment plan includes 144 new apartments in a
75,000-square-foot former Lord & Taylor department store, along with
restaurant and retail space as part of a “24-hour living” environment.
The Danbury Fair Mall contains 1.6 million square feet,
which represents roughly 40% of the retail space in Danbury. However, “the
simple retail economic fact is that all 1.6 million square feet cannot be
maintained as pure retail space into the future,” said Thomas W. Beecher,
an attorney who represents the mall owner. “Flexibility of uses are
needed.”
That’s the same sentiment shared by the owner of Milford’s
1.3 million-square-foot Connecticut Post Mall.
Austin, Texas-based Centennial Real Estate has been granted
a zone change to create a mixed-use “live, work, play” area within Connecticut
Post Mall, along Route 1, that could include up to 750 apartments, built in
three phases.
Death and rebirth of U.S. malls
The 1970s brought an explosion of mall development.
According to Forbes, the number of malls in the U.S. grew more than twice as
fast as the population between 1970 and 2015.
A 2017 report by Credit Suisse estimated that 20% to 25% of
malls would shutter by 2022, largely because of store closures. Newsbreak.com
said the U.S. had around 2,500 malls at its peak, but only about 600 to 700
remain.
In Connecticut, a number of malls in Waterbury, Enfield,
Waterford and elsewhere have faced significant challenges with high vacancies,
especially in the wake of store closures by major brands like Lord &
Taylor, Macy’s and Sears.
Other retail centers, like Westfarms in Farmington, have
fared better.
Malls across the country have been reinventing themselves
for years, converting empty retail space to various uses like entertainment
complexes, healthcare facilities and even pickleball courts.
Housing is a new twist in the evolution of Connecticut
malls.
Milford Mayor Richard M. Smith said malls are becoming
outdated, and in an age when Amazon has taken over the retail market, “we’ve
got to re-imagine.”
Phase one of “The Post” redevelopment includes demolishing a
portion of the Connecticut Post Mall — including space formerly occupied by
Macy’s and Sears — and building mixed-use areas, with up to 250 apartments and
outward-facing retail on the first floor, surrounding an open-area plaza,
similar to a town green.
Ten percent of the housing units would be affordable.
Like the Danbury plan, The Post will still contain retail
storefronts, but less space should drive down the vacancy rate and help attract
higher-profile merchants, especially with an embedded customer base living
on-site, the mayor said.
The project is also smartly positioned near other commercial
sites, right off the highway and not deep into city neighborhoods, he said.
“My goal was to seek an integration and to create a
destination that people know they’re going to want to go to,” Smith said.
Two additional development phases — each with up to 250
apartment units — could also occur, but only if there’s enough demand for more
housing, Smith said.
Financial impact, market demand
Milford City Planner David B. Sulkis said the mall’s
value, from a tax standpoint, has decreased over a number of years. The
property had an appraised value of around $180 million in 2021, down from
nearly $212 million in 2017, according to city property records.
Phase one of the redevelopment plan has the potential to
increase the mall’s property value by millions of dollars, Smith said, and up
to tens of millions if all phases are completed.
The location and its amenities position The Post to be
successful as a live, work, play destination, Sulkis said.
“We’re a stone’s throw from New Haven and Fairfield County,
not a long train ride to New York. So, it is a very attractive place to live. I
think that bodes well for the future development,” he said.
Industry experts agree that outfitting struggling malls with
apartments is a smart move to meet existing demand.
Victor W. Nolletti, executive managing director of
investments for Institutional Property Advisors, a division of Marcus &
Millichap, said the Danbury and Milford/Greater New Haven housing markets are
vibrant and not oversupplied.
Residents are facing a “pretty significant systemic housing
shortage in the country,” particularly in the Northeast, making multifamily
construction attractive, he said.
Malls, especially in dense commercial districts like Milford
and Danbury, are prime sites for residential development.
“There’s strong demand in both markets for housing. It’s a
matter of how it’s executed,” Nolletti said.
Malls are also not configured to compete with, or be
transformed into industrial or logistics centers since they weren’t designed
for heavy truck traffic and don’t have adequate ceiling heights, Nolletti said.
“I just don’t know how feasible it is to take a former
Macy’s and turn it into a high-bay warehouse where you’d get much less rent per
foot for a warehouse than you do for a residential apartment,” he said.
Donald J. Poland, senior vice president of urban planning
for East Hartford-based Goman+York Property Advisors, said the Milford and
Danbury plans are poised for success partly because the developers are also the
owners, an obstacle that other struggling malls and their municipalities have
difficulty overcoming.
If 250 units are built in place of empty retail, that
creates 250 captive consumers who are likely to shop and dine on-site, he said.
Projects like apartment conversions reduce mall vacancies
and make other retailers stronger, Poland added.
“Parts of these malls will almost always remain because
there is a market for a portion of that retail, which will become stronger with
the residential,” he said.
No hydrogen hub for CT and the Northeast
Connecticut and the Northeast came up losers Friday in the
high-stakes competition for regional
hydrogen hubs — part of the Biden administration’s Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law’s focus on hydrogen as an important clean energy source to
fight climate change.
A seven-state consortium led by New York and including
Connecticut and the rest of New England except New Hampshire, plus New Jersey,
were not among seven hubs selected to share $7 billion. The Biden
administration estimates the hubs will catalyze another $40 billion in private
investment and create tens of thousands of jobs.
The decision is especially disappointing for Connecticut.
The state has a decades-long history with hydrogen, a necessary component of
its well-known and regarded fuel cell industry. FuelCell Energy is
headquartered in Danbury, and there are expertise hubs at the Connecticut
Center for Advanced Technology (CCAT) and the University of Connecticut.
“While I am disappointed by today’s announcement, the
Northeast’s hydrogen and fuel cell network remains a critical cluster for the
development of American-made clean energy,” said U.S. Rep. John Larson,
D-Conn., who has been an advocate for Connecticut’s fuel cell industry in
Congress for years. “I’m proud of our efforts in Congress to secure funding for
cutting-edge research in our state and enact tax credits to spur the
development of clean hydrogen technologies, and will continue to advocate for
Connecticut’s growing fuel cell industry.”
Gov. Ned Lamont thanked consortium members and said in a
statement: “Along with our partner states and the hubs selected today, we will
continue to explore the opportunity hydrogen provides to decarbonize hard to
electrify sectors.”
Department of Energy and Environmental Protection
Commissioner Katie Dykes added: “We will keep up the momentum by continuing to
work with our Northeast states and partners and the hubs selected to advance a
clean hydrogen ecosystem in our region and across the country.”
Joel Rinebold, director of energy initiatives at CCAT, also called the decision disappointing while acknowledging the chosen projects were good and well thought-out.
“It does not diminish Connecticut’s position as a global
leader in field,” he said. “It simply may be the Northeast hub will be
positioned for a later round of projects. I don’t think this is the end of it.”