Hopeful news has recently been announced for two potentially huge projects for the City of Newburgh in two adjacent empty lots. Both of them are located at the same intersection of Liberty Street and Broadway. Monday the City Council voted to approve support for a project from Safe Harbors of the Hudson and, for another project mentioned a few months ago from Andy Cavaluzzi. Together, the two projects represent a $20 million investment in downtown Newburgh.
Safe Harbors of the Hudson is a non-profit organization that currently offers housing to single tenants in the renovated Cornerstone Building that was once the dilapidated Hotel Newburgh. They continually received calls for family housing, but sadly had to turn people away. Now, plans for the “Liberty House” are underway. It will have 68 units, and commercial space. They plan to use the same architects that were used for the Cornerstone Building.
The other project, “City Center” at 91-95 Broadway was first introduced last Spring. Modifications have been made from what was initially drawn up. Instead of 20 rentals there will be 15, and instead of 5 floors, there will be 4. There will be 3,500 square feet of retail space, for a total of 24,000 square feet of mixed use space. The project will be built on a blighted parcel of land that has sat vacant for 30+ years. It was once the location of the well known Fanny Farmer Candy Shop.
Details for City Center include nine on-grade off-street parking spaces, elevator, sprinkler system, centrally monitored fire alarm, and onsite tenant laundry facilities. The mixed use project incorporates green technologies (potentially solar panels and a living roof) and energy efficient building practices in coordination with NYSERDA. The appearance of the structure has been ARC approved and will be consistent with the historic district including aesthetically pleasing building details such as a brick veneer and oversized windows.
Now comes the hard part of getting funding to make these projects a reality. When all of these projects are completed, Eastern Broadway will have a totally updated look.
There’s a new project that’s been brewing and its halfway approved! This project comes from Ray Yannone from Storm King Builders and architect Giovanni Palladino. Behind the scenes this has been a project that has been in the works for over a year and, comes from the same team that accomplished the amazing transformation of the West Shore Train Station. It will be located at 15 Colden Street between Renwick and South Williams Street.
This building will be only residential and contain 30 condominiums. The rendering shows a North side and a South side building attached by an atrium in the middle. There will be two lobby’s, one for the Colden Street entrance, and one for the back Edwards Street entrance. An elevator will bring residents from the ground floor up, and parking will be available in the rear of the building as well as underground masked by faux storefronts. This building is not related to the Leyland Waterfront project. It is entirely separate, but equally exciting to see new development happening in Newburgh. Future residents will only be a walk away from the current Newburgh waterfront restaurants, and only a walk away from Washington’s Headquarters and the Liberty Street/Washington Market area.
There is no official start date as there are some approvals pending. But the word is that this project should be underway ASAP. Hmm, this makes one think that the commercial spaces in the surrounding area should start seeing some increased traffic.
SUNY Orange Community College is slated to open up for the 2011 Spring semester. I just passed by and snapped some photos to show the progress that’s going on. The college is really looking like it’s coming together. The video rendering really makes sense now! It will be really interesting when this site is done!
I am super excited to talk about the Chapman Steamer Firehouse over on 179 Dubois Street. Last year in June we posted about how the renovation of this amazing building was in danger. I had asked around and didn’t hear anything new, and the blog they started hadn’t been updated in ages, so I assumed that the project was dead. How wrong I was!
The Chapman Steamer Collective LLC is very much alive and kicking. The story starts out with 5 artistic friends who are originally from Brooklyn. They were happy there but quickly found that Brooklyn was turning into Manhattan and they were getting priced out. The search began for a work place that they could go to on the weekends. Not knowing much about anything North of Westchester or the Bronx, the friends began visiting another friend in Beacon who had renovated an old school. They were introduced to the owners of the Beacon Glass firehouse, who then told them about a firehouse in Newburgh across the river. At the time it was owned by Holland Woo.
There were many visions for the Chapman Steamer Firehouse such as- a bed and breakfast, a 3 story restaurant, or a live/work architecture space. In September 2007 the Chapman 5 purchased the firehouse. The goal for the space today is for it to become an education and entertainment space on the first floor, and artists lofts above. Roderick Vaughn (known as Vaughn), with whom I spoke to comes from a theatrical background. He has worked at Lincoln Center, BAM, and City Center to name a few.
Vaughn mentioned that he and his partners were surprised at how many people were interested in the work they were doing at the firehouse. Neighbors would bring over muffins and express their interest in investing in the area pending the success of the firehouse. Sitting at the Northeast corner of Downing Park, the firehouse is in a part of Newburgh that doesn’t get as much attention but, equally beautiful.
They anticipate to complete their project toward the end of May 2011. They will have “Firehouse Arts & Lofts” which will have 4 live/work spaces. The smallest space will be approximately 850 sq ft and the largest approximately 1275 sq ft. Each apartment will be unique and have special features like interesting tubs and entryways. There will also be a private garden for residents. The ground floor will consist of 2 commercial spaces that will be used for special events and art. They plan to offer classes that will cater to the community including: food preparation, exercising at home, how to go grocery shopping on $20 etc. In the summer they plan to have an ice cream parlor in the back.
Sustainability and the environment were kept in mind while renovating as well. They are applying for LEED certification and they will be using solar energy for the electricity. About 80-85% of the electricity for the lofts will be solar energy based. They will also reuse rainwater for the washers, toilets, and dishwashers. There will be radiant heated floors, and tank-less water heaters. Vaughn and his associates are extremely excited to provide pure energy for their tenants.
Seeing all of this come together one has to reflect back on the challenges that they have experienced thus far. Perhaps one of the biggest ones would be a huge crack in the façade of the building. Apparently in 1955 when South Street was being built, dynamite was used. That caused the whole face of the building to fall, and left a giant crack in the façade. Vaughn thinks the crack deterred many buyers because they thought the building would crack in half. Thankfully their construction manager managed to fix it by incorporating Heli-Ties to keep it together. Also, when I spoke to Vaughn, he was recovering from a cold that he caught from spending 2 days out in the rain repairing the leaky roof!
The last fireman to leave the building was in March 1976. Now the building will have a lot of new life in 2011. The Chapman 5 is now the Chapman 8. Members include Roderick Vaughn, Mei Wang-Vaughn, Toi Wang, Jerome Gasper, Noreen Sumpter, Aquanetta Wright, Romana Torres, and Decora. They invite anyone to come and visit when the doors are open. The Chapman Steamer Collective is a collective group of everyone in the community. They want this to be a local project of local people.
Stay tuned in the future for renderings, before and after photos and more! Click here to sign up for email updates, click here to sign up for updates on facebook. Thanks for subscribing!
Has it really been a year since the last time we took at look at this property? WOW! Anyway, just thought any interested people out there would like to know that the price has dropped $20k on this gorgeous commercial zoned property. You can convert it back into a residential property. So the new price is $180k. Check out the following link to see more examples of Newburgh Real Estate.
I am always in awe anytime I see old photos of the grand old Newburgh so many people talk about. Looking at old photos you can see they were certainly right. You can see a bustling city with a lot of life and movement. You can also see a walkable Newburgh were everything you could have possibly needed was probably available at every corner shop around. Today, there are so many empty lots in Newburgh it’s kind of hard to imagine such a busy mini metropolis. But it really did exist, and now there is the opportunity to transform yet another empty space as it once was above. So, some of you have heard the buzz that a brand new project is in the making on an empty lot in Newburgh. Well, it’s true, but it has a lot of finishing touches left before it can be approved and construction can begin. For now let’s talk about the things we do know.
Coppola Associates is planning a huge project on Broadway and Liberty Street. This is an exciting pivotal project for the City of Newburgh in this economy. This could drastically change the area in many different ways. The project would be located on the South East Corner of Broadway. It’s a 5 story building, with commercial store fronts along the first floor. The architecture of the building will compliment the historic landscape of neighboring buildings, as well as echo the architecture of the building that once stood there for about 100 years before as you can see in the original photo above. They will also be using green building efforts in the construction. Parking will be included in the project as you can see in the rendering. It suggests that perhaps there will be an underground or rear parking lot. However, the parking situation is something that will probably be tweaked with time.
Two and three bedroom apartments (1100-1400 sq ft each) are also included in the plan with about half of them being affordable housing. They are targeting people from different career backgrounds and demographics. They are also targeting the growing senior population, who will be able to remain active in the communities in which they have lived, but without the burden of maintaining houses, removing snow, mowing lawns, etc. They feel that affordable housing will give seniors this option.
It’s going to take time to get all of the approvals for this project because there will be a lot of planning involved. Parking is already a tight situation in Newburgh. So, the City will have to come up with public transportation and parking ideas to accommodate the growing Newburgh population. Remember, Newburgh used to have trolley and bus system. This made it easy for people to live and work in Newburgh with out a car. Also, affordable housing isn’t in the master plan of the City council, but as Coppola Associates mentioned to me, the renderings will change over time. That might come as a result of compromising on different levels and not just on design. Time will only tell.
It is extremely positive that Newburgh has someone willing to construct a project that could drastically change the neighborhood. When word got out about a possible new project in Newburgh two people said, “it helps us envision a better Newburgh,” and “any progress is good news.” Local established businesses would greatly benefit from added traffic from new residents. Also, the new commercial space could motivate business owners and entrepreneurs to fill up the new and existing store fronts of the area. This section of Newburgh could become walkable again. Overall, compromises will have to be made and brainstorming done. This is just another positive drop in the bucket for the restoration of Newburgh. We’ll be watching closely.
*Thank you Coppola Associates for providing the renderings.
