Six months after scrapping a 4-year-old agreement with private partners picked to lead the city”™s downtown redevelopment, Yonkers officials will try again to turn a barren and polluted city parking lot called Chicken Island into a thriving, pedestrian-oriented civic center of offices, retail stores and restaurants where new residences could be part of the mix.
The city, along with the Yonkers Community Development Agency and the Yonkers Industrial Development Agency, this month issued a request for proposals from developer teams interested in redeveloping the approximately 6-acre site off Getty Square. Chicken Island takes its name from a former island in the Saw Mill River on which a chicken farm stood in the 19th century. The city plans to uncover a stretch of the buried river on the site as part of its four-phase Saw Mill “daylighting” project to attract visitors to new downtown parks and walkways along the exhumed river and spur more development there.
The redevelopment site includes 19 city-owned parcels the private developer would acquire through a land disposition agreement with the city. The developer also might acquire any private parcels needed for the project.
The site includes a city fire station at 32 John St. The city wants to preserve the firehouse and has asked developers to include separate proposals for the building”™s rehabilitation and future use, possibly by the Yonkers fire department.
[box type=”info” head=”Wanted: seasoned developer”]Yonkers officials will look for these initial qualifications in a potential Chicken Island developer:
Ӣ Experience in successfully securing a mix of financial instruments to redevelop downtown urban districts through public-private partnerships.
Ӣ Experience with public-private partnerships and successfully negotiating and implementing development agreements.
Ӣ Experience in designing and developing a range of mixed-use buildings and public realm improvements in complex downtown districts with successful solutions.
Ӣ Experience in project managing urban commercial developments.
Ӣ Designed completed projects that have notably changed downtown market dynamics.
Ӣ Constructed urban redevelopment projects.
Ӣ Capacity to work with local contractors, union concerns and minority and womenӪs business enterprise goals.[/box]
The city in its request for proposals said it seeks “creative and thoughtful development programs that provide interesting strategies for making downtown Yonkers a place for local and regional visitors and workers.” Though it is not required in project proposals, city officials want developers to partner or collaborate with colleges or arts and cultural organizations seeking a presence in downtown Yonkers.
The city wants to expand its cluster of startup companies, creative enterprises and technology businesses that have leased downtown space by requiring Chicken Island developers to include in their plans “state of the art infrastructure to support innovative hub activities in buildings and in the public realm, such as high-speed fiber optic cable.”
Yonkers officials said innovative residential uses, such as live-work spaces and micro-units, will also be considered as part of the development mix.
Chicken Island”™s developer could be eligible for state tax credits for cleanup work and redevelopment costs on the brownfield site.
Developers will compete for selection by the city in a two-step process. Applicants must first submit the qualifications of the full development team. A jury of experts in development and urban design will review submissions and select a short list of up to four teams. Those teams will then submit full development proposals with architectural and urban design concepts for the project.
The Chicken Island site was to be the centerpiece and first phase of an ambitious downtown and waterfront redevelopment plan proposed by the city”™s former master developer, Struever Fidelco Cappelli L.L.C. Opposed by many Yonkers residents at a series of City Council hearings on the project, SFC”™s mixed-use redevelopment, branded as River Park Center, initially included high-rise residential towers, a cinema complex, major retail stores, commercial office space and a sports stadium that planners hoped would attract a minor league baseball team to Yonkers.
The River Park Center project, though later reduced in scope, never got off the ground as credit markets froze in 2008 and the economic downturn sidelined developers across the country.
In Yonkers, Baltimore-based Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse dropped out of the SFC partnership in 2009, when developer Louis R. Cappelli, head of Cappelli Enterprises Inc. in Valhalla, took over Struever”™s equity interest. But Cappelli, incurring heavy financial and property losses and mired in debt and lawsuits with former development partners in recent years, formally resigned from SFC in late 2012.
Last December, the Yonkers City Council unanimously agreed to end the city”™s land disposition agreement with SFC. The council also approved amendments to SFC”™s leases at Palisades Point on the Hudson River to allow SFC”™s only remaining SFC partner in Yonkers, Marc E. Berson, founding chairman of New Jersey-based Fidelco Realty Group, to move ahead with plans to build a low-rise rental apartment complex on the waterfront site.
Yonkers Mayor Mike Spano, who urged the City Council to end the SFC agreement, at the time said the city had “a lot of interest from developers” on Chicken Island. “You don”™t find a piece of property like that within the downtown area.”
“It”™s finally time for bricks and mortar on the ground,” Spano said in the city”™s announcement of the new request for proposals.
[box type=”info” head=”Chicken Island timetable”]Developers interested in redeveloping the Chicken Island area in Yonkers should note these dates and deadlines:
Ӣ Pre-proposal conference: July 10 at noon at the ceremonial court room in City Hall.
Ӣ Site inspection (optional): 10 a.m. July 15 or 2 p.m. July 17.
Ӣ Deadline to submit written questions: 5 p.m. Aug. 1.
Ӣ Proposals due: 2 p.m. Aug. 22.[/box]
