A New York City developer expects to break ground in Mount Vernon this year on a residential and retail project that city officials see as a gateway to a revitalized downtown and central business district.
The Mount Vernon City Council in late June completed its environmental review process for the three-phase, $120 million project proposed by Atlantic Development L.L.C. Michael Stolper, executive vice president at Atlantic, said the developer hopes to begin construction by the end of this year at 203 Gramatan Ave., the first of three residential buildings planned near the city”™s Hartley Park, at the north end of the Gramatan Avenue retail district.
The approximately 226,500-square-foot building will include 177 studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments affordably priced for residents with annual incomes ranging from $40,000 to $64,000, he said.
In the project”™s second phase, which Stolper said could begin during the 20-month to 22-month construction period for the first building, Atlantic Development will raise a 55,000-square-foot, 60-unit apartment building at 144 Crary Ave. for senior citizens with incomes ranging from $30,000 to $45,000.
In the third phase, the developer plans to build an approximately 125,800-square-foot market-rate residence at 30 Oakley Ave. whose 131 units Atlantic would prefer to sell as condos. Stolper said the first two buildings could attract residents, especially mass-transit commuters, to the downtown neighborhood and spark a transformation that would make possible a market-rate product there.
The revitalization effort will include a $2.5 million investment by Atlantic development to restore an underused and deteriorated city parking garage near the project site, said Brian Kelly, Atlantic”™s project manager in Mount Vernon. The city will dedicate 225 parking spaces there for use by project residents. Kelly said the lot has an approximately 560-vehicle capacity but is used daily by only about 150 to 200 vehicles.
The Atlantic officials said the company will invest $205,000 in improvements to Hartley Park and $1.5 million for streetscape improvements along Gramatan Avenue in the project”™s first phase. “We”™re trying to create a new Main Street for downtown Mount Vernon,” Kelly said.
Stolper said Atlantic, which presented its initial proposal for the first-phase development site to city officials about two and a half years ago, has reduced the mass and scale of the three buildings in response to concerns and comments from residents and city officials about their impact on the neighborhood. Those adjustments were still being incorporated into final site plans even as the city council adopted its State Environmental Quality Review findings for the project.
“The process has been very good,” said Stolper. “We”™ve gotten a lot of good feedback” from city agencies and the public.
Stolper said the Manhattan-based company”™s interest in Mount Vernon as a residential development site can be traced to its co-founder and principal, Peter Fine, and his “visionary” instincts as a housing developer. A former New York City social worker who in 1995 started Atlantic Development Group with principal Mark Altheim, Fine “looks at communities that he believes are ripe for reawakening,” said Stolper. “He saw that with Mount Vernon.” The city”™s center, with its pedestrian traffic for retailers and commuter rail stations and bus lines for residents, is “a place that really needs a rebirth,” he said.
Atlantic”™s first residential building will include about 20,000 square feet of retail space. Kelly said the company wants to attract “national, regional or strong-credit local tenants.” The developer has had preliminary interest from retailers, including a “higher-end” green grocery market, he said.
“We consider that the gateway to the downtown corridor,” Stolper said of the project site.
Mount Vernon Mayor Clinton Young said the project will add to the city”™s long-term property and sales tax revenue. “I think it”™s going to be extremely beneficial to the community,” he said.
“I think the project will be a catalyst for the Third Avenue corridor and Gramatan Avenue corridor” and encourage other businesses to improve their properties, the mayor said.
