Taking a left turn off bustling Main Avenue in Norwalk and then a quick right up Creeping Hemlock Drive, Tad Diesel, the city”™s director of business development and marketing, offered a dichotomous take on Norwalk.
“Behind us is six million square feet of office space,” he said. “Here, immediately, you feel like you”™re in the middle of New England.” The car wended past Cobblers Lane. “This could be Vermont. And so much of Norwalk is like that ”” you leave a very commercial zone and end up in New England. It”™s a wonderful mix of city and town.” He pointed to the harbor and said, “It could be Gloucester.”
Diesel has promoted business in Norwalk as a city employee for eight years. In that time, pictures both big and little emerge. He points out what is new and what was refurbished at the Pepperidge Farm headquarters at 595 Westport Ave. And he points out a favorite pizza restaurant, Fat Cat Pie Co. at 9-11 Wall St. In between, it is difficult to find a field of view without a big construction project, notably downtown where the mixed-use formula gravitates toward living on upper floors and offices, retail and restaurants on the ground floor.
The city”™s population ”” about 85,000 ”” continues to grow steadily and unemployment at 6.6 percent is trending down. (State unemployment is 8.1 percent.) Diesel acknowledged, however, “Norwalk was just like everyplace else six years ago ”” we got creamed. My opinion is we suffered a five-year setback. Now, with developments ”” Spinnaker, Waypointe and Avalon Bay Communities ”” we”™re seeing residential development taking off. Everything in the city center is designated ”˜smart”™ and ”˜mixed use.”™”
Diesel himself lives in the oldest house in town, a wood-frame, central-chimney true Colonial dating to the 17th century.
Diesel also waxed enthusiastic about commercial development. Cruising past the glistening Merritt 7 office park, he praised “responsible commercial management” with whom he works to attract and keep businesses. “Big and small, we”™re quietly growing like crazy,” he said.
Other cities wrestle with aging office parks, but a tour of the Northrop Grumman campus revealed unexpected success in that arena ”” a wireless telecom company and a major tour operator are already tenants ”” even as Northrop Grumman maintains a presence in the site, called Norden Park. So-called “managed hosting provider” Cervalis is moving into 170,000 square feet there, a move that required corporate, utility and civic efforts.
In another repurposing success, the SONO Ice House skating facility on Wilson Avenue remade the Nash Engineering headquarters, which was classified “long vacant.” It opened one year ago and includes a regulation-size rink and a smaller training rink. Adjacent is the SONO Marketplace, a cooperative of more than 80 food, craft and art merchants together under a single roof.
“It”™s the mix of attributes that makes Norwalk special,” Diesel said. “Our location is superb. We”™re at the confluence ”” if I could use a nautical term ”” of major highways like Route 7, I-95, the Merritt. We have the Long Island Sound; it”™s not only an amenity, it”™s a real part of the economy.”
Another selling point is quality of life. Twenty-five years ago Oyster Shell Park, which is being surrounded by mixed-use developments, was the city trash facility. Strollers and joggers rule there now and the water quality is such that ducks make the ultimate reclamation statement. Beyond aesthetics and green space, the park filters stormwater runoff from nearby I-95. In an aside, Diesel calls the park “Susan”™s Park” for its senior project manager, Susan Sweitzer. “She took what was a dump and made it one of my favorite places.”
Other “quality-of-life” stops of Diesel”™s auto tour included the Children”™s Museum and nearby Mathews Mansion. He called Mathews Park “our Central Park.”
Other city attributes that Diesel cites include:
Ӣ Fewer than 15 companies in Norwalk, including educational and government entities, employ more than 500 people. The vast majority of Norwalk companies are small, agile and entrepreneurial. No single industry sector dominates the employment market or the real estate market, which enables a community to be resilient in times of economic stress.
”¢ Corporate neighbors include GE Commercial Finance and GE Capital, Hewitt Associates, Xerox, Diageo, Virgin Atlantic Airways and Fact Set. The city is Connecticut”™s largest oyster producer and home to the nation”™s largest oyster company, Tallmadge Brothers. The headquarters of Stew Leonard”™s, “the World”™s Largest Dairy Store,” is in Norwalk.
”¢ New developments will offer 800,000 square feet of retail space, more than a thousand new homes, 700,000 square feet of offices and a new full service hotel. More than 2,000 new residential units ”” 500 of which are under construction ”” will be added once development is completed.
Ӣ The Norwalk Planning and Zoning Office issued 1,505 permits during the fiscal year ended June 30, 19 percent above the 10 year average and more than any other year during the last decade. August 2013, constituted the 23rd consecutive month in which the number of permits exceeded the 20-year average.
The city”™s development sticking point could be the old downtown, “the traditional Northeast Main Street of the 1950s” that, practically by formula, deteriorated in nearly every city. “We didn”™t avoid the residential community moving from Wall Street,” Diesel said. “It”™s among our most important projects and our most difficult to be sure.” He said a planned automated parking garage will be a boon; like other Main Streets, parking is problematic.
As for the bigger city down the road, Diesel said, “Stamford has the advantage of proximity to New York and more commercial space. Norwalk has the advantage of price.”
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