A redevelopment project conceived seven years ago as a $450 million transformation of 26 acres on New Rochelle”™s Echo Bay will reappear for public review this month much reduced in size and cost and adapted to new economic realities since the recession left it moribund five years ago.
The developer, Forest City Residential Inc., an affiliate of Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises, in February had its draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) for an approximately $90 million project accepted by the New Rochelle City Council. The council will hold a public hearing on the DEIS at 7:30 p.m. March 12 at council chambers in City Hall.
Chosen by city officials in 2006 as the developer to carry out the city”™s mixed-use redevelopment plan for Echo Bay, Forest City initially proposed to build 710 residences, including 62 townhouses, 42 condos and 606 luxury rental apartments, in addition to 150,000 square feet of retail space and two 150-room hotels on an assemblage of city-owned and private parcels. The vacant city armory on East Main Street would be razed and replaced by a 20,000-square-foot community center.
The City Council executed a memorandum of understanding for the project with the developer in May 2008. Forest City began preparing its required draft environmental impact statement that year “right before things went sideways,” said Abe Naparstek, the Brooklyn-based vice president in the Forest City Residential Group who directs the New Rochelle development project.
The project was dormant until 2010, when Forest City reevaluated its plans in the cooled-down economy and resumed talks with city officials on a scaled-down development.
“Previously the project was (spread) over a series of parcels,” Naparstek said. “Now we”™re focusing on the center parcel” owned by the city.
The revised development would be built on an approximately 9-acre site on East Main Street that includes the city”™s public works yard and a portion of the city armory parcel. The city yard would be relocated. The 36,575-square-foot armory building, whose demolition was opposed by military veterans and other New Rochelle residents, would be preserved for new uses.
City officials last year selected a proposal from Good Profit, a nonprofit group formed in 2011 that proposed to convert the armory space into a large urban food market. But the city”™s agreement with Good Profit reportedly expired on Feb. 28 when the redeveloper failed to meet a deadline to pay the city a $50,000 fee and sign a letter of agreement for the project.
Forest City now proposes to build a four-story mixed-use building with approximately 25,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space along East Main Street and 285 apartments totaling approximately 302,500 square feet of gross floor area. The residential mix would include 71 studio, 137 one-bedroom and 77 two-bedroom apartments. Twenty-nine apartments would be moderately priced for households with incomes not exceeding 80 percent of Westchester County”™s median annual income. Forest City expects the project will bring 524 new residents to New Rochelle, including 22 public school students.
The developer also would clean up and restore the Echo Bay shoreline at the project site and create an esplanade to open public access to the waterfront. Forest City also plans to build a small boat launch and a pedestrian bridge connecting the site to the county”™s wastewater treatment plant property. The bridge would allow for future development of a pedestrian path to Five Islands Park on the Sound.
Naparstek said the project is “right-sized” for the current market and the city”™s population and one that Forest City “is comfortable delivering at one time and something that”™s financeable today.” He said the company with its scaled-down plan is “trying to do something that can be done in the next few years.”
Naparstek said more than 10,000 cars daily pass the proposed retail site on East Main Street, or U.S. 1. “It”™s not going to be big box,” he said of the tenants the developer hopes to attract. “Small retailers, some restaurants for our residents and the neighborhood.”
Naparstek said construction likely would start in the fourth quarter of 2014.
At Forest City, “We think it”™s a great opportunity,” he said. “We like the apartment rental market in Westchester, the fact it”™s a city like New Rochelle on the Long Island Sound. We think it will be a great addition to southern Westchester County.”
This is a horrible project for New Rochelle. Not only do they give away the store in tax abatements, the developer claims only 22 kids will enroll in the school system from all 285 units. Also the developer is proposing 1 parking spot per unit so there will be a parking deficiency from the get go. And let’s not forget the $25 million New Rochelle will have to needlessly spend on moving its city yard to make way for this development. Money that the city doesn’t have & will have to borrow, all of it at the expense of $1.7 million per year. And where’ s that money coming from?
Also I see the story picture here shows a nice waterfront with sunny skies & lots of water activities, but unfortunately directly in front of this location is all mud flats at low tide. Did I mention the property also sits next to a sewage plant? Not so sure who’d want to live next to that.
In the language of Mayor Noam Bramson, this project will be a net negative for New Rochelle for all the lost revenue will have to be made up by homeowners. Homeowners who just got a 7% tax increase & that’s on top of the previous year’s 10++% increase.