Schema of the new project.
The City Plan Commission gave its blessing Wednesday night to the plan to convert the old Coliseum site into a new mixed use development.
Commissioners voted unanimously for a needed zoning change, a development and land agreement with City Hall, and a street redesign to enable the Montreal-based LiveWorkLearnPlay (LWLP) to build the $362 million development on the grave of the old Coliseum.
Architect Newman and Reim.
The recommendations now go before the Board of Aldermen, which will hold public hearings in November en route to a final board vote.
The DLDA, or development and land disposition agreement, for the Coliseum site calls for work to commence in two phases.
First come approximately 342 residential units, 58,000 square feet of retail, and 160 hotel rooms in a four-star caravansary at Orange and MLK Boulevard, along with an extensive public square and laneway focused on the Orange Street side of the lot.
The second phase on the State Street side includes another 377 rental units, and an office tower. The project is expected to generate approximately 4,700 construction jobs during the seven to 10 years of project build-out beginning in 2014, and between 2,800 permanent jobs during full operation.
Click here and here for previous stories with more detail on the project.
All the New Haven workforce requirements will apply for the utilization of resident, women, and minority contractors. The plan also calls for 20 percent of the apartments to be affordable.
In what City Plan Director Karyn Gilvarg and Economic Development Director Kelly Murphy called a first, LWLP has committed to 10 percent of those affordable apartments to be two- and three-bedroom.
Developers responded to that feedback at community meetings, said Murphy
Commissioner Kevin DiAdamo sought clarification on the basic terms of the DLDA: “The city will sell for one dollar but it’ll remain taxable from day one?”
“That’s my understanding,” Gilvarg responded.
Reim and New Haven Urban Design League’s Anstress Farwell, who termed the plan “excellent.”
In an uncommon sight, the plan elicited rave support from city and business officials, merchants, and new urbanist advocates who have voiced skepticism about past development deals.
LWLP needs more than the city’s approval. The City Plan vote formally recommended to the alderman “an abandonment and discontinuance of public right of way” to the one block on MLK between State and Orange. The city owns half that block. The state must also give its approval to the other half so the entire block can become part of the development.
Then the two halves of Orange Street now separated by Route 34 can be reunited for pedestrians, cyclists, and cars and create a direct route to Union Station. LWLP considers that new intersection at a crossing of Orange between the Nine Squares and the Hill critical also to the hotel and the gateway face of the development.
Gilvarg said that while the total investment in the project is $362 million, the total cost will be around $395 million. That larger number reflects the infrastructure cost for the project, the lion’s share of which is the conversion of Route 34 to “urban boulevards” with a new signalized intersection allowing left and right turning at Orange.
The project is on an accelerated track. Some of the city officials who have put it together with LWLP may not be working with the new administration taking over government in January.
LWLP’s Max Reim addressed that issue at the end of the proceedings: “This will be iconic and enduring. Our greatest issues are timing and interest rates. You’ve been marvelous. If we get approvals of the state, then we’re targeted to move dirt next summer. If we have a new mayor and new people, we might have to delay and do a new LDA [land disposition agreement] with new people. Then we’re looking at two and a half years” before work begins.
This all sounds pretty great.