Decrepit Factory’s Demolition Draws Near

Demolition of the remaining vacant, toxic former Winchester Repeating Arms factory buildings near Munson and Mansfield Streets is slated to begin this summer.

The cleanup and teardown project should take roughly a year to complete — and will ultimately lead to the construction of new housing or lab/office space in Science Park. 

Science Park Development Corp. CEO David Silverstone and LMXD Managing Partner Jake Pine delivered those updates Thursday night during the latest community meeting about the future of one of the most visible, crumbling emblems of New Haven’s 20th-century industrial past.

More than 50 Winchester Lofts residents, Newhallville neighbors, city employees, and others attended the meeting, which was held in the Winchester Works lab/office building at 115 Munson St.

The meeting took place in what was once an around-the-clock mini-city composed of factories with tens of thousands of people turning out Winchester rifles — and that has become an emerging 21st century upscale urban living and tech hub.

Silverstone and Pine told the crowd that, starting sometime between June and August this year, contractors will begin remediating and then knocking down the former factory buildings that stand immediately adjacent to where Thursday’s meeting took place.

Silverstone and Pine said that Science Park’s redevelopers had hoped as recently as 2019 to salvage these buildings, including the one at the corner of Mansfield and Munson known as 275 Winchester, to be rehabbed without wholesale demolition — in the same way that Winchester Lofts and Winchester Works were transformed into an apartment complex and a lab-office center in the 2010s.

Then they heard from the state Department of Public Health in 2020 that these buildings were so full of contaminants — including trichloroethylene, lead, asbestos, and oil — that they had to be demolished.

“It’s just a mess,” Silverstone said. 

The redevelopers, working with the Elicker administration, have spent the past several years applying for state money to fund the cleanup and demolition. They’ve lined up two $2 million grants from the state’s Brownfield Municipal Grant program and a $6.8 million grant from the state’s Urban Sites Remedial Action Program for the project. And now, Silverstone said, they’re finally just about ready to begin demolition.

He said that the redevelopers have received several bids back for general contractors interested in leading this cleanup and demolition. Now, they’ve got to award that bid, iron out a plan for exactly how these buildings will be demolished, and get all of the related necessary state and city approvals. 

Silverstone estimated that demolition should begin sometime between June 15 and Aug. 15. He said it will take a year to complete. Demolition will start with three exceptionally dilapidated wooden structures off Mason Street, a new street cutting through the factory complex that the redevelopers are creating along with 283 new apartments at ​“Winchester Green.” The demolition crew will then work their way down the western edge of Mansfield Street and the northern edge of Munson Street to knock down the half-block’s worth of building still standing next to Winchester Works and Winchester Lofts.

After demolition, Pine said, this property near Mansfield-Munson will likely be a parking lot and greenspace — until this same redevelopment team builds something new. 

“We don’t know what we’re gonna do yet,” Silverstone said. ​“That’s up in the air.” It will either be more apartments or a new bioscience buildings. He and Pine said that state government, as part of its funding of this project, have required the redevelopers to construct something new at this site within six years of completing demolition. 

"We Can't Leave It The Way It Is"

For the final hour of the 90-minute meeting Thursday, attendees pressed the redevelopers for answers on a range of questions — particularly regarding the relative safety risks presented by the demolition of such contaminated buildings.

What environmental contaminants are in this building? asked one Winchester Lofts resident. And is there a tenant relocation plan in case something goes wrong?

Pine, Silverstone, and Alex Twining — a New York City-based co-developer of hundreds of planned new apartments in the former factory complex — said that the to-be-demolished buildings have asbestos and lead and a tremendous amount of oil in the concrete.

Pine said that a licensed professional will be ​“consistently monitoring the air, taking samples,” and, if there are any issues, notifying the redevelopers so they can modify how they’re demolishing these structures. Pine promised that the demolition crew will follow ​“all of the regulations, all standards” set forth by the city and the state.

But what if tearing down these buildings releases all of these contaminants into the surrounding area?

“This is a constant worry, that contaminants will migrate off site,” Silverstone said about the risks posed by the buildings right now. ​“We can’t leave it the way it is. That’s the most dangerous condition.”

But what happens to us if something does go wrong? Winchester Lofts resident Alexzandria Dowdy asked, asking a question that became a refrain of the night.

“If the contaminants migrate off site, then our contractor has failed,” Silverstone said.

He noted that Science Park’s redevelopers successfully cleaned up and converted the factory buildings that became Winchester Lofts and Winchester Works without any environmental hazards escaping. The big difference there, Dowdy countered, is those renovated buildings remained standing — and were not wholesale demolished.

What precautions are you taking before you get started with the demolition? asked Newhallville resident Ray Jackson. 

“We are still establishing the means, methods and protocols” by which the cleanup and demolition will take place, Pine said. ​“We have a robust set of requirements that need to be met by the contractor.” There will be state oversight throughout the demolition process, and as well as constant monitoring of the air of the demolition zone.

What should neighboring residents expect to feel and hear over the course of the year-long demolition? asked another Winchester Lofts renter. 

“Definitely some noise and potentially some vibration” as the heavy machinery takes down these buildings, Pine said. While the exact method of demolition is still to be determined, he added, ​“we are definitely not doing dynamite.”

“I’m very concerned to have children outside playing” during the demolition of these buildings, said Highville Charter School Principal Che Dawson. Will these young students be exposed to toxic materials just by virtue of going to the school’s playground?

Pine and Silverstone said they are beginning demolition during the summer to minimize the impact of this process on the nearby school. They also committed again to making sure that none of the hazardous materials make it of site.

“If it goes off site, then we have failed,” Silverstone repeated. ​“The rule is: It can’t leave the site.”

How will you notify neighbors of how the demolition process is going? asked Newhallville community leader Jeanette Sykes.

Silverstone promised to send out emails, meet with the community management team, hold more community meetings, post regularly to a project website, and work with the neighborhood’s alder, Troy Streater, to communicate clearly with the public. 

“We plan on being here for a long time,” Pine said about his company’s investment in this project. And so they want to do this right.

“The end result is going to dramatically improve the entire area,” he continued. With more greenspace, more parking, more security. And ​“without the nuisance” of these dilapidated buildings.

The Winchester Lofts residents present at Thursday’s meeting pleaded with Pine and Silverstone to do what they can to get a representative from Winchester Loft Ventures, the holding company that owns their apartment complex — and that is controlled by New Jersey investors Shloime Rosenberg and Shlomo Katz – to show up to the next meeting on this topic. The residents said they want to ask their landlord directly about what accommodations they’ll be making to help make their renters’ lives easier as this nearby demolition takes place.

“I’ll take responsibility for using my powers of persuasion,” Silverstone said, to get a representative from Winchester Ventures to show up to the next meeting.