Allan Appel Photo
The under-construction DISTRICT project.
DISTRICT, the new nine-acre tech incubator/entertainment campus rising on James Street between Lombard and State, is three-fifths leased and on schedule to have a grand opening this summer.
It will also get some free street parking spaces out front.
That news emerged Tuesday night at the regular meeting of the city’s Traffic Authority.
The authority, which is comprised of the city’s police commissioners, heard a request from the Department of Traffic and Parking’s Doug Hausladen to rescind the current no-parking regulation on the west side of James from State to Lombard/Humphrey in front of DISTRICT.
The block is newly configured with sidewalks, driveways, and plantings to serve as the front yard of the $25 million complex on the site of an old CT Transit facility. City officials hail it as a harbinger of “Brooklyn”-style development in town.
The site already has 240 parking spaces. Plans also entail the development of a riverfront trail, beer garden and amphitheater. So it will need those extra parking spaces, Hausladen wrote in his formal presentation to the commissioners. He added that the neighborhood’s alder, Charles Decker, supports the recommendation.
Commissioner Kevin Diaz expressed concern that the new parking might impinge on people exiting the northbound ramp on State Street.
Hausladen with Traffic & Parking staffer Bruce Fischer at the commission meeting.
Hausladen said when the department marks the new parking spots in the spring, it will “make sure people can get off the slip ramp” by State Street.
“The area is in need of street parking and [street] life,” DISTRICT co-founder and Co-CEO David Salinas stated in an email message.
Salinas said that his company, Digital Surgeons, and the Connecticut School of Finance,began their first working day on the site last week.
Other companies previously moved in and have begun operations. They include, he reported, “the District Athletic Club with CrossFit New Haven, Balanced Yoga, Turn Spin Studio, and the DAC personal training facility.” He said in total the building is 60 percent leased.
The rest of the building will be rolled out across the coming months with spaces opening every few weeks including SphereGen, a fast growing technology company partnered with Microsoft HoloLens Mixed Reality platform, which started at the Grove.
The design company Urbane NewHaven, whose principal is Eric O’Brien, who is also a co-founder and co-CEO of District, is also moving in, along with the new restaurant being planned by Ordinary’s Jason Sobocinski and Jamie McDonald.
Salinas said that the site is offering co-working spaces to be available beginning in April.
The vote to approve the free parking on James Street was unanimous.
Seems like this community of businesses will be a great addition to New Haven. So great to see an empty warehouse building in a prime spot become a place of activity for business, food, and health.
Now if only that gigantic Trolley Square building owner across the street would take some notes...