Kenneth Boroson Architects
City plan commissioners signed off on the final site plan and design for the new Q House, thus bringing the resurgent Dixwell community center one step closer to becoming a reality nearly 15 years after it last closed its doors.
During Wednesday night’s regular monthly meeting of the City Plan Commission (CPC) on the second floor of City Hall, commissioners unanimously approved the final site plan for the center, which will be located at the corner of Foote Street and Dixwell Avenue.
A cornerstone of Dixwell’s predominantly African-American neighborhood dating back to when the center first opened in 1924, the Q House closed in 2003. For years, state and local politicians and community activists lobbied for state support to bring back the Q House. Mayor Toni Harp, who pushed for state funding of the project as the co-chair of the General Assembly’s Appropriations Committee, made the rebuilding of the Q House a priority of her mayoral administration when she was first elected in 2013.
In January 2016, the city secured over $15 million in state funds to build a new Q House. That package included $1 million to build within the Q House a new home for the Stetson Library branch. The old Q House building was demolished in January 2016, and over 300 people came out in November 2017 for the official groundbreaking for the new community center.
City Engineer Giovanni Zinn presents the Q House site plan to the City Plan Commission (CPC).
During Wednesday’s CPC meeting, City Engineer Giovanni Zinn walked the commissioners through the final site plan. Now that the site plan has been approved, Zinn said the city will get a final cost estimate next week and go out to bid for a construction contractor sometime mid-summer.
He estimated that construction will take between 12 and 15 months, and that the new Q House will open its doors by the end of 2019.
“We think it’s going to be a very dynamic and vibrant building up against the street,” Zinn said.
The two-story, glass-fronted building will be nearly 54,00 square feet large, and will sit at the corner of Dixwell and Foote.
It will contain a youth and community engagement wing, a full gym with a basketball court, the relocated Stetson Library, the relocated Dixwell/Newhallville senior center, and a kitchen large enough to hold small cooking lessons. The new facility will also be home to the Dixwell branch of the Cornell Scott — Hill Health center, which will be moving the entirety of its branch’s services and staff across the street to the Q House.
Although the city received a special exception from the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) in May to allow for 51 parking spaces where 313 were required, Zinn said the parking lot in the final, approved site plan for the new Q House actually has 75 spaces, including five handicap accessible spaces. That parking lot will be built behind the Q House just east of the building.
There will also be 35 U‑shaped bike racks stationed around the perimeter of the building.
Other proposed improvements to the site include the construction of a pedestrian plaza, new concrete sidewalks along Dixwell Avenue and Foote Street, a running/walking track, rain gardens, a stormwater detention basin, and landscaping.
All traffic will enter the site through a curb cut on Foote Street between Dixwell and John Daniels Place.
The main entrance to the Q House proper will be on Dixwell and will contain a large “Q” above its front doors. Zinn said the building’s façade will also display African motifs as a “great remembrance” to the design of the new community center’s original architect, Regina Winters-Toussaint, who died in 2016. The final design of the new Q House was completed by Kenneth Boroson Architects.
CPC Chair Ed Mattison and Westville Alder Adam Marchand.
“This project … has the potential to have a transformational effect on the surrounding area,” Westville Alder and City Plan Commissioner Adam Marchand said, “from a social and possibly economic standpoint. I’m glad that the building is fully programmed, and has good, interesting uses in different parts of the building.”
After the commissioners voted unanimously to approve the designs, City Plan Chair Ed Mattison looked at Zinn with a smile and said, “A great day for the city.”
Even before the outrageous 11% tax hike, the city had no business building a huge building for a failed private non profit organization. And over time the operating costs will dwarf the construction costs.