210 Hancock Construction Update, 9/2016

6 10 2016

I try not to sit on these for too long, but it’s been a busy week with the Voice.

The main apartment building is in the process of having its foundation walls dug, formed and poured. The forms are put in place to hold the concrete as it is poured and cured, and then the construction team (led by Lecesse Construction) moves on to the next section. The rebar grid sticking out of the concrete gives it additional strength and rigidity. The steel piles are being inserted with the hydraulic hammer, which should be wrapping up any day now if it hasn’t already. The four-story apartment building is divided into four sections – the two with concrete pours underway, the southern two, will host TCAction’s daycare and non-profit office space. The northern two will host indoor ground-level parking.

The soil in Northside is not so great, much of it lies in the 100 or 500-year flood zone and is too unstable for less expensive slab/shallow foundations like what they use in many of the projects on the hills. For a large project like this, the safe, albeit more expensive and intrusive approach is to do a deep foundation. However, the wood-frame townhouses are small enough and light enough such that a shallow foundation can be used – you can see foundation work for the five rental townhouses in the last two photos. The seven for-sale townhouses will follow a little later this November, the original plan was to have them open in June 2017, but they have been pushed back to late fall 2017 as a result of the contractor switch.

It looks like, however, they have added the interest form for buying a townhouse to their website here. Under the working name “202 Hancock”, this $2.36 million project will have five two bedroom units (1,147 SF) to be sold for about $114,000, and two three-bedroom units (1,364 SF) for $136,000. They will be available to those making 60-80% of local AMI, or $37,000-$49,000/year. The townhouses would be a part of the Community Housing Trust (CHT), keeping them affordable even as they are sold to others in later years. More info on those units here. For those qualified and preferring to rent an apartment or townhouse, the form is here.

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News Tidbits 9/17/16: Point By Point

17 09 2016

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1. Starting this week off with the Maguires again. Although there was significant vocal opposition from planning committee members to the proposal, they decided to postpone the decision for another month. It would have been more merciful and understanding if they had just declined to continue, but the committee voted 4-1 against making a decision at their Wednesday night meeting, citing to need to process public comment. Most of the comments in favor of the proposal mostly spoke highly of the Maguires as employers and economic drivers (and even some of the opposition did as well), most of the opposition focused on the plan not meshing with visions for what they want the neighborhood to become. The board will consider a resolution against the project next month, but it sounds like the decision has already been made.

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2. This will be something of an unusual month. Along with the typical retinue of meetings, the Planning Board will have a special meeting next week to weigh in on the next round of Chain Works District EIS public comments, approve some slight revisions to 210 Hancock, and zoning determination for 201 College Avenue.

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The changes to 210 Hancock are noticeable but minor. On the landscaping side, the concrete curb around the playground is proposed to be removed as a cost-saving measure, a fence separating the for-sale and for-rent townhouses will be removed and a fire lane put in, and the Lake Avenue paving will be changed up to match the waterfront trail. For the buildings, the 54-unit apartment building would have some windows tweaked or removed to standardize sizes (reduce cost) and fire safety concerns, and some of the yellow metal panels would be replaced with brick for cost and ease of installation. No changes are proposed to the townhouses.

As for 201 College, City Zoning Director Phyllis Radke issued a determination that 201 College is compliant and permitted by MU-1 zoning. She also states a number of concerns with the Planning Board’s handling of the review. Among the reasons cited are:

  • Pre-site plan review in November 2015 by zoning and planning concluded the project met CAFD guidelines.
  • Facade isn’t defined in the CAFD document. Building length and facade length can be interpreted as two separate measurements.
  • Facade length did not come up as a concern until July, four months after meetings began, after design review by the board, and after prelim site approval had been granted.
  • The building meets the conceptual guidelines provided in the zoning. While there are concerns about (yet unwritten) design standards and activation of both street facades, there’s nothing in the code for MU-1 that explicitly limits facade length on any side other than the primary face. There is, however, in MU-2. So secondary street facade length was stated in the code for one zone, but in no others. Even though it’s been argued as an ambiguity, the board did not consider secondary street facade length in its review of a CR-2 zoned duplex at 319 Oak Avenue in early 2015. The activation requirements apply only to the primary face for non MU-2 structures. If the board decided it was still ambiguous, Hess Realty Corp. vs. Town of Rotterdam (1993) says that ambiguities must be resolved in the favor of the property owner.
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  • The 2009 vision guidelines that people keep citing, and Neil uses on the “Save our Soul” facebook page – not only do they suggest taking down Neil’s house, they also have building lengths running the entirety of Bool Street.

With all that noted, even if it’s decided the project is in fact legal and doesn’t need a trip to the BZA, it likely won’t be moving forward this year, if at all. Visum couldn’t start in time for the desired August 2017 completion, and the project and site are for sale. For a potential buyer, though, it would be of significant benefit to have the zoning debate resolved before any sale occurs.

3. Out in the towns, there’s not a whole lot of development discussion in next week’s agendas. The town of Ithaca will continue its review of Maplewood Park (running behind schedule at this point) and issue a couple of lot subdivisions, neither of which are expected to be a big debate.  The town of Dryden received plans for a 10,500 SF self-storage facility for the vacant northeast corner of Freeville Road and Enterprise Drive. The 70′ x 150′ warehouse will house 121 units, and about 7,500 SF will be climate-controlled. The project will cost about $350,000. There also plans for an Open Development Area (ODA) on Dryden’s Scofield Road. ODA means an ROW or easement is required for building permits, and the town has to review the plans – nothing’s been filed yet.

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4. A pair of construction loan agreements worth noting this week. The first is Storage Squad’s facility going up at 1401 Dryden Road east of Varna. According to a filing on the 12th, the company received a construction loan of $1.4 million from Tompkins Trust. That money will be used to finance the build-out of their 79,600 SF storage facility already underway. The second is the Dollar General being built at the corner of Route 34/East Shore Drive and Cayuga Vista Drive in Lansing. Primax Properties (under the name Sea Mountain Ventures II LLC) received a $956,000 loan to build the 9,100 SF retail store, which is also under construction. that loan was also filed on the 12th. The lending institution is BB&T, a major regional bank in the Southeast. Primax is headquartered in Charlotte, and BB&T is headquartered just 90 minutes up the road in Winston-Salem, so in this case, it’s less about a bank being interested in Ithaca, and more about two major companies located near each other and having an established business relationship.

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5. So the Ithaca Urban Renewal Agency’s Economic Development Committee selected the $3.7 million Seneca/Corn proposal to submit to the state for the Restore NY 4 grant. And I feel a bit embarrassed because the Voice story, comparing the Seneca/Corn proposal and the State Street rehabs, ran after the decision was made, so it comes off as a bit clueless thanks to timing. Anyway, the application will be looked at by the Planning Committee, and submitted in early October. If all goes well, funding could be granted by the beginning of next year, with the renovated Wyllie’s and the Ithaca Glass overbuild ready for tenants by early 2018. Ed Cope is the developer, STREAM Collaborative the architect.

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6. For sale this week, and for the budding entrepreneur – 2,310 SF neighborhood commercial retail at 402-04 West Court Street in the Washington Park neighborhood. Talk about a change. When I started at Cornell ten years ago, this was “The Corner Store”, and it was severely run down. I don’t remember the florist sign, but everything else in the assessment photo below fits my memories from the mid 2000s.

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During the past ten years, the bump-out was renovated, then the building was repainted, and The Corner Store became the “Red and White Cafe“, a highly-regarded neighborhood fish fry and seafood restaurant. According to the listing, the major renovations came about three years ago. County records indicate the property last exchanged hands in 1988. Along with the retail space comes 432 SF of storage.

The listing is asking for $975,000, but that would be for building and business – the building and lot are valued at $120,000, so any potential buyer is going to be much more interested in the cafe than the building.


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News Tidbits 8/20/16: Another Campus Coming?

20 08 2016

Fairly quiet week, but still a few things going on-

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1. The Journal’s Nick Reynolds followed up on the pile-driving underway at the 210 Hancock site in Ithaca’s North Side neighborhood. Admittedly, no one wants to live next to a site while hearing and feeling the bang of the pile-driver against the piles being inserted into the ground. Thankfully, this phase of the affordable housing project should be wrapped up by the end of the month. Lecesse Construction’s subcontractor, Ferraro Piling and Shoring of rural Erie County, is inserting 10-15 piles per day between the hours of 8 AM and 4 PM, and about 170 piles will be used in the project. Not fun for the neighbors, but this too shall pass.

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2. The town of Ithaca’s planning board had their close look at the Sleep Inn proposal for Elmira Road. They were not impressed. The primary complaints were that it was a one-sided design (meaning the front received significantly more cosmetic attention than the rear and sides), that it was big and that it was ugly.

The architect of the 70-room hotel, Joe Turnowchyk of HEX 9 Architects, responded with “all corporate hotels are basically ugly”, which isn’t the kind of response that will be well-received. It was followed with “[He thinks] that if they’re going to put more money into the front of the building, they shouldn’t need to address the rear”, which isn’t a good response either, because the rear faces the Black Diamond Trail.

Outsider looking in, one interpretation of the board’s commentary is that the stone and brick is fine, but they want less of a slab and more articulation – the recently-opened 64-room Best Western Plus in Cortlandville comes to mind. The massing is broken up, and architectural details and brickwork add visual interest, giving it aesthetic appeal even though the road is 40 or 45 MPH over there. The minutes note a comparison to an Arizona Sleep Inn to show what can be done with Choice Hotels brands. Anyway, the decision was tabled, with a revised design presentation planned for a September meeting.

3. New to the market this week – a duplex and five-unit mobile home park in Varna being marketed for “development potential”. The site is a one acre parcel at 10 Freese Road in Varna, touted as “perfect for townhouses or apartments”. Since the late 1980s, the “Wayside Mobile Home Park” has been the property of Ithaca attorney Ray Schlather, who was an ardent opponent of West End density and waterfront rezoning a few years back.

Zoning is Varna Hamlet Traditional District (VHTD), and it gets a little weird density-wise – per the guidelines, and being one acre, a developer could do four single-family homes, six townhouses, six condos, or three rental apartments, max 30% lot coverage. If LEED Certified, add 2 S-F homes, 2 townhouses, 1 condo, or 4 apartment units respectively. Lastly, there’s a redevelopment bonus, which honestly appears to be at the town’s discretion. If awarded, add another home, 2 townhouses, condo or 4 apartments. So in theory, max build-out for a green redevelopment is either 7 single-family houses, 10 townhouses, eight condos or eleven rental apartments on that acre of land. No idea what happens if they’re combos thereof.

Anyway, the property is being offered at $219,000, just a little over the $192,500 tax assessment.

4. So this is intriguing – the city of Ithaca Common Council will be taking a vote next Wednesday to take $150,000 from the $500,000 Capital Project fund to relocate and build a new Fire station #9, and fund two consolidation studies. One would consolidate the city hall, the Central Fire Station, Station No. 9, and Police HQ into a government campus at the site of the Central Fire Station at 310 West Green Street; the second is to study a centralized facility shared by water/sewer and streets/facilities. There’s a lot that need to be considered as part of the government campus study, which would likely involve buying neighboring properties, or building skyward. Also worth noting, the fire station parking lot is part of the Downtown West historic district. Anyway, look for a lot more discussion if the money is awarded and the study gets underway.

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5. This week’s eye candy. Folks on Orchard Place asked for more detailed renders of the proposed two-family home at 123 Eddy Street, and here they are. Medium yellow Hardie board with white trim was the original plan. It appears that after the original drawing was submitted, the roof was realigned and one of the west-facing (front) second-floor windows was removed.

Note that this is just the planning board lot subdivision approval – although a single two-family home is typically too small to trigger planning board’s site plan review qualifications, the design still has to be approved by the ILPC and the Board of Zoning Appeals.

6. Case in point – If you live in Fall Creek, you might notice a new two-family house in the coming months. The Stavropoulos family, owners of the State Street Diner, just purchased the house for sale at 1001 North Aurora Street (above asking price, which is, for better or worse, quite common in Fall Creek) and plans to replace it with a duplex. Tompkins Trust gave them a $400,000 construction loan on the 18th. It’s a little different from the Stavropoulos’ typical M.O., which is to buy an existing house and do major renovations, as they did at 318-320 Pleasant Street and 514 Linn Street. This one looks like it will be a completely new build. No BZA, ILPC or Planning Board approval is required here, just staff level approval from the city.

7. Somewhat interesting Planning Board meeting next Tuesday. Here’s what in the bullpen:

1. Agenda Review 6:00
2. Privilege of the Floor 6:01
3. Subdivision Review 6:20

A. 123 & 125 Eddy St. (shown above)
Applicant: Nick Lambrou
Actions: Declaration of Lead Agency PUBLIC HEARING Determination of Environmental Significance Recommendation to BZA

4. Site Plan Review 6:40
A. Project: Mixed-Use Building (Harold’s Square)
Location: 123-139 E. State St. (The Commons)
Applicant: David Lubin for L Enterprises, LLC
Actions: Consideration of Project Changes

So I wrote about these changes for the Voice. The Planning Board resolution calls for modifications to the new design. The board mandates glass block for the elevator shaft on the north and lower west facades, restoration of the terra cotta cap and vertical bands on the Commons-facing facade, and restoring a deleted window from the East facade above the Sage Building. Could really used some updated renders right about now.

B. Project: Mixed-Use Building — Collegetown Crossing 6:55
Location: 307 College Ave.
Applicant: Scott Whitham for
Actions: Consideration of Project Changes (Landscape)

Project Description: Some slight tweaks here to the pedestrian walkway, mostly changes “simplifying and altering materials for the landscape”. The curvy benches are now straight, and the trees were eliminated in favor of shrubs because of concerns of branches extending onto the fire station’s property.

C. Project: Apartment Building 7:05
Location: 201 College Ave.
Applicant: Noah Demarest, STREAM Collaborative, for Visum Development Group
Actions: Consideration of Amended Negative Declaration of Environmental Significance, Request for Zoning Interpretation & Appeal Consideration of Final Site Plan Approval

Dunno what to say about this one at this point, since this is unfamiliar territory for everyone involved. We’ll see what happens.

D. SKETCH PLAN: 607 S. Aurora St. 7:35

The new project of the month is for 607 South Aurora Street on South Hill. It’s a single-family home on a 0.7 acre lot owned by Lou Cassaniti, the hot dog vendor on the Commons, but rumor mill says the applicant is Charlie O’Connor of Modern Living Rentals. Zoning is R-2a, which is detached single-family and duplex. Semi-educated guess, given lot size, zoning and rumored developer, the plans are small-scale infill, maybe subdividing the existing lot to build a duplex or two.

4. Zoning Appeals 7:50

5. Old/New Business 7:55

A. Chain Works District Redevelopment Project DGEIS: Special Planning Board Meeting, August 30, 2016, 6:00 p.m. to Review Comments/Responses
B. Maguire/Carpenter Business Park Temp. Mandatory Planned Unit Development (PUD): Public Information Session, Wednesday, August 31, 2016, 6:00 p.m., Common Council Chambers


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210 Hancock Construction Update, 7/2016

28 07 2016

At the 210 Hancock property in Ithaca’s Northside neighborhood, site prep is taking place. The site is being graded and excavation is now underway for subsurface utilities installation (water and sewer pipes, the teal tubes stacked in the photos). INHS is conducting vibration monitoring while all this goes on, although the pile installation won’t start for another couple weeks, running foe about three weeks, mid-late August to mid September. Contractor Lecesse Construction will be installing 10-15 piles per day with a hydraulic hammer, between the hours of 8 AM and 4 PM. If the Voice’s Facebook inbox during the demolition phase this past spring was any indication, some very zealous neighbors will be providing breathless live coverage.

All in all, the contractor issue set INHS back about three months, but the grant funding is accommodating and rental agreements won’t be signed until the project is much closer to completion, late spring or summer 2017. For those who meet the affordable income brackets (breakdowns here), the rental interest form is here. The 54 apartments and the 5 rental townhomes should be ready to go by this time next year.

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News Tidbits 7/16/16: Summer Storms of a Different Kind

16 07 2016

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1. It looks like the first round of funding has been filed for INHS’s 210 Hancock project. The $7,790,511 construction loan was filed with the count on July 11th, with the lender of record listed as “CPC Funding SPE I LLC”. CPC is the Community Preservation Corporation, a non-profit lending institution funded by 69 different lenders in a revolving loan fund in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. This includes big banks like Citi and wells Fargo, and smaller regional banks like Chemung Canal Trust. Since affordable housing isn’t intended to be a moneymaker, it’s difficult to get lenders to cover the construction costs of a project. CPC serves as a middleman, allowing multiple private lenders to engage in modest amounts of financing for affordable, multi-family housing.

The 54 apartments and 5 townhouses partially funded by this loan are expected to be ready for occupancy next summer.

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2. Things aren’t going well with the Old Library redevelopment. In Tuesday’s joint meeting between the ILPC and the Planning Board, some felt the current design of Travis Hyde’s DeWitt House proposal was too dull, some felt the previous design was best, and some fell in between. But, it seems like none of the three approaches has enough support to get a Certificate of Appropriateness, with a few of the members feeling that no design will work for the site because they feel they’re all too big. Frost Travis replied that the project can’t afford a major size reduction and still be feasible. Now the county’s getting involved since they selected the Travis Hyde proposal, and things are getting quite contentious.

Doing a quick check, for at least the previous iteration, the Travis Hyde proposal was about 85,600 SF, and the Franklin/STREAM condo proposal was 5 floors and 58,000 SF. Would residents have pushed Franklin/STREAM to reduce floors and potentially make the condo project infeasible? Who knows. If folks start clamoring for three floors or less, that will likely eliminate any proposals due to the cost of rehabilitation and reconstruction, and the county will have no viable options for a building in need of expensive repairs just to be usable. We’ll see what happens next month.

3. Namgyal Monastery has officially sold its city property. The house they owned at 412 North Aurora Street sold for $275,000 on the 13th, which is the same price it’s assessed at. Namgyal has purchased for the property for $150,000 in November 1992. A 2006 assets assessment placed the value of the Aurora Street house at $300,000, which might have been a bit generous.

On the one hand, the sale nets the monastery funds to continue construction of the new 13,000 SF facility on South Hill, which was recently selected to be a site of the Library of the Dalai Lamas. On the other hand, their webpage states they intended on keeping the Aurora Street house.

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4. The Ithaca Times’ Jaime Cone, new wind turbine laws in Newfield may effectively prohibit their construction. The town of Newfield decided to expand the radius of legally required unoccupied space from 1.5x the height of the turbine, to three times the radius of the propellers. In the case of the turbine that Black Oak Wind Farm (BOWF) was looking to put there, that raised the necessary easement support area from within 750 feet of the base, to 1,760 feet. Also, instead of 750 feet away from occupied structures, it’s 1,760 feet from any property line – in case anyone wanted to build on vacant land. Quoting Marguerite Wells, the beleaguered project manager of BOWF, “It makes it unbuildable…It’s a common way to outlaw wind farms in a town, to make the setback impossible.”

Apparently, things are so bad now, the town of Newfield voted to block a BOWF driveway that routed through Newfield to get to one of their Enfield sites. Given that a Tompkins County town is actively preventing and being malignant towards alternative clean energy sources and providers, it’s surprising there hasn’t been grater push-back from the sustainability proponents.

Overall, it’s been a rough month or so for green energy producers in Tompkins County – Ulysses is furious at Renovus and their solar panel installations, and Lansing’s planning board wants to vote in a moratorium on commercial solar panels.

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5. The county’s PEDEEQ (Planning et al.) Committee is voting next week to take $2,500 from the county’s contingency fund to host a housing summit this fall. Another $2,500 will come from the Planning Department. The purpose of the $55,000 summit is to take all the updated plans and housing needs assessments (the county’s, which is the big one, is due out next week) and figure out way to incorporate them into an updated county housing strategy. $45k comes from a Park Foundation grant. From the tone of the summit description, it doesn’t sound like the county’s affordable housing issues have improved since 2006, but we’ll see just how severe the housing issue has become when the study comes out later this month.

On a separate note, the county is looking to award the 23-bed Amici House project $225,000 in affordable housing grants, plus a loan forgiveness of $75,000 in pre-development costs.

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6. To round out this week of mostly unpleasant news, Mark Anbinder at 14850.com is reporting that the Marriott’s opening will be delayed from August 23rd to a likely opening in October, according to the director of sales. However, as extra padding in case of further delays, it appears won’t be taking further reservations for dates before mid-November. Unfortunately, this is well past Ithaca’s big tourist season, so it’s a safe bet to say neither Marriott nor the folks who had August and September reservations are pleased.


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210 Hancock Construction Update, 4/2016

21 04 2016

So far, not so good. When it first came out that INHS was dropping its contractor, Hayner-Hoyt of Syracuse, due to Hayner-Hoyt’s settlement in a government fraud of disabled veterans’ funds, my assumption was that alternatives had already been arranged and it would be just a token piece to fill out my writing quota.

Then came the interview with INHS’ Paul Mazzarella. And the words “in limbo”. That set a grim mood for the rest of our conversation.

At that point, there was some mental debate about passing the piece to someone else on the Voice staff, but given the complexity of the situation, there was a good chance it wouldn’t be done properly, or another news outlet would pick it up and miss some of the nuances. INHS didn’t know what was going on, since the investigation and negotiation were under seal. A check with the North New York District Court verified it. A bad situation that was in many ways beyond INHS’s control.

Dropping Hayner-Hoyt saved face, but also put the non-profit developer in a bind, since they were not just the general contractor, they were the construction manager, meaning that this was a design-build and everything had been priced out with Hayner-Hoyt’s help. Another contractor could have different, higher prices, which would put the project in jeopardy.

On the bright side, it looks like the project will move forward. Speaking face-to-face with Scott Reynolds last week, he described it as “more of a hiccup” at this point. Hayner Hoyt helped them locate new potential contractors, and there is likely a new firm who will take on construction manager duties. Hopefully, the Voice will have an article on that when INHS is ready to make the formal announcement.

Turning to the project itself, the ca. 1957 grocery store, and one-story 1970s office building, are gone. Demolition is complete, and there’s a pause in work “while the contractors get organized”. Further site work is expected to commence no later than late May, with pile installation occurring over a one-month period at a rate of about six per day, between the hours of 8 AM and 4 PM. The before photo was taken in late February, the weekend before they started tearing down Neighborhood Pride, and the latest photos are from this past weekend.

The store was previously a P&C Foods, before P&C went bankrupt and the Ithaca stores were bought by Tops in 2010. The original builder of the grocery store, Tony Petito, launched a new independent grocery store called “Neighborhood Pride” in February 2013, which came with a $100,000 loan from the IURA. However, the store was unable to compete with other nearby grocers (Aldi’s, Wegman’s), and shut down at the end of the year. INHS acquired the property for $1.7 million in June 2014. Community meetings to develop a housing plan were held during the fall and winter of 2014/15, and the 210 Hancock proposal received planning board approval last year, after an unexpectedly heated debate. Originally, build-out was expected to start in September of this year, but the project was one of the very rare few that managed to get affordable housing funding from the state on the very first funding try (meaning that Ithaca has a well-documented need, and that it was a very good application).

If built on schedule, 210 Hancock will bring 54 apartments and 12 moderate-income townhouses to market in July 2017. 7 of the townhouses will be for-sale units. Total construction cost is anticipated to be about $13.8 million.

The 54 apartment units (42 1-bedroom, 12 2-bedroom) are targeted towards renters making 48-80% of annual median income (AMI), defined by the HUD as $54,000 for a one-bedroom and $61,750 for a two-bedroom. The one-bedroom units will rent for $700-1,000/month to those making $25,950-$43,250, and the two-bedroom units will rent for $835-$1300/month to individuals making $29,640-$49,400. Three of the units will be fully handicap adapted. The project also includes two commercial spaces, one of which will host a daycare program run by TCAction for lower income families. The building would seek LEED Certification.

The two-story wood frame townhouses would also be LEED Certified. Of the seven for-sale units, five two bedroom units (1,147 SF) would be sold for about $114,000, and the two three-bedroom units (1,364 SF) for $136,000, available to those making 60-80% of local AMI, or $37,050-$49,400/year per the March 2016 IURA document. The townhouses would be a part of the Community Housing Trust (CHT), keeping them affordable even as they are sold to others in later years. The anticipated construction period is November 2016 – June 2017. The five rental units (4 2-bedroom, 1 3-bedroom) would be built at the same time as the apartment building.

To get on the waitlist for the affordable units, contact INHS here.

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