ITEM PHOTO BY OWEN O’ROURKE
Amy Korte, a member of the Arrowstreet Architecture & Design firm of Boston, makes their pitch in Lynn City Hall to develop the former car dealership land opposite North Shore Community College in Lynn.
BY GAYLA CAWLEY
LYNN — On Tuesday, representatives from Minco Development and Arrowstreet presented their first definitive plans to the city regarding the mixed use and primarily waterfront development that will be located on the former Beacon Chevrolet site.
Jim Cowdell, executive director of Economic Development, said the city has been working with Minco Development on the project for about two years. He said the Beacon site, located on the Lynnway and across the street from North Shore Community College, has been vacant for 30 years.
David Bois, an architect for Arrowstreet, presented plans for the project at a site plan review meeting Tuesday morning. He said the primarily residential development would be comprised of 348 apartments, which would be mostly one- and two-bedroom units. There would be 1.3 parking spaces per unit.
Louis Minicucci, president of Minco Development, said the total cost of the project would be upwards of $85 to $90 million. With the cost, he said the project would go under “all kinds of scrutiny.”
“I think we have a really solid project,” Minicucci said. Cowdell said the development would be mixed use, but would be 95 percent residential. He said there would be a small retail component, but doesn’t know what store would be there. Also discussed was the potential for a leasing office, bank or credit union on the site.
“Since we came up with our vision of the waterfront, this is the first project that fits into the new vision of what we’re trying to do on the waterfront,” Cowdell said. “I think it’s critical because it will lead to more development like this.”
Cowdell said the Tuesday meeting was the first presentation of the project to the city.He said it was the first official step toward developing the site.
“We can finally see the finish line,” Cowdell said.
Cowdell explained that the project will go through a city permitting process, which will take about three months. He said the state permitting process would be about six months and construction would begin in Spring 2017, when a “shovel goes into the ground.”
Cowdell said a zoning change was approved at the meeting. With that change, the size of the parking spaces at the site would be reduced from nine feet to eight and a half feet, retail space would be up to 5,000 square feet and the total number of parking spaces would be 458. Bois said that the amount of parking spaces required by zoning was 522.
“The ability to put (over) 300 residential units right on the Atlantic Ocean is what made it attractive to the developer,” Cowdell said of the project.
Gayla Cawley can be reached at [email protected].
