March 29, 2024
Archive

Waterworks housing proposal before planners

BANGOR – An ambitious plan to turn the city’s historic but neglected waterworks into low-income housing is among the matters planning board members will address tonight when they meet at City Hall.

During the meeting, set for 7 p.m., the planning board will consider approving a site development plan and a development subdivision plan submitted by Shaw House Inc.

A nonprofit subsidiary of the city’s shelter for homeless teens, Shaw House Inc., is in the process of acquiring the State Street property.

The $6 million plan is to convert it to 35 rent-subsidized efficiency units for very low-income adults and emancipated minors who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. Rent payments will amount to a third of each renter’s income.

The city approvals are among several hurdles that remain before construction begins next month, according to Shaw House Inc.’s Doug Bouchard, who’s been heading up the project.

The developer is awaiting the needed state transportation and environmental permits and currently is in the midst of a required “recordation,” or documentation, project.

To meet federal historic preservation requirements, Bouchard said, state officials have required that an extensive photographic record of the waterworks be made before construction-related changes occur. Bouchard said the city is tackling that requirement.

While Bouchard acknowledged that state historic preservation officials weren’t enthused about the proposed changes to the waterworks complex, which dates back to 1875, they recognized that the Shaw House plan represents a last-ditch effort to save the structure.

Plans call for razing the filter plant, the newest of the three structures, to make way for parking.

The engineer’s house would be converted to offices – after it is moved 15 feet back from State Street to make way for a circular driveway.

The proposed layout calls for moving the driveway about 100 feet west of its current location. Traffic lights would be installed and the railroad crossing improved. A traffic study suggests the project would have minor impact on traffic.

The Deane pump, an enormous cast-iron structure in the main building, would be restored and showcased in a central common area.

The long, narrow gatehouse building is not part of the restoration project at this time, but may be developed later.

Despite the city’s repeated efforts to find a developer for the waterworks, the renovation costs proved so prohibitive that private interests – including a restaurant, condominiums, a hydropower generation plant and office space for Eastern Maine Healthcare – found the project too costly.

As city officials have come to see it, the project Shaw House proposes not only renovates and restores a historically significant city facility but also fills a need for affordable housing. Simply put, their options boiled down to reuse the structure or demolish it – at the city’s expense.


Have feedback? Want to know more? Send us ideas for follow-up stories.

comments for this post are closed

You may also like