Worcester Will Get First Shopping Plaza in Eight Years

WORCESTER, MA-For the first time in more than eight years, this community will get a new shopping plaza. Developer Denis Dowdle, president of Madison Properties, tells GlobeSt.com that the Boston-based real estate investment and development firm plans to build a 375,000, sf, multimillion-dollar regional shopping center, the first in eight years, on a 43-acre parcel that was once the site of several US Steel foundries.

Dowdel says construction on the yet-unnamed plaza will begin late next year once demolition is completed on five industrial distribution buildings on the Ballard Street site. It will be the first new shopping center in this city about an hour west of Boston since construction began on Lincoln Plaza eight years earlier, a city official says.

"This project will take a dilapidated steel mill and turn it into a state-of-the-art shopping center that will create more jobs and will be an important part of the rejuvenation of this part of Worcester," Dowdel tells GlobeSt.com. In addition to jobs, Dowdel says the project will generate an estimated $500,000 in additional tax revenue for the city, nearly $300,000 more than its current $185,000 annual tax.

While Dowdel is firmly committed to his plan, he still has to overcome several obstacles before he can bring his dream to Worcester. The firm recently surmounted its first hurdle when the city agreed to change the property's zoning from manufacturing to retail. It was one of the first such change that city has made since 1992, Dowdel says.

But that's just the first obstacle. Madison Properties still needs the city to approve a building plan for the site, which Dowdel hopes will hold at least one big-box store along with several junior anchors. Several freestanding pads, primarily for restaurant use, also will be part of the project as will green space and a bike trail that will wind along the Blackstone River. The path, which will be built by the state, will eventually connect bike paths from Worcester to Providence, RI.

Dowdel purchased the acreage, which is appraised at $2.52 million, from Liberty Properties in 2004. The cost of the land purchase was not disclosed. The site, once the home of the Liberty Central Industrial Park, is located in Worcester's Quinsigamond Village section near Route 146, which will eventually connect Worcester center to the Massachusetts Turnpike. That $300-million highway construction project, set to be completed within the next 18 months, made the site a prime location for the plaza, Dowdel says.