YONKERS-The City of Yonkers has shifted its downtown redevelopment strategy from a scattered project-by-project approach to working with one developer on a two-mile area that could see more than $3 billion in new development. At a press conference on Thursday, Mayor Phil Amicone revealed the master development agreement with Cappelli Enterprises of Valhalla, Struever Bros. Eccles & Rose of Baltimore and Fidelco Realty Group of Millburn, NJ.
Struever Bros. and Fidelco have been working on a plan that would bring a 6,500-seat minor league baseball stadium and retail space to the Chicken Island section of the city as well as waterfront residences nearby. That project is included in the master development agreement that encompasses all of the city's central business core covering mostly industrial space on the waterfront and areas along Nepperhan Avenue, Yonkers Avenue. and other adjacent Downtown streets. The agreement calls for mixed-use development projects to be built in three phases.
"I recognize that with this approach we are taking a dramatic step, but the time has come for Yonkers to take advantage of the incredibly strong real estate market and on the tremendous interest in new investment we are seeing in our city," Amicone says. "Rather than continuing to try to develop sites on a scattered basis, I believe that having a master developer will create the critical mass needed to get a series of important new projects underway in the immediate future."
The mayor adds that his approach will give the city a general direction for downtown redevelopment for the next 20 years and "is designed to jump start projects that have been stalled and to keep the momentum going for the long-term future." Cappelli says the approach should result in "numerous new projects being undertaken in a short time span."
Phase I of the plan will involve the Getty Square and Chicken Island sections of the city and would include the minor league ballpark, 750,000-sf of mixed-use retail and entertainment space and up to 800 units of housing, some movie theaters and perhaps a hotel. This phase would also include riverfront development on Parcels H and I, as well as "daylighting" the Saw Mill River in the Larkin Square area. In later phases, the waterfront corridor, Alexander Street, Post Office Square, Ludlow Trust Village and Nepperhan Valley areas will be targeted for development.
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