BURLINGTON — CityPlace Burlington developer Brookfield Asset Management is now planning a 10-story building at the site of the stalled downtown development, the company announced at Monday’s City Council meeting.
The new design adds an approximately 175-room hotel to the site and features 280-300 housing units, around the same number included in the original plan. There will be less office space, retail space and parking in the new design.
Brookfield vice president Aanen Olsen said the company is aiming to start construction on the site next year but did not have a timeline for the project’s completion. The existing mall will remain, and the former Macy’s site will contain office and retail space.
Previous plans featured a 14-story, $220 million project which featured residential, office and retail space. Olsen said the decreased density in the new approach would lower construction costs.
“While the scope is the same, it’s now spread out over two blocks,” he said. “What we’re proposing is an adaptive reuse of the Macy’s building, bringing our office tenants there, thereby reducing the overall height of the center block.”
The developers began tearing down existing structures last summer and the site has sat empty since August 2018. Since then, the developers have struggled to secure financing.
Olsen wouldn’t say how much the new plan would cost, (he said that information is proprietary) but he explained that the smaller mass of the structure would save the company money. Constructing a 14-story building would have required high-rise construction techniques, and Brookfield would have to had to import subcontractors from larger markets to do the work, Olsen said. The company will now be able to hire local subcontractors for the smaller building.
There is more demand for hotel space than office space in the city, Olsen said.
“There aren’t that many large format office users in the market,” Olsen said. “It’s a great hotel market, and our research has shown the area can absorb the additional rooms. It’s going to be a successful part of the project.”
Brookfield continues to be in conversation with the University of Vermont Medical Center, the project’s lead tenant, and Olsen said UVMMC has some concerns about parking.
“We’re working with them, they are still interested,” he said. “In the meantime, there are still hurdles, we have parking issues to solve.”
The company has not yet secured funding with the Bank of the Ozarks, but holds an executed term sheet with the creditor, Olsen said.
Mayor Miro Weinberger said the new plan was a “step in the right direction” for the project.
“I think there’s a lot more work to do in the couple months ahead to get the project back on track,” he said. “I do think what you laid out tonight has the potential of meeting all the major goals the city laid out in this process years ago.”
These goals include creating more housing and jobs downtown and generating new public revenues, Weinberger said.
Brookfield met Weinberger’s demand that the company present a new plan at Monday’s meeting. The company also met deadlines earlier this month to make $192,000 in payments the company had promised but not yet paid.
The city is poised to spend $22 million in tax increment financing on public improvements alongside the project, primarily reconnecting Pine and St. Paul streets through the site.
Voters approved the TIF funding in 2016, and all of the work on public improvements must be completed by June 30, 2021, under the development agreement. The city may have to ask the Legislature for an extension.
Olsen said Brookfield is committed to preserving the tax increment funding and will be meeting with the city attorney in the near future to discuss options.
Brookfield, which took over control of the project from its minority partner developer Don Sinex, announced in July that the project would be redesigned.
Councilor Karen Paul, D-Ward 6, said she thought the new plan represented a willingness from Brookfield to listen to the community.
“The one thing we have heard time and time again … is that the project needed to be more in line with the skyline of Burlington, and I think you have done that,” she said.
Councilor Max Tracy, P-Ward 2, said Brookfield had more work to do to restore trust with the community. Tracy was happy to see a scaled-down project, but scolded the company for delays.
“It is incredibly frustrating to have been saying those things and having been pretty much ignored during this process, not seeing a lot of responsiveness to these comments,” he said.
Tracy said he thought the addition of the hotel was a “substantial change” to the project and that Brookfield needed to take the time to engage the public on the new plan.
“We’ve seen numerous hotels come into our downtown in recent years,” he said. “It seems as if the public should have a chance to weigh in on if that is a use that they want.”
Attorney John Franco, who represents project opponents, said he was pleased by the new design.
“This is a huge step forward, it’s very much what we had expressed we wanted three years ago and were told they couldn’t make it happen,” he said.
Franco said the permit revision process would likely mean a 2021 construction start date, a year later than Brookfield’s goal.
Jeff Glassberg, a consultant who is managing the city’s relationship with the developers, said in an email to councilors that Brookfield had “fully met” Weinberger’s demands from last month.
“There is significant evidence of progress with regard to planning for development of the project site, as well as the former Macy’s,” Glassberg wrote.
Glassberg said the city would like more information about UVMMC’s commitment and more information about the schedule.
“Those will be forthcoming as a matter of course,” Glassberg wrote. “There is significant work to be done to keep the TIF opportunity live. But overall, there has been notable focus and progress.”
Brookfield is currently working on restoring the right of away around the site, and the company’s next step is seeking feedback from the community on the concept, Olsen said.
“Now we are going to focus on refining the spaces, and architecture, drawing the look and feel of the building,” he said.