Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com December 22, 2014 • Hartford Business Journal 21 Industry Focus E c o n o m i c F o r E c a s t Connecticut River are both largely cut off from the rest of town by Interstate 91. A vestige of '50s and '60s urban renewal, I-91 similarly severed downtown Hartford from the river. SepteMber 18 Stilts Building, CityPlace ii deals ripple through downtown Downtown Hartford's commercial real estate market is heating up and it's not just Connecticut investors taking notice. Two recent deals — the $20 million sale of CityPlace II and $45 million recapital- ization of the Stilts Building — were led by investors outside Connecticut, who may not be done shopping for Hartford real estate. Downtown brokers and property owners say they are now keeping a close eye on Constitution Plaza, which recently went up for sale and has also garnered interest from outside money. If the 665,000 square foot, Class A property sells at the high end of its projected market value it could trigger other downtown office building owners to test the market as well. "Other downtown owners should be encouraged by these two transactions," said Patrick Mulready, senior vice president and partner for real estate services firm CBRE/New England. OctOber 27 CT's bankroll quickens brownfield redevelopment efforts Owners and developers of contaminated, vacant or underused Connecticut com- mercial-industrial sites are finding the state's funding window open for cleanup and redevelopment of "brownfield'' parcels. In early October, the state Department of Economic & Community Development's brownfield division launched a new round of brownfield funding of up to $300,000 per project — $1.5 million in all — to conduct revitalization studies and assess- ments of any one of the estimated 400 old mills, factories and other historic indus- trial sites around the state. Earlier this year, 42 applicants with remediation/redevelopment proposals totaling $75 million bid for the $20 million in cleanup funds DECD had available this fiscal year. Demand was so high, the agency wound up awarding $28.1 million to 31 of those applicants, said Tim Sullivan, state director of brownfield, waterfront and transit-oriented development at DECD. OctOber 20 Carving a new future for Canton's old ax factory Even inside many of the red-hued buildings, where Canton's Collins Axe Co. carved a global market and built the quintessential factory town churning out axes, hunting and battle knives, machetes and plows, signs are everywhere that the de- cades have been unkind. Leaky, crumbling roofs and walls, rotting floorboards abound, including inside the 188-year-old factory site's sturdiest structure, a building fashioned from schist that, in more recent years, was a community-theater hall. Now, nearly a half-century after the factory closed, a development partnership consisting of the property's current owner and area investors envision salvaging and rebuilding its sturdiest structures and razing the rest to create The Axe Factory — $56 million worth of luxury single-family houses, townhomes, condominiums, a "boutique" hotel and retail space, and office space. July 28 Hartford builds on its 'arts, culture capital' mantle Finally, after decades of trying — and failing — downtown Hartford is shedding its "office park'' image. As owners of some of the city's smallest, least desirable mid-20th century and older buildings remake their outmoded interior office spaces into apartments that Millennials — generally those born from the early '80s to 2000s — and "empty- nest" Baby Boomers (born 1945 to 1964) crave, the essence of a new downtown is emerging, brokers, landlords and others say. In a decade, local brokers and futurists see the central business district of Con- necticut's Capital City as more like a big "living-recreation room.'' They, too, see downtown continuing to pulse as a business-to-business and learning marketplace, albeit one accompanied by a diverse population of young pro- fessionals and near-retirees with disposable income aplenty to splurge on dining, shopping, clubbing, and taking in the arts, movies, sports events, concerts and other live entertainment. nOveMber 3 Hartford's rising apt. rents likely to remain so Greater Hartford's apartment renters and landlords for quite some time have known, anecdotally at least, that good, affordable units are hard to find. Now, thanks to Dallas apartment-information researcher Axiometrics Inc., there's hard data on Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford apartment rents dating from 1996 to this September to back that up. The picture the data paints isn't much dif- ferent from the word-portrait of the Hartford area's rental-housing market that other real estate advisers and analysts offer. Yes, the Hartford region's apartment inventory is mostly older and more expen- sive than other U.S. housing markets. But — and this is likely music to the ears of landlords and developers-investors pouring millions into refurbishing, converting or constructing new apartment units — this region's apartment inventory is more occupied than almost anywhere else in America, except metropolitan New York, ac- cording to Axiometrics' latest third-quarter survey data. Tolland businessman/developer Kenneth Kaplan is converting the old Hockanum Mill in Vernon's rockville section into a motorcycle-themed museum and for other uses. The ax Factory's developers, from left, Michael Goman, Julius Fialkewicz, and Gregory Boyko. P H O T O | H B J F i L e P H O T O | H B J F i L e

• Cover