Last week, ROAN Ventures — the developers of The Hamlet at Saugatuck — rebutted a series of claims made about the project by the Westport Alliance for Saugatuck.
Today, the Alliance responds.
The Westport Alliance for Saugatuck thanks ROAN development for opening this discussion to the public, whose need for more information has been clearly voiced.
Unfortunately, the developers’ op-ed reads like a travel brochure. It lacks substance, specific data points and solutions our residents, Planning & Zoning Commission and specific committees tasked to protect our community deserve. Here is a detailed view of the problems we refer to in brief on the Westport Alliance for Saugatuck Website.
The developers made a proposal in 2022 whose scale, look and feel many were in favor of. However, problems still needed to be solved around parking, traffic and safety. The expectation was the developers would come back with thoughtful and realistic solutions to these concerns. Instead, the developers rewrote the zoning regulations, got them approved and increased their original proposal, yes, by 800%.
Artists’ renderings of The Hamlet, from the Saugatuck River: 2022 (top) and 2025 (bottom).
The concerns around this proposal are a direct result of the increased scale and mass. They include:
Increased traffic: Zoning regulations, including the new text amendment allowing for this development, clearly state any development must not have a negative impact on traffic.
Note: The traffic peer review relied on traffic studies done and paid for by the developer during the pandemic. The peer reviewer was transparent that he would shortly have other business in Saugatuck coming before the P&Z. He posed many questions and concerns around the solutions proposed by the developer. Among other concerns, he repeatedly pointed out the Franklin Avenue garage entrance and stacking system as a potential cause of problems whose back-ups could cause tie ups on Railroad Avenue, Franklin Avenue and Charles streets.
Traffic problems fall into two categories: access and public safet
Access: Cumulatively, the traffic issues this development will cause are impaired access to Metro-North, educational, medical, and the unique other resources of central Westport merchants that will impact every Westport resident. To wrap your mind around the problem, imagine the Norwalk Italian Festival occurring in Saugatuck every day of the week.
Residents in every district north and east of the station will experience mounting delays accessing Metro-North and the merchants of Saugatuck. RTM District 1 residents will have decent access to Metro-North and Saugatuck, but these 1000+ households will be effectively cut off from the educational, medical, arts and cultural and merchant/culinary resources that convince people to choose Westport over other communities.
Many have said they will dine and shop in Norwalk and points south. Some spoke about moving. This is sure to have a negative impact on Main Street, Post Road and the existing and future merchants of Saugatuck itself.
Drivers through Saugatuck now experience traffic delays of 20-30 minutes or more at peak times. Parents of school-age children are terrified that should the development go through as planned, they could experience interminable delays getting to their children if an emergency arises at their school.
Traffic app during rush hour in Saugatuck.
The developers’ own estimates include roughly 500 cars per hour parked/ re-parked via the Franklin Street garage entrance during peak hours. Anyone transversing Railroad Avenue for drop-offs and pickups will be sitting behind these cars as they try to exit the area.
Public safety: With only 2 main arteries for access to and from this area, residents are concerned that emergency vehicles could be delayed when minutes can literally make the difference between life and death. Given the density of the proposed development, questions also remain as to whether future Saugatuck residents can be adequately serviced with current fire station equipment and the narrow streets proposed. Will the developer or the town take on the liability for a fatally or a life-changing disability resulting from delays in emergency vehicle access?
The garage entrance for the hotel is located on a blind spot along the curve under the railroad trestle as Ferry Lane becomes Riverside Avenue. The developers propose narrowing Riverside Avenue, envisioning it as a pedestrian thoroughfare. But it will still also be a vehicular thoroughfare. The potential for impaired drivers leaving the garage after dark, after celebrating, causes great concern. Saugatuck has already experienced an increasing occurrence of automotive accidents, including a recent fatality.
There are no bike lanes and/or other pedestrian safety options planned. Bikers and pedestrians along Saugatuck Avenue have already experienced safety incidents from road rage because of traffic back-ups due to construction. What will happen when this becomes an everyday occurrence?
Event and truck traffic: In addition to increased traffic due to regular guests, weekday events of up to 300 people at the over 100,000 square feet of hotel event space will require large food service, laundry, refuse and other commercial vehicle access, plus traffic from event attendees. It’s not inconceivable these truck movements could back up traffic on Ferry Lane extending all the way to Saugatuck Avenue, blocking railroad parking and emergency service vehicle access.
Reductions in commuter, resident and patron parking: There is no question this development, as proposed, has woefully inadequate parking. It lacks enough parking for its proposed residents and hotel patrons, without accounting for parking for large scale events.
To be viable it relies on railroad parking, which is against town regulations, relying on a COVID-era provision that can change at any time allowing free parking after 3 p.m. in commuter lots.
There are two problems with this:
1) These lots do not belong to the town; they belong to the state and are leased to the town. The leases come up for renewal in 6 years, but can be revoked at any time.
The state of has begun a process of re-examining its leases, and how towns manage them. The state’s view, and we agree with it, is that these lots are for commuters. What happens if the state decides to revoke the town’s leases because it disagrees with the use?
2) Once commuters are parked, very few of them leave at 3 p.m. In fact, most remain until 5, 6, 7 or later. Surveys of the parking lots in the last 2 weeks, even during school break, found they are almost full, and the cars remain there until well after 3 p.m.
Elimination of current free parking and usurping of permit parking: The current site plan eliminates 42 free parking spaces and over 150 paid-for surface parking spaces that commuters, restaurant and merchant patrons currently use.
Artists’ rendering shows no parking on Railroad Place.
The developers also plan to enter a long-term contract with the town to purchase at least 70 parking permits for their employees, thereby taking them off the market for Westporters. In addition, they estimate their development will have 650 employees, many of whom will need parking. Where will they park? More importantly, since any of the remaining 575 employees can buy a parking permit, where will commuters park?
Westport is blessed with a direct shot to Grand Central – a very attractive asset that helps maintain property values and the growth of our community. What happens when commuters can no longer reliably find parking, and have to navigate through increased and unpredictable traffic tie-ups due to trucks servicing the hotels, banquet areas and event spaces.
Environmental Impacts: Although by no means a complete list, 3 major issues include:
1) The “wet” garage below the hotels at the river’s edge and below the water line
2) Flood water runoff
3) Need for close, technical supervision and highly skilled personnel to execute the brown fields remediation.
The “Wet” Garage: Although the technology of so-called “wet” garages is well known, it’s expensive, complicated, and relies on assumptions about the experience level of the developers and their ability to maintain its systems and structural components well into the future.
Should anything arise that encumbers this development to thrive financially – a not uncommon occurrence in development — the town could inherit this responsibility. If there is no plan or ready expertise to do this, the impacts to the river and harbor we all recreate in could be catastrophic.
Even if successfully implemented, commercial garages built below the waterline can have several environmental impacts, including:
Groundwater Disruption: Construction can alter the natural flow of groundwater, potentially leading to changes in local ecosystems. De-watering systems may lower groundwater levels, affecting nearby vegetation and wildlife.
Water Pollution: Runoff from vehicles, including oil, grease and heavy metals can contaminate surrounding water bodies if not properly managed. Inefficient drainage systems can exacerbate pollution risks.
Energy Consumption: Maintaining waterproofing and de-watering systems often requires significant energy, contributing to carbon emissions.
Habitat Loss: Building below the waterline may disturb aquatic habitats or wetlands, leading to loss of biodiversity.
Flooding Risks: Improper design or maintenance can increase the risk of flooding, which may harm nearby communities and ecosystems
Flood water runoff: More cars, activity and density inevitably lead to less absorption of flood water runoff and the potential for more contaminants within it. As anyone living in Westport at or near seawater levels knows, flooding is not predictable, and can even occur on sunny days. To date, we have not seen a complete and viable plan for this.
Certain train station parking lots are prone to flooding.
Need for close, technical supervision during the brownfield’s remediation. A Hamlet supporter who spoke at the P&Z zoom meeting last month indicated that we’re making “a big deal out of nothing” in the brownfield’s remediation. He said it will just be a couple of weeks of excavators and trucks to haul away contaminated soil. We disagree.
The development includes 3 areas which contain an untold number of feet of highly contaminated soil that need to be remediated. While we welcome this area being cleaned up, our residents need to be assured this will be done right, not rushed through, and every safety precaution taken. The state awarded grants of up to $8 million for the remediation, and their technical expertise could be used to monitor it. However, the awards and supervision would only occur if the developer agrees to build affordable housing on site – not off site as proposed.
Many questions surround this aspect of the development. The public deserves to know and understand the plan to keep them safe during and after remediation. Contaminants from this remediation could affect residents’ and surrounding areas’ health and well-being well into the future. This plan needs to be completely revealed and assessed by experts before this project is approved — not as a conditional requirement.
The veiled threat of 8-30g and massive redesign after 2022. According to many RTM members who voted for the text amendment to increase zoning by 800%, the developer used the veiled threat of an affordable housing development (8-30g) that could bypass town zoning to convince them, and residents, that their plan was the best option to maintain control.
There are several problems with this:
Their plan does not solve or stall the 8-30g threat. In fact, it makes Westport’s 8-30g problem worse, leaving the town at the mercy of other developers who may demand even bigger increases.
There are other properties in Saugatuck abutting this property that could still become 8-30g affordable housing.
The scale of this development is now closer to what could be built within 8-30g.
This developer has no substantive plan for affordable housing. It has promised 14 off-site units but hasn’t specified where they will be, and has said they may be delayed up to 3 years from coming online.
Lack of open space, sky and access to the riverfront: At the most recent Architectural Review Board meeting, board members repeatedly asked for a scale model, but the developers refused. Board members said they could not “wrap their arms around” the ramifications of the development, and questioned why the developers’ renderings did not offer views depicting the height of the buildings. After some back and forth, the board was able to get the developer to agree to provide street level elevations of Riverside Avenue.
Here they are:
East view (above): Access to and views of the river would only be between the 2 68-foot and 63-foot tall buildings. A small but important detail is missing. Where exactly would the public park?
West view (above): Note the building heights: 63 to 70 feet tall. To understand the scale, the height of the I-95 overpass over Riverside Avenue is only 52 feet high. These buildings will exceed that height by 10 feet or more.
Viability of the project and the developers: Westport is blessed with a community of accomplished and successful residents, many with extensive experience in development, business strategy and marketing to high-end luxury consumers. Many question the underlying assumptions around this development.
The forecast room rate ($900/night) of the hotel rooms (located directly across from the sewage treatment plant) is more than twice that of the current average room rate of any other hotel property in Westport.
The forecast selling price of the condos (from $1 million to $3 million) could be difficult to sell to high-end consumers, whose means give them unlimited choices, on a former brownfields site located at a train station with trains arriving/leaving every half hour or so, including Amtrak service more frequently.
Finally, our comfort level with the experience and expertise of the developers is hard to ascertain because of their limited track record.
Developments are always risky, and not for the faint of heart. The ambition of ROAN is certainly laudable. However, experience has shown that even developers with extensive experience and a lofty track record can be tripped up.
Think South Street Seaport in Manhattan, where many small retailers and restauranteurs lost their life savings, or closer to home, Southport’s Village Green.
Artist’s rendering (aerial view) of the proposed Hamlet at Saugatuck.
Why should residents care if the developers’ dream doesn’t come to fruition, and local investors lose their investment?
Aside from being a “neighborly thing” to care, the town and residents have a very real stake in this development succeeding. Especially because it is so complex.
Although the developments above eventually were resold and redeveloped, the long periods of bankruptcy and change in ownerships presented many problems for the communities, merchants, city services and tax rolls. W
ith this development, the town would have the added problem of ensuring the complex systems remain operational, and don’t end up causing environmental and/or other damage.
Who will pay the tab and keep the complex systems operating and maintained should the developer experience financial difficulties? Who will ensure that merchants and other stakeholders don’t get hurt in the process? Who will pay for remediation of the river and harbor should contamination occur?
Sometimes developers with the best intentions simply don’t know the community well enough to understand its needs and concerns.
As one of our Saugatuck residents with extensive experience in development put it, “in any public/private partnership there is a period of open communication between stakeholders followed by changes to accommodate the publics concerns.” There is good reason for this on both sides.
In the final analysis, the developers want a successful, financially sustainable project they can be proud of, and that offers returns on their investment. To achieve this, they need residents to support it – not turn their backs on it.
Town residents want a development that meets their needs, preserves access to the unique and important features and essentials they moved here for, and the sense of place Westport and Saugatuck offers.
As one resident put it in their petition comments: “If I wanted to live in a place that was as dense and urban as Stamford, I would’ve moved to Stamford.”
Going from the proposed 2022 rendering to the 2025 rendering says it all. A charming New England coastal village we could all enjoy and support to ensure its success, to densely packed urban high-rise development that forever loses the “unique sense of place and soul” that Saugatuck and Westport are known for.
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