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An aerial view of 801 Bridgeport Ave.
A proposal is on the table to put a new hotel and 10 other buildings on a former United Illuminating office property on Shelton’s Bridgeport Avenue.
A public hearing before the Shelton Planning & Zoning Commission has been scheduled for Nov. 29 at 7 p.m. in City Hall.
Plans for the development proposal show:
- a four-story, 123-room hotel
- a 14,200-square-foot pharmacy
- a 2,500-square-foot coffee shop
- a 2,200-square-foot bank
- a three-story, 4,400-square-foot office building
- three restaurants totaling 16,776 square feet
- three retail buildings totaling 30,100 square feet
The 19-acre property — 801 Bridgeport Ave. — is being sold for $6.6 million, according to paperwork submitted to the Shelton land use office.
The deal has not yet closed.
The buyer is a limited liability company managed by John Worgan, an accountant from Middlebury.
Dominick Thomas, the lawyer who submitted the paperwork for the development, said Worgan is a representative of the buyers, who will be developing the property.
“At the present time there’s no indication of flipping it,” he said. “These are developers.”
He declined to name who the buyers are, but said more will be revealed at the Nov. 29 public hearing.
“The investors will be at the meeting,” Thomas said. “They’re people who have had some experience with Bridgeport Avenue.”
The site was formerly used by United Illuminating, which bought it in 2004 for $16 million, according to city property records.
The property had been marketed with an asking price of $8,995,000.
A two-story office building currently standing there totals about 100,000 square feet, according to marketing materials.
It has been vacant for about five years after the utility company consolidated its operations in Orange.
The land is currently zoned for industrial use.
The application seeks to create a “planned development district” for the property.
Opposition Organizing?
The proposed development is about a half-mile from the site of a sprawling, 121-acre mixed use development known as “Shelter Ridge.”
Shelton’s Planning & Zoning Commission approved a planned development district at that property in March after months of contentious hearings that saw widespread public opposition.
Those opposed to the development organized as a group called “SOS Save Our Shelton,” and vowed to campaign against commissioners who voted to approve the project in this year’s election.
FILE
Caitlin Augusta, one of the leaders of SOS Save Our Shelton, holds a sign after a March 17, 2017 Planning & Zoning Commission hearing.
They endorsed two candidates who voted no on the zone change — Jimmy Tickey and Anthony Pogoda — as well as Mark Widomski, who petitioned his way on to the ballot.
On Election Day, the trio endorsed by the group won office.
That meant Ruth Parkins, the commission’s longtime chairwoman, who had voted in favor of the Shelter Ridge zone change, lost her bid for re-election.
Though Parkins received 163 more votes — 3,991 to 3,828 — than Tickey, minority representation rules meant at least one Democrat would be elected.
Widomski and Pogoda, both Republicans, received 5,111 and 4,822 votes, respectively.
In a Nov. 17 comment on its Facebook page, SOS said the proposed development at the former UI property is “just what we don’t need.”
The group sent the Valley Indy a statement opposed to the zone change proposal Tuesday (Nov. 28). Click here to read it in its entirety.
