A $100 million project aims to bring new life to Hartford’s Pratt Street and the surrounding downtown neighborhood. These developers have a vision for life in the city after COVID-19.
An ambitious vision for the redevelopment of downtown Hartford’s Pratt Street into a new, $50 million hub of nearly 200 apartments above restaurants, entertainment space and shops is now under construction as the city heads into the uncertainty of life after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I’m not a fortune teller — nobody’s a fortune teller — however, our sense is we are detecting a very positive and strong interest in leasing,” said Michael Seidenfeld, chief operating officer of Shelbourne Global Solutions LLC, of Brooklyn, N.Y., a partner in the project. “We have even seen some serious interest for new retail on Pratt Street that would bring a perfect vibe to street.”
Pratt runs between Main and Trumbull streets and is viewed as a critical “walkable” connection among the North Crossing development around Dunkin’ Donuts Park, the XL Center, new apartments on Allyn Street and Union Station. But vibrancy has eluded Pratt Street for decades, despite the charm of its brick-paved street and sidewalks and late 19th- and early 20th-century structures, many of them architecturally ornate.
The Pratt Street project is part of a larger, $100 million vision for the heart of downtown Hartford, reaching east along Pratt to Main and Market streets. Plans call for adding more than 300 apartments over the next few years, reinvigorating storefront space and replacing a decaying parking garage.
Shelbourne, downtown Hartford’s largest commercial landlord, has partnered with LAZ Investments, headed by parking magnate Alan Lazowski, and developer Martin J. Kenny on the project, a veteran of development projects in the city.
Shelbourne, which acquired much of the south side of the street in 2018 and 2019, sees the addition of apartments, replacing tired, often vacant office space as crucial to paving the way to not only a cool place to live but also to visit.
The pandemic has taken a heavy toll on businesses downtown, as office towers emptied and restaurants and other businesses struggled. New apartments initially saw an erosion of occupancy but have, in recent months, turned around. Rents are, for the most part, stable, but landlords are offering tenants incentives to move in.
As painful as the pandemic is, mid-sized Hartford could stand to benefit from a further migration of employers — and people — out of more densely-populated urban centers such as New York, Seidenfeld said.
Southwestern Connecticut — and to a lesser extent, Hartford County — already has seen a migration out of nearby urban areas during the pandemic.
“Whereas, in the past, a lot of companies, retailers and people would not even give Hartford a second thought, the pandemic has caused people to rethink, take a fresh look at, everything in life,” Seidenfeld said, during a recent tour on Pratt Street. “And we have seen that in Hartford as well.”
Shelbourne plans to cultivate a “vintage hipster” vibe on Pratt, taking advantage of the historic nature and look of the street. Shelbourne also is pairing those efforts with a 12-month marketing campaign for the capital city at large. The goal is to reposition Hartford as a destination — lifestyle, arts and cultural center — in the Northeast.
“Ultimately, Pratt Street, I think, rises or falls to the extent that it is able to draw from and become relevant to the rest of the city, if not the region,” Michael Berne, president of MJB Consulting in New York, a planning and real estate consultant, who has closely followed Hartford redevelopment. “And that’s a challenge.”
Shelbourne also has to contend with owning just the south side of the street, the opposite side controlled by Northland Investment Corp, of Newton, Mass.
So far, Berne said he is seeing positive signs from Shelbourne. The company understands that it will need to “get creative” with leasing terms to cut down on the risk for retailers and other entrepreneurs, he said.
For Pratt to become a success, however, the street also will have to carve out a distinct personality from Front Street near Hartford’s convention center, Berne said. Front Street includes an entertainment district, apartments and the University of Connecticut’s regional campus.
“The key will be — and to some degree this is a marketing challenge — can you effectively and convincingly differentiate Front Street from Pratt Street, not just in the minds of consumers — physically, it’s a very different experience — but also in the minds of prospective tenants and retailers?’' Berne said. “That’s a little bit of threading the needle, no doubt.”
More rentals downtown
The new apartments on Pratt Street are part of a major wave of new rentals downtown that launched in 2014, whose financing was bolstered primarily by state-taxpayer backed, low-cost loans from the quasi-public Capital Region Development Authority.
So far, about 2,000 rentals have been added to 1,200 that previously existed, with the idea that urban centers need residents and not just 9-5 office workers. The goal is to bring 3,000 new rentals downtown, boosting the residential population in and around the central business district to 5,000.
The larger, $100 million project now kicking off with Pratt Street also includes a revamping of the former student housing behind the Lofts at Main and Temple into rentals and the replacement of the decaying Talcott Street garage. So far, the project has been approved for $14 million in CRDA loans, $12 million for Pratt Street.
The $29 million conversion of 99 Pratt St. will build on Shelbourne’s 32-unit, $5.8 million apartment conversion project at neighboring 196 Trumbull last year. Those “co-living” rentals are tailored to participants in the city’s Upward program, a downtown hub of 21st-century entrepreneurs and innovators.
The project at 99 Pratt St., just around the corner from the Trumbull Street conversion, will add 97 apartments, including 72 studios, 19 “studio-plus” and 6 one-bedroom units.
The units will range in size from 360 square feet to 462 square feet, with rents spanning $1,150 to $1,250 a month, plus parking.
Amenities will include a fitness room, community room, pet washing station, library and “arts room,” a “nod to creative, free-spirited innovators and people who have a creative vision” that Shelbourne hopes will form the foundation of its tenants on the street.
Plans for a rooftop lounge, however, have been scrapped because it presented too many construction challenges, Seidenfeld said.
Built for the Steiger’s department store in the 1920s and part of the downtown destination shopping scene until the 1960s, the 5-story building at 99 Pratt will retain its Art Deco-inspired flourishes outside and contrasting painted medieval beamed ceiling in the lobby.
Construction is expected to run through July of 2022, with apartment pre-leasing beginning at the end of this year.
A second phase in four more buildings owned by Shelbourne just to the east of 99 Pratt could add another 60 rentals on the street.
Berne, the real estate consultant, said COVID-19 has accelerated the move by millennials to the suburbs as they start families, so downtown projects such as Pratt Street will have to focus in on what Generation Z — future tenants now teenagers through recent college graduates — will be crucial.
“We have a whole new generation — Generation Z — that is really going to drive things in our downtowns and those are the ones whose feelings on downtowns are really front and center,” Berne said.
Berne said it is assumed that Generation Z will want many of the same things as millennials in cities: vibrancy, energy and a population for finding friends and, likely, a significant other.
“But what will that look like?” Berne said. “For instance, among teenagers, gaming is huge. It’s big business. To what extent are the gathering places that Generation Z favors going to revolve around gaming?”
Investing in Hartford
Shelbourne is a relative newcomer to the Hartford market, buying it first office tower, 20 Church Street, in 2014. But it quickly added to its holdings with Metro Center One, at the western end of Church Street; 100 Pearl and One Financial Plaza, the “Gold Building,” partnering on the purchase with Lazowski.
Shelbourne also has purchased properties outside of downtown, including the sprawling, former Fuller Brush complex in the city’s North End.
Seidenfeld said Shelbourne — in addition to offering special promotions and events with retailers on Pratt Street — can offer its tenants use of space in its nearby office buildings.
“So let’s say, someone needs conference space, someone needs flex space, if someone wants to use a gym in another place, if someone wants to host a big meeting, we will be cross amenitizing all of our assets downtown for our residents as well,” Seidenfeld said. “We’re not siloing anything.”
Seidenfeld said its entry into mixed-use development is a new step for Shelbourne, which has built its real estate portfolio in the prime, Class A office space.
“But what Hartford as shown us and taught us and we’ve learned that in order for one to thrive, all have to thrive because it’s an ecosystem,” Seidenfeld said. “So you need a strong residential, you need a strong corporate office presence and you need a strong presence of retail. You need all of that.”
How quickly office workers — a significant component that downtown ecosystem — return and in what numbers is still not known, but Seidenfeld is upbeat about prospects in Hartford.
“Despite people working from home and learning how to acclimate to the new reality — humans need humans and people are eager to get back with other people, whether it’s at events, whether it’s on the street and certainly in the office space,” Seidenfeld said.
“COVID was certainly a setback,” Seidenfeld said. “We view it as a temporary setback — very painful — and we respect and acknowledge that 100%.”
Contact Kenneth R. Gosselin at kgosselin@courant.com.
