NYC developer wants to build 199 apartments near Batterson Park in Farmington
A developer is looking to build nearly 200 apartments near Batterson Park alongside the Pondview Corporate Center in Farmington, a town where more than 800 other new apartments are already planned.
New York-based Pond LLC is proposing a four-story, 56,000-square-foot apartment complex to join the center’s two office buildings.
Pond View Apartments stands to become the fifth major apartment-construction proposal on the books in Farmington. Theoretically, if developers built all five as planned they would add a total of more than 1,000 apartments in town.
Details about the the Pond View project haven’t come out yet but will be part of the developer’s formal application for zoning approval later this year.
Pond LLC bought the two three-story office buildings at Pondview Corporate Center in the summer of 2019. The buildings are home to about 20 tenants ranging from insurance agents and financial advisors to medical offices.
Pond LLC paid just under $20 million for the buildings at 74 and 76 Batterson Park Road, as well as the surrounding 34 acres. Last month, the company applied for a local wetlands approval to add a new building with additional parking, a project that would cover about 3 acres.
“The T-shaped building is to be four stories tall, accommodating 199 units, with a courtyard containing an approximately 2,100-square-foot pool situated along the western face of the building,” according to a report by SLR International, a consultant working on the project.
The original developer who constructed 74 and 76 Batterson Park Road in the 1980s had planned a third building, too.
“Due to changes in market demand, the building was never constructed, and the current developer has sought a zoning approval to permit the placement of a residential property on the site, which is currently zoned as ‘professional office,’ " according to SLR’s report.
Pond LLC contends its project would have no impact on a nearly 8-acre wetland nearby. When it began its review last week, the conservation and inland wetlands commission concluded it wouldn’t need a public hearing but did not reach a conclusion. The commission is scheduled to resume work Feb. 1.
As of now, Pond LLC hasn’t filed a site plan nor requested a zone change from the planning and zoning commission. That process will require a public hearing.
Pond LLC is a unit of Sovereign Partners LLC, a real estate investment firm based in a midtown Manhattan office tower. Sovereign Managing Partner William Gentile, who is listed as the Pond LLC contact on the wetlands application, could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Among the other large-scale Farmington apartment projects in the planning stage are the conversion of the former Hartford Marriott Farmington into 224 one- and two-bedroom units. That property went through a sale last fall, but town officials believe the new developer is ready to resume work.
Kaoud Real Estate Development LLC plans to build 190 apartments around the site of the McCallum Building on Route 4. A third developer, Metro Realty, has approval to build up to 146 apartments across Route 4 from the UConn Health campus, but neighbors have blocked that with a pending lawsuit.
A fourth developer holds municipal approval to construct 268 apartments in the town’s Unionville section, but that project hasn’t advanced in several years.
Don Stacom can be reached at dstacom@courant.com.
