By Jennifer Myers, jmyers@lowellsun.com
LOWELL -- Everything old is new again at the Appleton Mills.
A mason is perched on scaffolding above the Hamilton Canal along Jackson Street, attached to the 175-year-old outer wall of the former Appleton Mill building. Wearing a protective mask and a hard-hat he works with a saw, fitted with a vacuum attachment. Brick-by-brick damaged mortar is removed, the bricks are repointed.
To the mason's right, a section of the wall that has been repointed and power-blasted has been reborn. It looks new.
On the inside of the steel beam-braced wall, big men in heavy equipment begin regrading the site and building roads. Larry Sparrow, project manager for developer Trinity Financial, said 22,000 yards of fill is expected to be trucked in this season.
The contractor for the 200,000-square-foot Appleton rehabilitation project is CWC Builders of Newton.
The first phase of the $800 million Hamilton Canal revitalization, the construction of 130 one- and two-bedroom affordable artist live-work spaces, is on schedule to be ready for occupancy next April.
"To drive down Broadway and see those huge cranes and what is taking place down there in this economy is incredible," said City Manager Bernie Lynch. "That (the Appleton Mills) was a building a lot of people wanted to see torn down; they (Trinity Financial) are taking a historic building that was collapsed in on itself and putting it back together bit by bit. This development will transform the downtown."
The Appleton Mills redevelopment was financed through state and federal historic and housing tax credits that were purchased for $42 million by insurance giant MetLife Inc.
The project also received a $1.6 million permanent mortgage and a $34 million construction loan from MassHousing.
Gov. Deval Patrick helped launch the project last fall with a $13 million state grant.
When completed, the 15-acre Hamilton Canal District will boast up to 450,000 square feet of commercial and office space, 55,000 square feet of retail space and 700 units of affordable-and market-rate housing downtown, as well as generate as many as 400 permanent jobs.
The full project is expected to be completed in about 10 years.
Lynch added that seeing a project of this magnitude moving forward in this economic climate, "shows great confidence in the city of Lowell by the developer and the finance community."
Back on site, Sparrow points to a fifth-floor window. New drywall is visible through the frame. Throughout the other units, the nearly 100-man crew can be seen running wiring, installing mechanical systems and duct work and putting the bathroom and kitchen cores in place.
New installed exposed beams are visible through the windows. The lumber is Douglas Fir, trucked in from Oregon.
Sparrow said they had been getting the Oregon lumber from a Pennsylvania distributor, but that company could not keep up with the project's demand.
"We are at about 50 percent completion right now," Sparrow said. "It is very challenging and labor-intensive, but a great juxtaposition of the old and the new."
DeFelice Corp., of Dracut, has begun construction on improvements to the adjacent Lord Overpass, said Adam Baacke, assistant city manager and director of the Department of Planning and Development.
Improvements to the overpass are expected to be complete at the end of the summer. Changes include new lane designations, traffic islands, and signal timing on the overpass, to improve traffic flow, and better pedestrian connection between the train station and the Hamilton Canal District and downtown.
Baacke added that the next infrastructure contract, which will be put out to bid later this year, will be for "construction of a permanent bridge to carry Canal Street over the Hamilton Canal and improvements to the entire length of Jackson Street to support both the Hamilton Canal District and the Hamilton Crossing projects including the planned new Lowell Community Health Center."
The infrastructure work, Baacke pointed out, is funded through federal and state grants, including a $2 million grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration awarded to the city last month.
The next project is the 50,000-square-foot former Saco-Lowell Shops, also known as the Freudenberg building. It will be reborn as commercial retail space.
Trinity Financial has tapped ICON Architecture to design the building and is working on putting together a financing package, which Baacke said will likely include a mix of debt financing and federal and state tax credits
This story appeared in the Lowell Sun on Sunday, July 18, 2010