Lowell - Hamilton Canal District

[LowellMass]

http://www.hamiltoncanal.com/default.aspx

[LowellMass]

http://www.lowellsun.com/fastsearchresults/ci_3989727

06/28/2006

Development of Hamilton District on fast track

By MICHAEL LAFLEUR, Sun Staff

The district is bounded roughly by Middlesex and Central streets, the Lord Overpass and the Lower Pawtucket Canal, connecting Lowell's downtown with the Gallagher Intermodal Terminal on Thorndike Street.

Since December 2004, city officials have been able to acquire all the privately held properties within the district either through purchase agreements or eminent-domain takings.

The city paid $3.6 million in December 2004 to purchase the nearly six-acre former Freudenberg Nonwovens Group plant off Jackson Street, which since has been demolished.

Much of the remainder of the district -- almost seven acres -- was contained in a large chunk of the decrepit Appleton Mills complex owned by controversial downtown landlord James Lichoulas. Councilors voted in April to pay Lichoulas $2.5 million to take his land by eminent domain.

[LowellMass]

http://www.lowellsun.com/local/ci_4189780

City officials 'excited' by developers' proposals for Hamilton Canal plan

By MICHAEL LAFLEUR, Sun Staff

At issue is the Hamilton Canal District, as it is dubbed by city planners, a nearly 15-acre, blighted patchwork of mostly empty buildings and vacant lots on the fringe of downtown. It consists mostly of a tumbledown, 7-acre swath of the Appleton Mills complex and the 6-acre former Freudenberg Nonwovens Group plant site. City officials have acquired all of the properties either through negotiated sale or by eminent domain.

The plan is to sell all the land to a private, master development firm that will oversee a massive commercial and residential revitalization of the area. Interested firms were asked to submit their qualifications by yesterday.

[Cotuit]

Here's the website for this project:

Hamilton Canal District