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November 18, 2022

Affordable housing approved for former industrial laundry site

RENDERING | CONTRIBUTED Rendering of a planned residential development for New Haven dubbed the Monarch.
By Liese Klein

The site of a former industrial laundry will be transformed into an affordable housing development under a plan approved Wednesday by New Haven’s City Plan Commission.

Avon-based Honeycomb Real Estate Partners, developer of parcels at 149 and 169 Derby Ave. in the city’s West River neighborhood, secured approval for a special permit to build ground-floor residential units on the site, which is in the BA zone. The commission also approved the project’s site plan and coastal site plan.

Honeycomb plans a new building housing 64 apartments, all affordable under the terms of the federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program. The development will be called the Monarch, a dual tribute to the defunct Monarch Cleaners that once sat on the site and the endangered butterfly. Industrial laundry New England Linen also once occupied the property, which is near but not fronting the West River. 

Pending approval of a grant to clean up contamination at the site, the developers expect to complete the project by late 2024 or early 2025.

Lewis Brown, principal at Honeycomb, said, “The idea of metamorphosis and changing this dirty, contaminated site with shuttered buildings into what we think is quite attractive, contextually appropriate affordable housing is pretty powerful.”

Contact Liese Klein at lklein@newhavenbiz.com.

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