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August 2, 2019

Apartments debut at former W. Locks Montgomery Mill Complex

Rendering | Contributed A 3-D rendering of the lobby inside the redevelopment former Montgomery Mill Complex in Windsor Locks, which is being converted into 160 apartment units.
By Joe Cooper

Tenants began moving into new apartments Thursday at the redeveloped former Montgomery Mill Complex in Windsor Locks, according to First Selectman Christopher Kervick.

The first 36 units of the $64 million apartment complex on Thursday received certificates of occupancy, allowing several residents to move into the property, which has been vacant for at least two decades.

Boston-based developer Beacon Communities LLC, which acquired the building in 2016, is currently renovating the three-building complex on Canal Bank Road to house 160 units total by October.

“It’s such a major change for us in terms of our entire downtown revitalization process,” Kervick said Friday. “We haven’t had any significant construction in our downtown area since the early 1980s, so this is big for us.”

The remaining apartments will debut in two seperate waves on Sept. 1 and Oct. 1, the first selectman said.

As of Friday, Kervick said the complex already had a 90 percent occupancy rate.

He called the transit-oriented apartment complex a “catalyst project” for other new developments downtown, especially the town’s ongoing restoration of its historic train station, which will eventually connect to the CTfastrak line.

“It puts the feet on the streets in the downtown area near the new train station,” Kervick said. “We have small shops and plans for larger shops but they are all dependable on this critical mass of people living downtown. They feed off each other.”

Kervick added that Beacon Communities has met all of its construction timelines since breaking ground on the development in Jan. 2018.

The Montgomery Mill building sits by the Windsor Locks Canal State Park, directly next to the Bridge Street Bridge connecting Windsor Locks and East Windsor.

The project has received assistance from both the town and state, with the town providing property tax breaks over a 10-year period and the state providing millions in grants, loans, and housing credits.

In 2017, Windsor Locks voters approved a final $8 million in state funding; the town was used as a “passthrough entity” from the state to the developer.

Beacon that year paid the town a $375,000 permit fee before it began renovating the building.

Journal Inquirer contributed to this report.

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