Harvey, Hanna and Associates offered an update on the proposed redevelopment of the former GM Boxwood plant at a public meeting on Tuesday night.
The 3.4 million square foot plant closed in 2009 and was the location for the ill-fated effort to build a hybrid gas-electric car that ended in a bankruptcy filing.
Harvey Hanna executive Thomas Hanna confirmed that the plant will be razed at the public session at the Five Points Fire Co. east of Newport. Demolition should begin this year and continue into 2019, with construction also commencing in 2019.
“We did try hard to market the plant to manufacturers. We could not find any takers,” Hanna said. In an earlier update, Hanna had expressed hope that a portion of the plant could be preserved.
The Newport-based development company plans to build four buildings with about three million square feet and anticipated total employment of 2,100.
The timetable is nine years, although Harvey Hanna hopes to cut that figure. The focus is expected to be on fulfillment and distribution activities.
The economic impact of the Boxwood site is estimated at $281 million annually, with upwards of $10 million annually in tax revenue.
The site has an adjacent CSX yard and connections to the Port of Wilmington.
A separate proposal envisions a transit-oriented development for Newport, with the centerpiece being a SEPTA rail station. Hanna says the company hopes to connect the Boxwood area to the county trail network that extends into the Wilmington Riverfront.
Hanna noted that the company has already built out a comparable a project – the Twin Spans Business Park in New Castle off Route 9.
The site now employs 1,000 with a mix of light manufacturing, logistics and fulfillment clients.
The Boxwood site has undergone environmental clean-up work under the supervision of the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control. Nearly three-fourths of the Boxwood site has been released for redevelopment.
The site has groundwater contamination that is believed to be confined to the site, although continuous monitoring will take place.
A special fund that came out of GM plant closings pays for environmental costs.
During a question and answer period, one neighbor of the plant expressed concern over traffic and other issues that come with placing a fulfillment-distribution center in a residential area. She also called for an independent evaluation of traffic, environment and other impacts.
A civic association leader said environmental clean up funds are not adequate, since the site borders on a residential area and needs a higher clean up level.
Other residents also expressed worries over truck and rail traffic that come out of fulfillment activities and pointed to growing traffic volume and noise from the nearby railroad CSX.
Hanna said traffic, noise and pollution will have far less of an impact than the level of activity during the heyday of the GM plant, which at one employed 6,000.
