Housing Headlines

ORLEANS --- A vacant strip mall of empty offices and the former home of Phoenix Fruit may get new life as a local builder has made an informal presentation to the town's affordable housing committee to build six two-family townhouses and four one-bedroom apartments. Initial plans call for the townhouses to be sold at market rate and the apartments rented at affordable prices. However, committee chair Tom Johnson told the Chronicle that the developer was reconsidering the inclusion of affordable housing.

FALMOUTH --- In an interview with the Falmouth Enterprise, new town planner Thomas Bott said one of the first things he did when he arrived was research how a municipality like Falmouth can qualify for Gov. Charlie Baker's Housing Choice Initiative. "I did some research with the building department and found out that the town couldn’t qualify for that initiative based on the production that we have,” said Bott, whose previous job was in Kingston. “Next year we will look at it again. We’ll have a bit more of a leg up if we have a housing production plan that is current.”

LAWRENCE --- One week after celebrating with Gov. Charlie Baker the grand opening of 55 more apartments at his Riverwalk development in South Lawrence, developer and pizza king Sal Lupoli is making headlines again, this time talking up plans for a 20-story apartment building, 70-room hotel, restaurants and retails stores that he would build on sites he's acquired or needs to acquire between the Merrimack River and his Riverwalk development.

WORCESTER --- The site of a defunct downtown shopping mall is continuing its $92 million rejuvenation as Roseland Residential Trust has completed construction of a second apartment building is completed as the first one is leasing up. All told, 365 apartments are slated to be built on the downtown site.

BROCKTON --- Mayor Bill Carpenter may seek legal action against a downtown business called Trim-Line Automotive after complaints that the site is a homeless hangout and a defacto junk yard littered with broken-down vehicles and machinery, including SUVs, cars, a delivery truck, a rusting sit-down lawn mower, a camper and a large motorboat.

MARLBOROUGH --- Having already built 350 apartments near jobs off Route 495, Avalon Bay sees an appetite for more housing and is partnering with Atlantic Management to propose 123 one- and two-bedroom apartments at its Marlborough Hills development. Marlborough Hills is located at the former Hewlett-Packard campus on Forest Street, which currently houses GE Healthcare Life Sciences, Quest Diagnostics, a Whole Foods headquarters, a 153-room Hilton Garden Inn, a Learning Experience Child Development Center daycare and the Avalon apartments.