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The plaza was the town’s first mall, built in the mid-1950s, and is zoned for commercial use, allowing a drug store.

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Both Godlewski, a Democrat, and Renna, a Republican, are running for Town Board in November for the only open seat.

Quoted from Rene

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Both Godlewski, a Democrat, and Renna, a Republican, are running for Town Board in November for the only open seat.

I thought Godlewski was running for County Leg.?

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ROTTERDAM
Capitol Plaza nearly cleared of businesses
Walgreens drugstore will be built on property
BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter

Like the rest of the nearly barren Capitol Plaza, the storefront at Newest Lunch remained dark Tuesday evening.
Inside, a scattering of booths and kitchen equipment was all that remained of the bar and grill that once bustled in the 1950s-era shopping center. The restaurant was one of the final businesses moved from Capitol Plaza last month, as HDB Ventures prepares to take ownership of the soon-to-be demolished building at Curry Road and Altamont Avenue.
    “If you drive by,
you’ll find an empty plaza,” said Bob Blank, a partner with HDB Ventures.
    Of the 15 businesses once located in the building, only Alesio Chiropractic remains. Blank said the owner of the plaza — Jeff Musiker — is relocating the business.
    Blank expects to complete the purchase of the building later this month and demolish it in late February or early March.
    The site should take about a week to clear, with work beginning on a 4,550-square-foot Walgreens drugstore shortly thereafter. Blank said the new drugstore should be built within five months and is anticipated to open sometime during the fall.
    Members of the town Planning Board approved the project in July 2006, but stipulated that the developer would need to acquire an eighth of an acre nearby the shopping center to ensure adequate parking. A dispute over the strip’s ownership stalled the project for nearly a year.
    In April, officials from the state Department of Transportation determined that the land belonged to Schenectady County, which promptly sold the parcel to HDB Ventures for $25,000. The sale wasn’t confi rmed until December.
    Meanwhile, the last vestiges of the shopping center are being liquidated, said George Keleshian, who is running the sale of all remaining equipment in the building for Musiker.
    Keleshian said any item not sold Monday will be moved at an auction on Jan. 17.
    Keleshian said an assortment of items from the New- est Lunch — including most of the bar signs and even the bar fixtures — have already been snapped up by restaurant owners around the Capital Region.
    Still, he said thousands of dollars worth of commercial kitchen equipment, restaurant furnishings and other remnants — everything from the doors to air conditioning units — remain to be sold.
    “Everything is being sold for 10 cents to 15 cents on the dollar,” he said.

Quoted from bumblethru

It's like the building on the corner of Curry Road and Guilderland Ave.. CVS bought it...and the property, that looks like it's ready to fall down with a good wind, just sits there....empty!!!

Quoted from bumblethru

I thought the hold up was DOT and Walgreens needing some of the public road for parking. There was something about the street that runs in back of the Plaza that runs from Curry to Altamont. I don't recall exactly...it was such a long time ago. :-/

Quoted from JRaup

I thought that the exemption had been approved?  Or am I misremembering that?

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Walgreens drops Rotterdam move
After 14 businesses depart Capital Plaza, Illinois drug chain cancels expansion plan

By ALAN WECHSLER, Business writer
First published: Thursday, July 31, 2008

ROTTERDAM -- First the pizza place departed. Then the printing store left. The men's shop followed, as did the salon, the lunch spot and the chiropractic office.

     
By early 2008, 14 tenants had left the Capital Plaza, a 50-year-old shopping center at the busy corner of Curry Road and Altamont Avenue.

But it was all for naught. It seems plans for a Walgreens drug store -- the reason for this retail diaspora -- have been abandoned.

"Walgreens has no plans for a store in Rotterdam, N.Y.," wrote Carol Hively, a Walgreens spokeswoman, in response to a recent query on the status of the store. She did not respond to requests for more information.

The Deerfield, Ill.-based company operates nearly 6,300 stores, but has slowed down its expansion plans to save $500 million in the next three years, the company announced in early July.

Two years ago, developers had won approval to build a 14,700-square-foot Walgreens drugstore at 1925 Curry Road. HDB Ventures LLC of New Jersey had planned to demolish the plaza and begin construction last year.

It never happened. Property owner Jeff Musiker said HDB Ventures never even bought the property from him, despite a contract dating back more than two years. He said he's heard nothing about Walgreens abandoning the project.

"I don't know what's going to happen," he said. "As far as I know, Walgreens has a commitment."

Calls to HDB weren't returned.

The delay has left Musiker holding a plaza with no tenants. With storefronts empty and weeds growing around the perimeter, it's become an eyesore for the town and a weight on Musiker's back.

"I'm sitting on a building with no income and all the expenses," said Musiker, a stockbroker and financial adviser with Wachovia who owns the property through his own business, IJM Associates. "I might have to put it back as a shopping center."

That may not be so easy. Most tenants have set up shop elsewhere in town.

"We're doing very well," said Jacquie Bond, owner of La Bella Salon. She left her space at Capital Plaza in January and bought a two-story building down the road.

"It was a lot of work, and we had to rush to do it," she said. "It's kind of ironic -- all the hard times we all went through, and now to see (Walgreens) fall through."

Anthony Denning, owner of Vincy's Printing, moved two blocks to a building he now owns.

"We're doing fine in our new spot," he said. "It's probably one of the best things I ever did."

The plaza was built in the 1950s with a variety of spaces on several levels for both offices and stores. It brought a lot of independent businesses together in an area increasingly being taken over by chain stores.

Town officials say they still haven't lost hope that Walgreens will come in. On Wednesday, Peter Comenzo, the senior planner, had just phoned Musiker, the property owner, to ask him to clean up the property.

"It was nice in its heyday," said Lawrence DiLallo, the town's Planning Commission chairman. "It's not nice anymore."

Alan Wechsler can be reached at 454-5469 or by e-mail at awechsler@timesunion.com.

Quoted from Kevin March

Where's the Metroplex when you need it???

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ROTTERDAM
Walgreens backs out of Capitol Plaza
BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter

    After more than three years of maneuvering and the relocation of more than a dozen businesses from Capitol Plaza, Walgreens has decided against opening one of its pharmacies there.
    The plan had been to demolish the 1950s-era shopping center at busy Curry Road and Altamont Avenue. But spokeswoman Carol Hively said Walgreens recently decided against opening a drug store at that location, and she offered no further explanation for the company’s decision.
    “The bottom line is we not going to open a store in Rotterdam,” she said.
    News of Walgreens withdrawal came as a surprise to most of those involved. Bob Blank, a principal with HDB and a developer for the chain drug store, said he was negotiating a deal on the property up until learning about the decision this week.
    “I’m not going to buy it without Walgreens,” he said.
    Blank suggested Walgreens’ recent downsizing of its expansion plans may have doomed the Rotterdam project. After opening more than 1,100 stores over the past three years, the nation’s largest pharmacy chain announced in July it would reduce store growth in 2010 and 2011 to conserve $500 million.
    Jeff Musiker, owner of Capitol Plaza, was caught off guard by the apparent loss of the sale after insisting the deal would go through for the past three months.
    “It’s very frustrating,” he said Thursday. “I basically have an empty plaza and all the expenses I had before.”
    Musiker was unclear about the property’s future, but said several other companies had inquired about the location over the past few years. Without a deal with Blank, he said, he plans to renovate and re-rent the plaza which sits at one of Rotterdam’s busiest intersections.
    “One thing that cannot be denied is that the plaza is in a great location,” he said. “There is no better place to do business in Rotterdam.”
    In 2005, developers proposed demolishing Capitol Plaza to make way for the 14,700-square-foot pharmacy and a 65-space parking lot. Opponents of the project — mainly the plaza’s 14 business tenants — argued there were already too many chain pharmacies in the town and that another would merely displace viable businesses.
    But Blank insisted his company would help relocate the businesses with long-term leases to other areas of the town. He even suggested the company might help provide money for their move, provided the project received town approval.
    In July 2006, the Rotterdam Planning Commission accepted the plans contingent on the developer acquiring a sliver of state Department of Transportation-owned land adjacent to the plaza which it said was needed to allow enough room for the proposed parking lot.
    Plans for the project remained stalled until it was determined the land actually belonged to Schenectady County, which promptly sold it to Musiker for $25,000 in April 2007.
    With demolition seeming inevitable, many of the businesses vacated Capitol Plaza. Alesio Chiropractic was the last to leave the building in February, with Blank assuring the project would move forward sometime in March.
    Since that time, the project’s special use permit for the Walgreens’ drivethrough has expired. And this week, town officials approached Musiker about upkeep on the derelict property.
    “It’s an eyesore,” said Planning Commission Chairman Lawrence DiLallo. “We looked forward to having a new building in that site and now we don’t know what’s in store for us.”
    Capitol Plaza is among three dilapidated commercial properties along the Curry Road corridor. Plans to redevelop the mostly vacant Curry Road Shopping Center into 94 condominiums has remained stalled for nearly a year, while there seem to be no plans in the works to redevelop a dilapidated mixed-use building at the Guilderland Avenue intersection after it was purchased by CVS Pharmacy in March.
    Meanwhile, many of the business owners that once occupied Capitol Plaza say they’ve experienced more success at their new locations than in the aging mini-mall, which they said was short on parking and occasionally flooded.
    Terri Ferrara, one of the owners of the Ferrara Dance Studio, said being forced out of the plaza where her business was located for more than four decades was a blessing in disguise.
    “There’s a silver lining in every cloud,” she said of her new location on Hamburg Street, near the Fasula Boulevard intersection. “For us we’re much happier where we are now.”
    However, the move didn’t come cheap. Ferrara said the studio spent about $12,000 to build the wood floor at its new location, a cost that Blank had initially pledged to cover.
    Nearly a year after the move, Ferrara is still waiting. She said she last contacted Blank in March, when the developer insisted he’d cover her expenses once his deal with Musiker was signed. It was the last time she heard from him, she said.
    “It was nothing but an empty promise,” she said.
    Likewise, the management at Regal Dry Cleaners said the business hadn’t received any help in relocating. Denise Skokan said the company was on a month-to-month lease, so there was never any compulsion for the developers to help them move them to their new spot off Curry Road.
    “It’s turned out to be a much better location, so they actually did us a favor,” she said.

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The drugstore that never came to Rotterdam

    What a fiasco the Walgreens that was supposed to be built at Capitol Plaza in Rotterdam has turned out to be. The drugstore chain’s decision not to come after all means that 14 viable local businesses were displaced for nothing, and the plaza’s owner and town are left with an empty shopping center at a major intersection: Curry Road and Altamont Avenue. If the owner can renovate and re-rent the place, which he says he plans to do, the town could actually be better off — but with would-be tenants seeing the way he operated in this case, that’s a pretty big if.
    We opposed this project from the beginning because a funky 1950s-era shopping center with a neat sign, densely packed with local businesses, looks better, employs more people and serves more people’s needs than a large, chain-owned, suburban-style drugstore — especially when there are already several others nearby in town. This last fact also raises the possibility that Walgreens could have put one or more of those other drugstores out of business and left a big, empty building standing there for a long time, just like the old Eckerd on State Street in Schenectady.
    Now we know that these drugstore chains not only might leave, they might not even come after they say they will. The Capitol Plaza owner who was going to get a big payday for his property never did, and the tenants with long-term leases who the developer suggested might get money to help them relocate, never did and never will.
    The town, which is looking to encourage small businesses and make its main commercial corridors more pedestrian-friendly and attractive, should make clear, through changed zoning if necessary, that it wants the same thing for Capitol Plaza.

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Town should use Capitol Plaza for own business

    Re Aug. 1 article, “Walgreens backs out of Capitol Plaza”: Since Walgreens has definitely decided not to purchase Capitol Plaza on Curry Road, many residents of Rotterdam are of the opinion that the town should consider purchasing this property for the construction of a new, centrally located, state-of-the-art public safety building that would house the Rotterdam Town Court and police station.
    Anyone who visits the courts in surrounding towns in our county or adjacent counties can easily see that our present facilities are antiquated, insufficient and a fire trap, as well as being dangerous to the litigants, attorneys and court staff. Our town court, police and residents deserve much better.
    I am asking that the town board consider purchasing the property to construct a public safety building that we can be proud of, one that would take us out of the 18th century and bring us into the 21st century.
    THOMAS E. DELORENZO
    Rotterdam The writer is an attorney.

Quoted from Kevin March

I would have to say that although the Draper School may be a good place, the Capitol Plaza is definitely a more centralized location, with the entrances / exits to Curry Road and Altamont Ave.

Quoted from Salvatore

really? I wasnt sure if they had a town hall or not. Is it in Princetown?

Quoted from Shadow

The town has already said that they want the new town complex to be located near the 5 corners area as there's easy access to all areas of the town from that location.

Quoted from Rene

Why would the Duanesburg Town Hall be located in Princetown?  Yes we have a town hall, it is very modest and not nearly large enough to accomodate our needs, but we do have one.  You should come out and visit us sometime.  We even have running water and indoor toilets ;)

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Rotterdam should look into idea for Capitol Plaza

    This is regarding the Aug. 8 letter from Thomas DeLorenzo about Capitol Plaza and Walgreens.
    I have never been to a Walgreens, and from the way they bullied into the Capitol Plaza, forcing everyone to move to new locations and then not taking over the nowempty space, I don’t think I want to visit a Walgreens. That aside, I agree with Mr. DeLorenzo [who suggested turning the plaza into a public safety building].
    Most of the town residents I spoke to in the past were not happy with the plaza emptying out to make way for yet another drug store, but town officials decided to go ahead with it anyway.
    Now let’s make this plaza into something useful again. Mr. DeLorenzo’s suggestion is a good one and it should be looked into.
    JANN CHASE
    Schenectady

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Intersection too busy for new Rotterdam police station

    Re Aug. 8 letter, “Town should use Capitol Plaza for own business,” by Thomas E. DeLorenzo: First of all, I believe that Rotterdam police do need to look into getting a new station. I also am a little upset that a plaza that was there for so long was to be demolished for yet another drugstore.
    I have talked to a few people since hearing that Walgreens had decided against bringing their business to this busy intersection. When I was speaking with them, I favored putting the new police station there. I have since changed my mind. Why?
    First, have you ever tried to drive through Curry Road/Altamont Avenue during rush hour? What do you think would be the consequence of the authorities needing to respond out of an entrance onto either one of these streets during this busy time of day?
    Second, think of the additional time this would add to responses for the entire town, including Rotterdam Junction and Pattersonville. They are all part of the Rotterdam budget, overseen by the Rotterdam Town Board and protected by Rotterdam police. Let’s look at how much more time it would take to respond to a call in Pattersonville (since it is the most outlying area). This is an additional two miles, or five to 10 minutes depending on traffic, for any response.
    While I realize they would be responding with lights and sirens when someone is calling 911 for an emergency, do you want the response to be that much slower? While this may be a good central location for Rotterdam proper, we need to think of all areas of town while making these decisions, not just the parts people think about every day.
    I do believe we need to make this plaza area into something that could be used by everyone. While I don’t see Mr. DeLorenzo’s idea as best, maybe the plaza could be rebuilt into something to better the town, such as a new town hall or community center. Or, as another idea, maybe take down the entire thing and bring in someone else who wants to expand the town and county tax bases.
    KEVIN MARCH
    Rotterdam

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Bob Blank, a principal with HDB and a developer for the chain drug store, said he is anticipating preliminary work on the building to begin sometime next month.

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ROTTERDAM
Walgreens plan moving forward Company said plan was dead, developer says otherwise
BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter

    Plans for a Walgreens at the former Capitol Plaza in Rotterdam are back on the table.
    Less than three weeks after a spokeswoman disclosed that the Illinois-based pharmacy was no longer interested in a project to build a 14,700-square-foot store on the bustling corner of Altamont Avenue and Curry Road, a developer under contract with the company said plans are back on track. Bob Blank, a principal with HDB and a developer for the drugstore chain, said he is anticipating preliminary work on the building to begin sometime next month.
    “I’m going to move forward,” he said during a phone interview Thursday. “We plan on proceeding with the plan as presented to the town.”
    Town officials confirmed Blank’s intentions. Rotterdam Planning Commission Chairman Lawrence DiLallo said he met with Blank Thursday to discuss advancing the project in accordance with what the town approved in 2006.
    “He’s telling us he’s confident in the next couple of weeks he’ll be able to resolve his contract issues with [Capitol Plaza owner] Jeff Musiker and go forward with the deal,” he said.
    The Walgreens project is slated to be discussed by the commission during their fi rst meeting in September. DiLallo said Blank must reapply for a special-use permit he had received to add a drive-through to the building, since it expired earlier this year.
    Town Planner Peter Comenzo said Blank seemed earnest in his efforts to build the Walgreens and even presented final drawings to the town during their meeting.
    Attempts to contact Walgreens were unsuccessful Thursday.
    In 2005, developers proposed demolishing the 1950s-era shopping plaza to make way for the chain pharmacy and a 65-space parking lot. The project faced numerous setbacks, including a lengthy relocation of the plaza’s 14 business tenants and the acquisition of a sliver of state Department of Transportation-owned land adjacent to the plaza.
    The last business left the plaza in February, and Blank had initially discussed demolishing the structure in March. Then nearly five months later, a Walgreens spokeswoman disclosed that the company was no longer interested in locating a store in Rotterdam.
    Initial reports of the deal’s apparent failure perplexed Blank, Musiker and town officials. At the time, Blank insisted that he would pursue the project, but not without Walgreens on board.
    Blank said the apparent problems with the deal arose when Walgreens removed the project from their active project list. He said the company routinely opens about 400 stores per year, so it’s not difficult for some of the longer-term projects to fall out of their purview.
    “The [Rotterdam] store had been removed from the list because it was put on hold,” he explained.
    Blank said his discussions with Musiker have been in an attempt to make the project economically feasible. And while the deal hasn’t closed, he’s confident that the project will advance to the demolition phase sometime this fall.
    “It’s been a bit of a dance,” he said of the ongoing project.

Quoted from bumblethru

The water issue just may have been a problem for Walgreens cause it has been ongoing for a very long time. Long before Walgreens came on the scene. Perhaps they got wind of it, huh? Perhaps they did their homework?

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Best alternative for Rotterdam town offices

    Re Aug. 8 letter, “Town should use Capitol Plaza for own business”: I think the town of Rotterdam should consider the property at 679 Mariaville Rd., the V Stream Manufacturing building, for the police station and all town offices.
    The property has 7.5 acres that can be used for expansion if the building is not large enough to house all town departments. It is not far from the present police station, is easy to locate and has plenty of room for parking and a garage for the police cars. Who says the police station has to be in the middle of town?
    PAT COOKINGHAM
    Rotterdam

Quoted from Kevin March

Yes, to some extent, but there's not always going to be times that they are out and roaming around...and in that case, you only have so many that can go around such an expanse of area.  There needs to be one base, central location, as I see it.  Look at it this way.  If you live in Rotterdam proper, would you want to wait for a police car to come in from Pattersonville in case of an emergency?  Or roll the dice and hope one is rolling through your neighborhood or an area near yours?  And for communication, since they were just looking at a new radio setup recently, location is everything.  That NEEDS to be able to reach the full distance...which it might not be able to do if it is located on one end of the area that needs to be covered.  It may be spotty when the officer is trying to determine the address and the radio is breaking up because they're so many miles from the base.  

Quoted from Kevin March

I understand what you're saying.  Really, the best thing would be to have them at both places.  The only problem is the good old bottom line.  I don't think we could afford to have 2 stations, but in the end, it may be something that is needed.  I don't know how far down the line, but it may be something to look into in the future.  I imagine, though, that most of the calls (I would even gander a guess that 80-90%) of the calls for the police would be coming from Rotterdam "proper."  

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ROTTERDAM
Drug store plans OK’d
Capitol Plaza sale not yet set
BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter
Reach Gazette reporter Justin Mason at 395-3113 or jmason@dailygazette.net

    Rotterdam’s Planning Commission approved plans for a Walgreens pharmacy off Curry Road and Altamont Avenue, but doubts remain about the longawaited demolition of Capitol Plaza.
    Commission members revisited the project plans Tuesday, giving an approval that will allow the developer to seek a demolition permit and then dismantle the now-vacant 1950sera shopping plaza. The new approval was needed after owner Jeff Musiker and prospective builder Diamond Development LLC couldn’t agree on a sale price for the property before a special use permit for the drug store’s drive-through window expired last spring.
    However, Musiker said a fi nal sale agreement with Diamond Development hasn’t been completed. He would not discuss specifics.
    “Nothing has been fully worked out at all,” he said during a phone conversation after the commission meeting Tuesday.
    Town officials said Bob Blank, a principal with the developers, has assured them he has a contract with Walgreens until May 2009 and that the project could be completed within six months of the demolition. Blank, who did not attend the commission meeting, could not be reached for comment late Tuesday.
    The re-emergence of the project to build the 14,550-squarefoot drug store and 65-space parking lot comes only weeks after a Walgreens spokeswoman claimed the project was scrapped. Blank later insisted the Rotterdam proposal had only fallen off the company’s active list of projects, after the sale of the property stalled for more than a year.
    In 2005, developers proposed demolishing Capitol Plaza to make way for the chain pharmacy. Following its approval in 2006, the project faced numerous setbacks, including a lengthy relocation of the plaza’s 14 business tenants and the acquisition of a sliver of state Department of Transportation land adjacent to the plaza.
    Planing Commission Chairman Lawrence DiLallo said the shopping plaza is in dire need of attention. He urged the developers to “progress as fast as possible” to take down a building that has become an eyesore at a very visible intersection in the town.
    But during a review of the project, a Capitol Plaza tenant said Musiker was still trying to lease space in the building. Pat Corniello, the owner of Pat’s Men’s Shop, said Musiker had offered spots in Capitol Plaza to him and another business owner this month.
    “He asked me if I wanted to go back to the store two weeks ago,” said the business owner, who questioned who is telling the truth about the plaza’s future.
    DiLallo said Blank had assured him something could be worked out during a meeting in late August. He hoped the reissuing of a special use permit would help complete the discussions between Blank and Musiker.
    “We hope Mr. Musiker and Mr. Blank can get their heads together so we can start this project,” DiLallo said.

Quoted from bumblethru

Did anyone hear about a car driving into Capital Plaza where the old LaBella's was located last night?

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Driver charged with DWI in Rotterdam crash
Friday, September 19, 2008

ROTTERDAM -- An 18-year-old Schenectady man was taken by helicopter to Albany Medical Center Hospital early today after his car slammed into a vacant commercial building at the Capitol Plaza shopping center, according to police.
     
Joshua Lewis of 2175 Tower Ave.was traveling along Curry Road about 1:15 a.m. when his vehicle veered off the road and into the shopping center at the intersection with Altamont Avenue. He was charged with driving while intoxicated and excessive speed. Police said Lewis' injuries were not considered life-threatening.

The building sustained "major damage," police said.

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ROTTERDAM
Car rolls through plate glass window
Driver charged with DWI, speed

BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter

    Town police said a local man is facing drunken driving charges after he rolled his car, crashing through a plate glass window of the vacant Capitol Plaza early Friday morning.
    Police Lt. Michael Brown said Joshua Lewis, 18, of Tower Avenue, was traveling east on Curry Road in a 1988 Chevy Celebrity when he failed to negotiate a bend in the road at the intersection of Altamont Avenue. Lewis’ car sailed over the concrete median and then rolled through the parking lot before crashing into the shopping center around 1:15 a.m.
    Emergency personnel initially feared the teen suffered life-threatening injuries, so he was taken by helicopter to Albany Medical Center. However, Brown said Lewis’ injuries were not as severe as feared. A hospital spokeswoman listed Lewis’ in stable condition Friday afternoon.
    Lewis awaits arraignment on a misdemeanor driving while intoxicated charge and was also cited for speeding. Crash scene investigators determined Lewis was traveling at a high rate of speed.
    Plaza owner Jeff Musiker is involved in negotiations to sell the property to a private development company, which has proposed demolishing the building and replacing it with a Walgreens pharmacy. The demolition was originally expected in March, but was held back after Musiker and Diamond Development LLC couldn’t reach an agreement.
    The town’s Planning Commission re-approved a special use permit for the pharmacy’s proposed drive-thru window this week, but Muskier said the sale still hasn’t gone through. Commission members have advocated for the plaza’s demolition lately, citing it as an eyesore at one of the town’s most trafficked intersections.
    Town code inspectors examined the building after the crash and determined that it did not sustain any major structural damage. “There was some structural damage, but the building is not at risk of collapsing,” Brown said.
    Musiker was dismayed to learn of the damage to Capitol Plaza, even as Diamond Development maneuvers to demolish the structure. He said the damage was the second sustained by the empty plaza this week, after someone apparently shot holes through one of the windows along Curry Road.

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EDITORIALS
Drugstore redux in Rotterdam

    After the Rotterdam Planning Commission on Tuesday again approved a project that should never have been approved in the fi rst place — a proposed drugstore at the corner of Curry Road and Altamont Avenue — its chairman urged the developers to move as quickly as possible to remove an “eyesore” at that very visible intersection. We don’t find the funky, charming 1950s-era Capitol Plaza an eyesore — certainly no more of one than a new, suburban-style big-box drugstore, complete with oversized parking lot, would be. But even if it were an eyesore, it’s one of the town’s own making.
    When this project was approved two years ago, Capitol Plaza was a vibrant shopping plaza with 14 tenants, a wide range of local businesses from restaurant to dance studio to dry cleaners to print shop. But those tenants all got displaced after the Planning Commission gave its blessing to an out-of-town developer’s proposal to demolish the plaza and bring in a Walgreens pharmacy. Supposedly the developer and shopping plaza owner, an absentee landlord, had agreed on a price, but the sale was never consummated, the project was delayed, and a few months ago a Walgreens spokesperson said the company was no longer interested.
    Obviously the owner was foolish to give up his tenants before actually getting money for the property — he has been paying for taxes and maintenance the last two years with no income, and he is in a much weaker bargaining position to sell it now. But what about the planning commission’s and town board’s hands-off role in a deal between real estate speculators that was not in the best interest of the town? Not only would the tenants be forced to move, but there was no need for a new chain drugstore with a half-dozen, including supermarket locations, already in close proximity. The town also should have been quite wary about emptying out a viable shopping plaza when it has several large old ones nearby sitting vacant.
    Ideally the plaza would be refilled with small businesses. But that would probably require a new owner, since would-be tenants couldn’t trust the current one, seeing how he treated the old tenants. The Planning Commission has made such a sale less likely by once again approving the project, despite the lack of a final sale agreement and without confirming that Walgreens is again interested and will be coming. We don’t know what you’d call it, but it certainly isn’t planning

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After the Rotterdam Planning Commission on Tuesday again approved a project that should never have been approved in the fi rst place — a proposed drugstore at the corner of Curry Road and Altamont Avenue — its chairman urged the developers to move as quickly as possible to remove an “eyesore” at that very visible intersection. We don’t find the funky, charming 1950s-era Capitol Plaza an eyesore — certainly no more of one than a new, suburban-style big-box drugstore, complete with oversized parking lot, would be. But even if it were an eyesore, it’s one of the town’s own making.

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When this project was approved two years ago, Capitol Plaza was a vibrant shopping plaza with 14 tenants, a wide range of local businesses from restaurant to dance studio to dry cleaners to print shop

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Ideally the plaza would be refilled with small businesses. But that would probably require a new owner, since would-be tenants couldn’t trust the current one, seeing how he treated the old tenants. The Planning Commission has made such a sale less likely by once again approving the project, despite the lack of a final sale agreement and without confirming that Walgreens is again interested and will be coming. We don’t know what you’d call it, but it certainly isn’t planning

Quoted from JoAnn

I spoke with the owner of Capital Plaza. Their contract with Walgreens expired March 15, 2008 and has not been renewed. So they are now looking to make repairs and possibly update the building and is currently looking for new tenants.

Quoted from MobileTerminal

::insert evil chuckle::

Quoted from Salvatore

eyyy it is a dump lets be real my friends. They oughta bulldoze it soon