Brownfields
Success Story
Ludlow M lis
Ludlow, Mass.
A 200-year-old mill complex that once provided an economic engine in
western Massachusetts is now being redeveloped into one of New
England's largest brownfield mill redevelopment projects.
The Ludlow Mills site, covering about 170 acres along 1,5 miles of the
Chicopee River, has already been redeveloped into housing, a hospital
and greenspace along the river. Future plans for the 50 historic mill
buildings include a $50 million mixed-use project that is expected to
create 2,000 jobs, attract $300 million in private investment, and increase
annual municipal property tax revenues by $2 million per year.
Located in the Ludlow Village Historic District and listed on the State
and National Register of Historic places, the site is being redeveloped in
one of the most economically disadvantaged regions in Massachusetts.
Priming the Property for Redevelopment
New England has an industrial legacy dating back to the 18th century.
Many cities and towns were originally built to supply workers for the
manufacturing mills. A great many of these mills remain today, some
successfully redeveloped, but the majority abandoned or underutilized,
posing a significant health and safety risk and dragging down the local
economy.
New Englanders still feel a connection with their old mills, and often prefer
to restore them rather than tearing them down. The mills are as much a part
of their heritage as the fieldstone walls that wind throughout the landscape.
The brick and carved-stone walls, massive wood timbers and steel I-beams,
and wide-planked wood flooring lend an architectural quality and historical
authenticity that cannot be reproduced in new buildings.
The challenges to restoring and modernizing these buildings are magnified
in large mill complexes with many buildings of varying sizes and types of
construction, as is the case in Ludlow. Further complicating matters,
information on the early operations may be hard to come by, making it
difficult to identify the types and locations of any contamination. The Ludlow
Mills site is among those mills with these added complications,
WESTMASS Area Development Corporation, a private, not-for-profit
development corporation, proposed a mixed-use, sustainable building
complex with residential, office, retail, commercial and industrial uses. To be
viable, the project, announced in 2018, would need considerable
involvement of other public and private partners, which in addition to EPA,
included HealthSouth, Winn Development, Massachusetts Department of
Environmental Protection, Mass Development, Mass DOT, U.S. Economic
Development Administration and the Town of Ludlow. EPA's Brownfield
Program was key.
EPA Grant Recipient:
WESTMASS Area Development
Corporation
Grant Types:
Assessment Cleanup, Targeted
Brownfields Assessment
Current Uses:
Housing, Hospital and Greenspace
&EPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
"Opportunity Zones: helping to bring
investment to distressed communities"
Former Use
Mill

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EPA's involvement spanned many years, beginning with a $231,000
assessment grant and continuing to this day. The assessments gave
WESTMASS both the liability protection and the environmental information
it needed to negotiate a purchase with the private owner; which was critical
in moving the redevelopment forward. EPA's initial investment led to an
additional $275,000 in EPA assessment funding, including a recent $150,000
targeted brownfields assessment, and $800,000 in EPA cleanup grant
funding; bringing the total to $1.3 million.
Because of the complexity of the site, the project team needed to
understand first-hand the environmental site conditions in relation to the
overall redevelopment.
Today
Major redevelopment projects completed to date include:
Senior Housing: Winn Development has spent $24 million rehabilitating
the 109-year-old Mill # 10 into 75 senior independent living
apartments, which were finished in 2017.
HealthSouth Hospital: The $27 million rehabilitation hospital opened in
2014 creating 70 high skilled jobs.
Riverwalk and Greenspace: The 1.5-mile paved walking trail along the
Chicopee River was built with $600,000 from HealthSouth &
WESTMASS, completed 2016, and 50 permanently protected acres.
Riverside Drive: The Department of Commerce through the US
Economic Development Authority awarded $3.1 million for the
development of this crucial artery that will run through complex. The
town of Ludlow is providing a $3.1 million match to complete this
project.
And this is just the beginning. Winn Development has a purchase & sale
agreement and is pursuing tax credits to finance construction of the $50
million mixed use project that will include apartments, retail and office
space. According to WESTMASS, $1.3 million in EPA funding has already
leveraged over $127 million, 94 percent of it private capital. This represents
about $100 realized for every dollar of EPA investment. Over the next 20
years the project is projected to create 2,000 jobs, attract $300 million in
private investment, and increase annual municipal property tax revenues by
$2 million per year.
"EPA involvement,
funding, and support
has been instrumental
to the success of this
project. If it wasn't for
EPA's commitment to
our project, we
wouldn't be able to
attract the type of
private and public
investment into the
Mills that we are now
experiencing."
Jeff Daley, President/CEO
WESTMASS Area Development
Corporation
For more information:
Visit the EPA Brownfields website at
www.epa.gov/brownfields or contact
Jim Byrne at 617-918-1389 or byrne.james@epa.gov.
EPA 560-F-20-011
June 202.0

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