Gatti’s patience pays off in Garden Theater block rehab
For Bill Gatti, this is one summer blockbuster that has been a long time in coming — six years, in fact.
By July, Mr. Gatti’s company, Trek Development Group, and partner Q Development should be ready to get rolling on the long-awaited rehab of the Garden Theater block on the North Side.
It’s a project that has required Job-like patience, as Trek and Q battled through years of delays and litigation to get to this point.
“It tested our resolve, for sure,” said Mr. Gatti, Trek president and CEO. “We were committed to seeing it through.”
The battle over the block actually goes back some 20 years, predating the involvement of Trek and Q.
Urban Redevelopment Authority officials acquired the Garden Theater, a former adult film venue, in 2007 after a legal battle that lasted more than six years and reached the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
Trek became involved in 2015 when it purchased the Garden Theater from another developer.
It wasn’t long before challenges arrived.
A plan by Trek and Q to build an eight-story, 72-unit apartment complex at the end of the block fizzled when Allegheny County Common Pleas Court overturned a city zoning board of adjustment ruling granting a variance for the work.
The state’s Commonwealth Court upheld the lower court ruling, sending the developer back to the drawing board.
What emerged is the plan that Mr. Gatti, Trek and Q Development are gearing up to start. It involves the construction of a five-story, 50,526square-foot building at the corner of Federal Street and North Avenue. It will hold 49 apartments and 1,300 square feet of street-level retail space.
The adjacent 8,371-squarefoot Morton House — actually two side-by-side structures — will be converted into eight apartments.
At the Garden Theater itself, Trek and Q will build three studio apartments on a mezzanine level that once housed movie projectors. There also will be street-level retail space.
Filling the retail space may take time, given the perils of the pandemic.
“It’s a challenging time for retail because of what’s going in with COVID,” Mr. Gatti noted. “We’re still more than two years away from a completed development. Retailers tend to be more here-and-now people. We don’t expect to be in serious discussions for a while yet.”
Nonetheless, after so many delays, he is feeling a mix of relief and excitement as the start of construction in July approaches. The work is expected to take 15 to 18 months.
Although he said the pandemic has created supply chain issues and boosted prices for material, Mr. Gatti stressed that Trek and Q are committed to moving forward.
“We’re really excited to be finally bringing it to fruition,” he said.