Tower Place development in planning stages
First phase of site build-out includes 2 medical office buildings
Three years ago, Martin Tower came down in a cloud of dust. With a plan in place, developers are moving forward with the first part of a project to build on what’s now a large vacant lot.
The plan for the 53-acre site along Eighth and Eaton avenues in Bethlehem has been on the drawing board for more than a year after the 21-story skyscraper that once housed Bethlehem Steel’s corporate headquarters was demolished in May 2019.
The plan from property owners Lewis Ronca and Norton Herrick of SWB LR Ltd. and 8th and Eaton Holdings LP includes two three-story medical office buildings and a 24,000-squarefoot grocery store fronting Eighth Avenue, two office buildings totaling more than 85,000 square feet, two restaurants and a 130-room hotel in the center of the parcel.
It also includes a gas station and 300 apartment units. A nature trail is also planned and 10% of the
parcel was set aside as green space.
Developers submitted a plan to the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission for the first phase of the project, known as Tower Place. It includes the two medical office buildings, which will total about 100,000 square feet.
LVPC Executive Director Becky Bradley said this is the first of a long series of steps before the entire project is completed. The commission’s recommendations will be forwarded to Bethlehem planners, who will make the final decision to proceed.
Darlene Heller, director of planning and zoning for Bethlehem, said the city will discuss the plan in upcoming weeks.
“We’re still reviewing them,” Heller said. “[The LVPC] had their public meeting prior to ours, obviously, so we’re still reviewing the plan. It may be at the next meeting in October, but because the plan is still under review, I can’t really confirm that for sure.”
Heller said the master plan does not include a timetable for completion.
“The city does require that they have a master plan in place, which they do now,” she said. “We kind of know what the balance of this site is going to look like, but that doesn’t really attach a timeline.”
The developers plan to split the parcel into three lots.
“This is very typical for large sites where a developer will divide the development into pieces, because it’s really hard to build five or six buildings all at once,” Bradley said. “What the commission saw this month was looking at the first two buildings that are proposed for the site, and they’re like medical office building-type uses. We can always assume that there’s going to be more development in the pipeline for the site, but this is the first portion of the redevelopment.”
Other large projects in the Lehigh Valley that are being built piecemeal include the Waterfront in Allentown, a $425 million project of a dozen office and residential buildings that will take eight years to complete. Another is Lehigh Valley Industrial Park VII, which is slowly rising along Commerce Center Boulevard in south Bethlehem, just off Route 412 and Interstate 78.
“You have to do it one piece at a time,” Bradley said, “and that’s normal, whether it’s a redevelopment of south Bethlehem over on Commerce Center Boulevard, for example, where the old Bethlehem Steel site was redeveloped. That’s a good example of one building at a time.”
Bradley said it’s also typical for projects that run into the millions of dollars.
“When you start hitting a very high multimillion dollar threshold, this is very typical for those things to happen,” she said.
Commission recommendations
The LVPC’s recommendations for the site include:
The addition of “ample vegetation and pervious materials” to help reduce climate change impacts and landscape diversity to create visual interest and help protect nearby natural areas, including Monocacy Creek.
Additional sidewalks to link the network into the complex across the parking lots as well as walkways in and around the perimeters of the property and the interior of the parking lots.
Improvements to the two LANTA bus stops to help comply with the American with Disabilities Act along with bus shelters and seating.
Outdoor seating for patients and staff.
Electric charging stations for electric vehicles.
“This development possesses a unique opportunity to incorporate sustainable designs that would complement the character of the area while minimizing environmental impacts,” LVPC Community and Regional Planner Bambi Griffin Rivera reported to the board last week.
“One opportunity is through sustainable and enhanced parking lot design, which combines abundant vegetation, pervious paving materials, safe pedestrian, cyclist and ADA access, as well as connections to transit. This is especially important in an urban environment where there is existing density paired with new development.”