As we reported, during last week’s meeting of Conshohocken’s Borough Council, council agreed to a timeline for Keystone Property Group to seek approval of its proposed redevelopment of lower Fayette Street. During the presentation by Keystone Property Group it outlined what it projected to be the economic impact of the construction period and then into the future as the hotel and office buildings are fully occupied.
The Construction Period
What the above image shows is a slide that projected 630 constructed related jobs during Phase 1 and Phase 2.
Post-Construction Economic Impact
The slides above show the number of people currently employed in the two existing office buildings (1 West First Avenue, which is referred to as Phase 1, and 100 West Elm, referred to as Phase 2). The redevelopment would see these two buildings, which are under 50,000 square feet, replaced with buildings that are over 200,000 square feet.
415 people are currently employed in these two buildings. If Phase 1 and Phase 2 of the redevelopment were to take place, the number of people employed is projected to jump to 2,549 people. Please note that Phase 1 also includes the hotel and a brew pub as separate structures. The hotel would be built on the grass area at West Elm and Fayette and the brew pub would be in the old fire house. In addition to the brew pub, there are two restaurants proposed in the Phase 1 office building and one restaurant in the hotel.
The above table shows the projected economic impact to the borough and the school district once the project is built and occupied. The borough would receive an estimate of $773,168 and the school district $1,225,133 above what it currently receives with the existing office buildings on the redevelopment site.
Please note that these projections are from the developer. One thing it doesn’t project is the positive or negative impact on other local businesses, such as restaurants. There are four major restaurants within this plan. We are going to explore that in another article, along with how 2,000 new commuters and corresponding hotel visits will generate in regards to traffic.