$70 Million Highland Park to Bring 600 Residential Units to Fillmore-Leroy
Another struggling Buffalo neighborhood is lighting up with Highland Park, LP Ciminelli's new $70 million 600 until housing development project at the former Central Park Plaza, located in the Fillmore-Leroy neighborhood on the East Side. The largest housing development project in the city for decades will appeal to a mixture of incomes and is also conveniently located a short distance from the Amherst light rail station; the project is expected to be completed by 2016.
Fillmore-Leroy suffered for a long time because of the brownfield that once was the vacant Central Park Plaza, which was prone to illegal dumping, feral animals, and homelessness. LP Ciminelli is hoping to attract some of the 10,000 workers that will soon be hired at the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus as well as improve the neighborhood from where it originated. Along with the new housing will come additional green space, safer and more connected streets, and more businesses. Vice President John Ciminelli says:
“What we are doing is not necessarily creating a neighborhood, but this property for over 100 years was a quarry and then a shopping plaza. Throughout its life it has separated this neighborhood. What we are doing is re-establishng the street grid and knitting that neighborhood back together.”