By Rit Carter and Jack Krampitz

The city council’s recent decision to vote down the Wheeler Clinic project is just one more missed opportunity in the long sad history associated with Bristol’s downtown development.

While the project may be resurrected–there is an economic development workshop planned this Saturday for council members (and it is a public meeting if anyone is interested) –chances are the decision betrays a misunderstanding of this history and the work that goes into these decisions.

From the late 1800’s until the mid 1960’s it was simply called North Main Street, and it was an integral part of Bristol’s downtown, with retail stores, shops, even a movie theater. It was no different than tens of thousands of downtown streets across America in the first half of the 20th century.

But the future in the 1960’s was not in downtowns; it was in shopping malls. So the City of Bristol made the fateful decision which is forever derisively known as downtown redevelopment. The wrecking ball came to Main Street and North Main, and Bristol’s quaint little downtown was gone.

Bristol Center Mall

After redevelopment, Main Street in Bristol became a shell of what it once was, but the new diamond in Bristol’s rough was something named the Bristol Center Mall. Groundbreaking was done in 1965 by the Bristol Center Realty Corp. with the backing of the federal government and the Bristol Redevelopment Agency. The grand opening was held in 1970.

The Center Mall’s first anchor tenants were Raphael’s and another nondescript department store named Grandway, hardly a Macy’s or a G. Fox Store. Raphael’s and Grandway lasted all of three years, closing in 1972 and 1973, respectively. Over the years, Sage Allen and Sear’s Outlet came and went, but there was always a major problem luring a top-level business to take one of the anchor spots on either end of the mall.

The discount store Ocean State Job Lot ultimately occupied the southern-most anchor spot, and the second anchor space remained vacant for years. There were 20 storefronts in the main building, and those spaces were leased by a variety of merchants. There were jewelers, a sports store, a pet shop, a restaurant, and multiple other merchants who came and left.

The Center Mall limped along for years in that configuration.

Located on 19 acres at North Main Street and Riverside Avenue, directly across the street from Bristol City Hall, the complex consisted of 202,167 square feet of leasable space, including the 175,800 square foot enclosed mall, an 18,150 square foot supermarket and 8,200 square feet in a third building.

The entire property was worth $10.4 million when it was assessed in 1987.

The National Bank of Canada, which held an $11 million mortgage on the property, worked with the City of Bristol and the Greater Bristol Chamber of Commerce early in 1998 to market the mall. The bank rejected several offers as too low.

Mall Sells to Southbury Developer

In November of 1998, the newly-titled Mall at Bristol Centre was sold for $2.5 million to a Southbury developer who promised to pump money into the deteriorating complex and make it the attractive downtown shopping destination envisioned 30 years earlier.

Scott Goodreau, executive vice president of Southbury-based S. Rudy Gatto and Associates Development Corp., had this to say about his company’s latest acquisition. “We had our eye on that property for a long, long time. We really believe this property is going to become something special,” Goodreau said. “We truly believe we can make this property thrive as it should …. There are several hundred thousand people that live within 3 to 5 miles …. It is a unique property.”

Gatto’s corporation, which also owned Southbury Plaza, created a limited liability company called Galleria at Bristol Centre for the purchase.

The property did not thrive as Mr. Goodreau had prophesied.

Boys and Girls Club interested in Center Mall

In January of 2004, the people organizing the building of a new Bristol Boys and Girls Club were committed to keeping the club downtown because many of the children who use the Boys Club Laurel Street building lived there.

So club leaders were looking to collaborate with another downtown entity that could use some help — the Bristol Centre Mall, owned by Southbury-based S. Rudy Gatto and Associates Development Corp.

Bill White, chairman of the club’s board of directors, said club officials had talked informally with the mall’s owners about building on their property.

“Our ideal would be a nice youth facility on the mall property with amenities that serve the entire community,” White said. “The mall is a logical place for us to look and the mall seems to be declining as a retail center with nothing on the horizon that suggests it won’t be anything other than what it is now.”

Watching the situation closely were city officials who were to revitalize downtown and the mall. Jonathan Rosenthal, executive director of the Bristol Development Authority, said putting the club at the mall was an attractive idea because it could help bring more people downtown.

“It’s all hypothetical at this point so I can’t say if the idea makes sense, but I’ve encouraged the club and the mall to talk to each other,” Rosenthal said. “Having the club at the mall would tie up resources there, but it could make sense.”

John Ottaviano, general manager of the Mall for Gator and Associates, said it was too early to say what form a new club building might take. He said the club could occupy space in the mall building itself, like the space that once housed the Sear’s store. But building next to the mall was also possible.

Ultimately, the Boys and Girls Club moved into their brand-new building on West Street.

‘The Maul OF Bristol Center’

The above headline ran in The Hartford Courant on Feb. 19, 2004.

The Courant story described how the owners of the mall, Chris and Rudy Gatto of Southbury, were considering an overhaul. Plans were not set, but could include improvements to the facade and separate, exterior entrances to stores so that customers could enter from the street instead of having to go through the mall first. A Bristol Centre spokesman said more would be revealed as plans for a freestanding Walgreens Pharmacy on the mall’s property along North Main Street were submitted to city agencies for approval.

But the article posed an even more important question- whether the mall could be, or even should, be saved. “For years, Bristol Centre Mall has been downtown’s reigning eyesore. Surrounded by acres of asphalt, it is an island unto itself, cut off from the sidewalks and businesses on the surrounding blocks. With its few entrances and with most of its stores accessible only from within, the mall is a hermetically sealed commercial environment. And it has been slowly dying of suffocation. Bristol Centre Mall is a symbol of urban decay. That site should instead be featuring the centerpiece for Bristol’s downtown revival.”

The City of Bristol decided against the Gatto’s overhaul plan and purchased the Bristol Centre Mall for $5 million in the summer of 2005. Remaining tenants were told their leases were null and void and they had to vacate the mall by Dec. 31, 2005. The city agreed to help pay for moving expenses and find new locations for the businesses.

By April 1, 2006, all the tenants had moved out except for Centre Mall Pizza and Ocean State Job Lot. Both businesses filed a lawsuit against the City of Bristol. Centre Mall Pizza ultimately dropped their suit and decided to move across the street. Ocean State Job Lot opened a store in the Bristol Plaza on Farmington Avenue and finally closed their store at the mall.

The city then looked to find a new developer to bring some magic to downtown.

Renaissance Downtowns

Renaissance Downtowns was designated by the City of Bristol as Master Developer for the Revitalization of Downtown Bristol Project in May of 2010. The city was looking to turn Bristol’s downtown into a thriving destination place once again, starting with development of the former Centre Mall site.

To kick off the revitalization efforts, Renaissance planned an innovative mix-use development (retail/residential/office) for what they were calling Depot Square. They planned for 1,000 units of residential and 180,000 square feet of retail and commercial space for the mall site. With residential, the idea was that people living in the multi-story New England style buildings would create baseline sustainability for retailers on the ground levels. The idea of mixed-use was not a new invention. The idea was that truly great downtowns were places where there are many dimensions (live, work, shop, play, learn) in one relatively concentrated space.

Community as Source of Ideas

By having a constant conversation with the community, Renaissance was hoping it could gauge what the community wanted and build that element (like the overwhelmingly popular public piazza above) or recruit a business to open what the community desired. In this case, a craft ale house called Barley Vine opened on Main Street because an entrepreneur was inspired by the community’s response for craft beer.

Renaissance told the city that it was impossible to state exactly what the downtown revitalization would eventually entail because they wanted to create a shared vision for the redevelopment that reflected the desires and wishes of the city and the community.

Renaissance presented different plans to the city for five years, but the proposals were voted down by the city council, primarily because the developer wanted Bristol to kick in city money in grants and loans, and the city was unwilling to risk the funds.

In 2015, Renaissance asked Bristol to kick in $3 million for sidewalks, drainage, a piazza and other infrastructure at the Depot Square site downtown and asked for another $6.9 million in city loans to build the retail part of the project’s first phase. The latest version of the company’s proposal included low-interest state loans for most construction costs of 100 apartments; private investors would put $3 million toward the roughly $23 million project.

Bristol residents were divided about whether the city should keep Renaissance as the primary developer for the 15-acre Depot Square property and surrounding sites downtown. Senior citizens, fiscal conservatives and people on fixed incomes were the most outspoken against using tax money to aid Renaissance’s plan.

Younger families and young professionals were the primary voices in support of the Renaissance plan, saying that Bristol desperately needed fresh, modern apartment housing along with better nightlife and a vibrant, pedestrian-oriented downtown to attract and keep younger residents.

The city council rejected that final proposal in June of 2015. The Center Mall remained a 17-acre vacant lot after 10 years of talk, plans, and then more talk and more plans, with nothing to show for it. The Centre Mall had become a wasteland, and the City of Bristol a cautionary example of how to destroy a downtown. It had been 50 years since Redevelopment was undertaken, and the city had nothing to show for it.

Master plan finalized for Centre Square

In 2017, a breakthrough occurred when Bristol Health contracted with the city to build a 60,000 square foot ambulatory health center. The health center was being constructed by Rendina Healthcare Real Estate and was set to be built on the portion of Centre Square at the corner of Main Street and Riverside Avenue.

Then in August, 2017, the downtown committee of the Bristol Development Authority unanimously passed a motion to accept a new master plan for the development of Centre Square. The plan, which was created by engineering consultant Milone & MacBroom, pertained to the area of Centre Square that was not be used for the new Bristol Hospital Ambulatory Care Center.

The area of Centre Square that fell under the plan spannned from the corner of Riverside Avenue up North Main Street to the McDonald’s.

The plan included the construction of a central roadway and access drive, which divides the Centre Square site into smaller properties. A bus stop was to be constructed on the roadway for CT Transit and CTFastrak.

In addition, the plan included the construction of 88,000 square feet of two-story buildings, similar to the ones already in downtown. The buildings would be placed along the roadways and the city would market them to attract businesses.

Streetscape improvements were part of the plan, which turned excess road space on North Main Street and Riverside Avenue into additional on-street parking. There would also be lane reconfiguration on these roads.

Inside Centre Square, the plan called for several small interior parking areas scattered throughout the site. The plan stated that, if necessary, an additional parking garage could be included in the future, which would be located on the north-end of the property near the McDonald’s.

When the Bristol Hospital Ambulatory Care Center opened in June of 2019, the very first concrete sign of progress was in place.

After the health care center was completed, the proverbial dam to progress seemed to be broken. In short order, the city received commitments from several companies to develop other parcels on the site.

In 2021, By Carrier purchased lots 5, 6, 7 and 8 with a plan to build three buildings with 17,000 square feet of retail on the ground floors and a total of 88 apartments above. These buildings basically cover the entire north side of Centre Square. Carrier had already constructed two apartment buildings at the top of Main Street that sold out.

Also in 2021, the Wheeler Clinic negotiated with the city to build a 30,000 square foot building on the corner of North Main Street and Riverside Avenue, housing approximately 200 administrative and frontline jobs. The momentum that Bristol Health began was now in full charge mode.

However, the momentum of the development of Centre Square took a direct hit in December of 2021, when the city council rejected the contract that the city had negotiated with Wheeler. The five council members who voted no cited the fact that Wheeler Clinic, as a non-profit, would pay no taxes to Bristol.

Even more important to several councilors was their insistence that the space be used for entertainment, such as restaurants and retail. As of the writing of this article, it appears that the council has no Plan B for the site Wheeler had committed to. Was the Council aware of the 50 years of failed attempts to revitalize the area? Certainly, there is no Nordstrom’s or Macy’s or Cheesecake Factory in Centre Square’s future. How much longer now will the parcel lie vacant?

In Tomorrow’s TBE

This Saturday morning look for the first installment of Rit Carter’s latest article about sedition and intrigue in Bristol, circa 1918