Developer Paxton Kinol talks to the Norwalk Zoning Commission on Thursday in City Hall.NORWALK, Conn. – New plans for what was the Loehman’s Plaza will be submitted next week, developer Paxton Kinol told the Norwalk Zoning Commission on Thursday.
This will still include an iPic movie theater, planned to be the anchor for the Waypointe neighborhood’s retail and restaurants, but also 330 apartments, he said, offering details about what new stores might move in.
It’s the Waypointe South Block, a 4.5-acre parcel bordered by West Avenue, Orchard Street, Butler Street and Quincy Street. The site will be fenced in within a week or two and turned into a construction site, he said.
Kinol in October obtained Zoning approval for a technical change, a text amendment to clear up complications stemming from different investors having ownership of buildings within the Waypointe complex.
Although Belpointe Capital is involved with every aspect of the plan that originated with Stanley Seligson, it has partners in the Waypointe ventures and things had become complicated, he said.
“If you approve this tonight, I believe next month we will see the Gap and Loehmans come down,” he said.
On Thursday, Kinol said developers had spent six months coming up with a new plan.
The modifications were unofficially submitted Thursday and will officially be submitted next week, he said.
The development is planned for 110,000 square feet of retail or entertainment and will include a swimming pool on top of the parking garage, a new trick for his company, he said.
A year ago, Kinol won approval for a 109,157-square-foot mixed-use development with 76 apartments and 16,820 square feet of retail, with an underground parking garage.
The new plan is to dig the parking garage deeper, Kinol said Thursday.
Also new is a plan to push the development back from the street to allow better on-street parking than currently exists in the area, he said.
Cars parked on both sides of Orchard essentially reduce it to one lane of traffic, as drivers pull off to the side where possible to allow others to pass.
“I think everybody has seen how tight the parking is,” Kinol said.
The topography allows for two floors of retail on Orchard Street and it looks like there will be an LA Fitness or a 24-hour fitness facility on the second floor, while the first floor is not yet spoken for, he said.
Completing the development will mean that a pedestrian plaza is created from Orchard to Butler Street, which will probably be lined with restaurants, he said.
This would begin across the street from Waypointe’s pedestrian plaza, where Old Colony Pizza and Barcelona are, and open up on the other end to the Stepping Stones Museum for Children.
The plan has always included moving the two-story brick building at 3 Quincy St.; while it was planned to go across the street, Kinol said that plan has fallen through and the building will instead be moved to 6 Butler St.
It was pointed out to him that many of Waypointe’s retail spaces are vacant.
Belpointe has not had control of that for 18 to 24 months and has been frustrated as its investment partner has let deals fall through, Kinol said.
“We have signed letters of intent with Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, CKO Kickboxing and Burtons Grill… all deals that they have chosen not to move forward with,” Kinol said. “It’s frustrating for us to be partners in the project and watch them not sign these deals.”
Belpointe plans to let those businesses move into the new development, he said.
“We are not going to let this fester,” Kinol said.
Commissioner Galen Wells asked about the iPic theater as possible competition for Bowtie Cinemas.
“I don’t think you’re going to see any movie theaters go out of business because of iPic,” Kinol said. “It’s a membership business, people drive for a while to come to it. So, iPic in Boca knows it will do well here because there are so many Fairfield County residents who are already members of iPic, Fla.”
Memberships are free, but iPic has credit card information so it knows where the zip codes are, he said.
He went on to describe iPic’s luxury: there’s a four-star restaurant and a bar in the building, with black-clad “Ninja’s” bringing food to movie patrons ensconced in leather La-z-y Boy recliners in the theater, he said.
Tickets are $22 each, and 55 percent of the businesses revenue comes from alcohol sales, he said.
“You literally check in at what looks like a hotel counter,” he said.
“They are very expensive,” Kinol said. “We are paying $7 million in tenant fit up for them to come, but we think it’s a nice anchor for Waypointe.”
A map of the Waypointe area, prepared by Belpointe Capital.
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