Stuart Harper and Howard Rich have worked hard for months to realize a shared vision for a new development project.
Harper, president of Build Promise, and Rich, a volunteer and board member, want to create a shelter for men experiencing homelessness on the East Side campus of St. Luke’s Mission of Mercy. The project has received city approvals, and architects are completing their drawings and construction documents.
The goal, Rich said during a recent site tour, is to be “ready in January, to start bidding and then put a shovel in the ground.”
“If there’s anybody left who’s not working on the stadium,” Harper cautioned.
Harper’s remark, made partly in jest, may come true sooner than he thought.
Developers, general contractors and construction firms are watching their future project pipelines and needs with a wary eye toward the $1.54 billion Buffalo Bills stadium.
One of the biggest developments in this area in decades, construction of the enormous new Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park is still in the early site-clearing and preparation stages, with about 10% of the bids awarded.
But it is expected to pick up steam in the coming months and will last for three years. In turn, that will put a major strain on the supply of labor, equipment and supplies in the region while also driving up prices.
“We’re just at the infancy of what I think will be a very, very busy time for contractors and subcontractors in general,” said Douglas Elia, president of Montante Construction.
Construction has also begun on the $110 million transformation of the former LaSalle Park into Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Park on Buffalo’s West Side. And internet retail giant Amazon is expected to start work at some point on its new, $550 million mega-distribution center in the Town of Niagara, near Niagara Falls International Airport.
That is three major construction projects going on simultaneously, drawing from the same pool of talent, cement, dump…
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