Three commercial construction projects, all of which are on Route 25, are progressing amid mild weather conditions, during a time of year that often puts such work on hold.

Construction work has been moving forward at Pleasant Paws Pet Center, an approximately 17,000-square-foot veterinary complex being built at 94 South Main Street. The Planning & Zoning Commission (P&Z) approved the project for the South Main Village Design District (SMVDD) zone in June 2018.

The project represents the redevelopment of a former plant nursery site with a two-story building that will include a veterinary clinic, animal boarding facilities, an animal rehabilitation unit, and a pet-related store. Prithvi Real Estate Management LLC is the developer. Dr Rakesh Vali, the owner/veterinarian at Mt Pleasant Hospital For Animals in Hawleyville, is a principal in Prithvi Real Estate.

The construction proposal involved many town land use approvals for the site at the busy intersection of South Main Street and Greenbriar Lane. In response to neighbors’ opposition to the presence of a secondary two-way driveway for the complex at Greenbriar Lane, the developer then designated that driveway for entering vehicles only.

New Version Of An Old Gas Station/Convenience Store

Construction also was underway last week at 151 South Main Street, where a Milford firm has demolished its former gas station/convenience store and is building new versions of those facilities.

In October 2019, the P&Z approved the project for CPCI LLC. This project also is in the SMVDD zone.

The redevelopment project is located where the Citgo/Friendly gas station/convenience store formerly did business. When completed, the project would look similar to, but be somewhat smaller than, the Wheels gas station/convenience store located at 67 Church Hill Road.

Bennett Sullivan Architects Inc of Southbury is the architect. The convenience store would have food service with fixed-position seating within a 3,043-square-foot building. A variety of retail items also would be sold.

The new complex is intended to physically improve the site’s layout for its planned uses. The property will have new underground fuel storage tanks installed.

The SMVDD zoning process allows applicants to propose customized zoning regulations that are tailored to an individual property’s development or redevelopment. The P&Z created SMVDD zoning regulations in 2007 to foster economic development which is in harmony with New England architecture along the four-mile-long South Main Corridor.

Enclave At Taunton Lake

On Route 25, at 41-47 Mt Pleasant Road, Toll Brothers Inc has constructed a paved roadway, providing all-weather vehicular access to a 29-acre site, where it is constructing Enclave at Taunton Lake, a planned 29-unit condominium complex containing 29 individual buildings. The site is in the borough.

Under its former ownership, the development project was known as Rochambeau Woods.

Following more than a decade of various litigation in the courts, a lawsuit that challenged the BZC’s February 2017 approval of the condo project was dismissed by a judge in December 2018, clearing the way for the 2019 start of construction.

Almost 70 percent of the site will remain undeveloped under the terms of the Borough Zoning Commission’s (BZC) Residential Open Space Development (ROSD) zoning regulations, which also is known as “cluster housing.” The site has about 450 feet of frontage on Taunton Lake, but the land near the lake will not be developed.

The multifamily development is the largest residential project approved in the borough in decades. The project is a “market rate” complex that will not be “age-restricted” and will not contain “affordable housing.”

More than 15 years ago, another builder sought to develop the property with a conventional large-lot subdivision of about 14 single-family houses, but that project never materialized.