Join us on March 9th at 4:00 pm as Bild Architecture, Raise-Op, and Hebert Construction provide a tour of two new buildings in Lewiston's Tree Street Neighborhood, Blake & Walnut.
Libations to follow at The Pub at Baxter.
Tour provides 1 HSW Credit.
About Blake and Walnut:
Consisting of 9 units each, these developments infill vacant lots in the Tree Street Neighborhood at 198 Blake Street and 84 Walnut Street.
The development is the result of an investment partnership between the Raise-Op and Evernorth, a regional syndicator of affordable housing, with financing from MaineHousing.
These two buildings represent many groundbreaking achievements for Lewiston and the partners involved:
These will be the first passive-house certified buildings in Lewiston, a rigorous design standard for building operation regarding energy efficiency and air quality, the result of which is an extremely comfortable and healthy living environment for the residents, and a lower carbon footprint as the building demands less energy consumption.
The first time that low-income residents of the Tree Street Neighborhood have programmed and designed new multi-unit apartment buildings from the very beginning of the design process. A process that served as a model for the City’s Choice Neighborhood Transformation Plan.
The first open-source building design that will be shared with the City of Lewiston for the purposes of helping create more small-scale infill housing in the neighborhood that meets the goals of the Choice Neighborhood Transformation Plan. The design is meant to be easily adapted to any standard lot in the neighborhood.
The first time a housing cooperative in Maine has served as the developer of housing that utilizes the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program as a financing mechanism. Given the complexity of LIHTC financing, and the unique nature of a housing cooperative, this has been a learning experience for all parties involved.
The Raise-Op acquired the lots at 198 Blake Street in 2018 with financing support from Community Concepts, and with a grant from Healthy Neighborhoods installed community artwork and facilities to make a small dog park. Raise-Op’s long term vision for the space was permanently affordable housing that would meet the needs of residents in the way that existing buildings cannot achieve due to their age and design. This included physical accessibility, air quality, energy efficiency, and more privacy for residents in their homes so that people of different lifestyles and cultures can live next door to each other with less conflict.
Project Partners Include:
Raise-Op, Developer, Project Sponsor, Resident Services
Evernorth, Syndicator
MaineHousing, Financing
Hebert Construction, Construction Manager
Bild Architecture, Design
Lewiston Housing, Property Manager
Community Concepts Inc.
City of Lewiston