WILLIAMSVILLE, N.Y. — The Eastern Hills Mall will soon enter its next stages of redevelopment.
With construction on the new mixed-use Town Center soon to be underway, many interior mall tenants have been notified of plans to vacate the building as early as January of 2024. Those that must vacate will be permitted to stay through the busy holiday shopping season before demolition and redevelopment begins.
"Some merchants will be relocated to new locations on the property, and others will be introduced to real estate brokerages who will assist them in finding a new location. Nearly all merchants with exterior entrances are expected to remain open," according to a news release from Uniland Development Company.
According to Uniland, the only thing that may slow regulatory approvals on construction is off-site sewer capacity. Given the increased amount of housing, hotels, and restaurants, additional sewer capacity will be required for the new site.
They added, "without additional sewer capacity, 80% or more of this project is likely unfeasible. The County is currently undertaking a feasibility study to expand sewer capacity, which should be completed late this year," said Uniland's Senior marketing manager, Ryan Weisz.
"Without a doubt the sewer is a lead factor right now on whether the project goes ahead or not. There's no question," Clarence supervisor Patrick Casilio said.
The towns of Amherst and Clarence are currently working on their own town feeder lines. Casilio estimates a main sewer line for the mall could cost the Erie County Sewer District between $14-18 million. He feels that is a small fraction of what has become Erie County's single largest private investment. It is a potential half-billion dollar project.
Casilio also says that currently the mall complex has a capacity of roughly several hundred thousand gallons per day. As a newly converted "Living Neighborhood" with 3,000 people living and working there it could jump to 1.5 million gallons per day.
"When we get the assessment done and figure out how much it will cost to get to the sewer treatment plant, I'm sure Uniland will be reaching out to the county, state, and federal officials for subsidies to help pay for the sewer pipe." Castillo said.
Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz hopes that Uniland Development will take into consideration the additional associated costs, as all major projects are not paid for out of the county tax dollars. He says instead they are funded by the rate fees of that sewer district's ratepayers.
"If there's a big project that has to be move ahead it affects all the ratepayers in that area, so I would hope that the developer understands as they do the feasibility study that they're gonna probably have to put in additional value," Poloncarz said.