East End’s Bakery Square 2.0 Complex Adds Townhouses

Construction of 52 luxury townhouses is expected to start this summer in the East End’s Bakery Square 2.0 complex, bringing the first for-sale housing to an area where apartment, office, retail and tech development has blossomed.

“It’s another piece of the puzzle,” said Gregg Perelman, CEO of Walnut Capital Partners, developers of the growing Bakery Square complex along Penn Avenue in Larimer and Shadyside.

Perelman said the townhouse development will be called Bakery Village. Prices will start in the “mid-to-high $400,000 range,” Perelman said.

“It’s the right price point for this market,” Perelman said.

Read more: http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/8502370-74/bakery-building-square#ixzz3cD3bKKRM
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Bethlehem In Line For 300 New Manufacturing Jobs At Newly Approved Facilities

Two new manufacturing facilities with a likely 300 total jobs will soon be opening in Bethlehem.

The Bethlehem Planning Commission on Thursday approved two new mixed-use manufacturing and office buildings on former Bethlehem Steel Corp. land within Lehigh Valley Industrial Park VII.

Fountain Hill-based Reeb Millwork will occupy one of the facilities, a 175,000-square-foot building on Gilchrist Drive, a new road off Commerce Center Boulevard. Reeb’s new Bethlehem facility will be in addition to its current Brighton Street building, but the company plans to consolidate all operations there in the future when an expansion is built, said Ed Detmer, Reeb’s vice president of corporate development.

Read more:

http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/bethlehem/index.ssf/2015/03/bethlehem_in_line_for_300_new.html

PhillyDeals: French Building Firm Chooses Malvern For New U.S. HQ

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Chester County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

John Crowe is the top North American executive for Saint-Gobain, the $55 billion- a-year French construction- materials maker that traces its roots to the group that built Versailles for King Louis XIV. Crowe has been looking for a place to build another palace – in Pennsylvania – as Saint-Gobain’s U.S. base and showroom.

To replace the company’s aging U.S. headquarters near Valley Forge, Crowe scouted sites for “an absolutely spectacular building that will incorporate all aspects of what we know as a building-materials company in terms of energy efficiency and a sustainable, open, collaborative workplace,” he tells me. Plus, a research and development center to replace the old labs in Blue Bell.

The search, extended by the recession, took Saint- Gobain six years. The company plans to announce this week that it has picked a potentially spectacular fixer-upper, an $80 million-plus expansion of the once-innovative but now-rusted and vacant complex built in 1969 by the former National Liberty Life Insurance Co. on 65 acres north of Malvern, close to the new State Route 29 ramp from the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/business/20140413_PhillyDeals__French_building_firm_chooses_Malvern_for_new_U_S__HQ.html#2pYscMdh5kLGVKze.99

Maximus To Hire Hundreds In Jenkins Twp.

English: Map of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania higlighting Jenkins Township (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

JENKINS TWP. — A Virginia government contractor is expanding its operations in Northeastern Pennsylvania with a new service center in CenterPoint Trade Park East promising between 500 and 700 new jobs for the area.

Maximus, a company that provides support for health and human services at all levels of government, expects to occupy its new location sometime in January and will be accepting job applications for the next several months.

The company is filling seats to support its Medicare and Medicaid appeal review operations, which first appeared in the region last April at a smaller center in Moosic with about 100 employees. When Medicare and Medicaid determinations are appealed, Maximus provides an independent review service for those disputed claims. The new building represents Moosic’s expansion.

Modifications to a new building in CenterPoint, which is owned by Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services, are likely to be finished by the end of the week. The company plans to set up shop next month, according to Lisa Miles, Maximus’ vice president of investor relations and corporate communications.

Read more: http://www.timesleader.com/news/local-news/1030582/Maximus-to-hire-hundreds-in-Jenkins-Twp.

Norristown Officials Tout Micro-Loans For Small Businesses

Location of Norristown in Montgomery County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

NORRISTOWN — Local officials are putting their noses to the grindstone to lure more businesses to Norristown, and they say they have the bucks to back up their plans.

Specifically, the municipality wants new restaurants, boutiques, delis and coffee shops along the so-called Main Street corridor, which runs along the Schuylkill River Trail from West Norriton to Plymouth Township.

Ron Story, director of the Norristown Small Business Assistance Center (NSBAC), and Gabriele Prete, Norristown’s business development coordinator, presented Norristown Planning Commission with a series of short promotional videos Wednesday targeting would-be businesses.  Prete said there are 13 countries represented on Main Street in the form of restaurants.  The videos and an interactive map are available on the municipal website, www.norristown.org.

Read more:  http://www.timesherald.com/article/20130711/NEWS01/130719906/norristown-officials-tout-micro-loans-for-small-businesses#full_story

Dentist Dr. Matthew Freedman To Stay Put In Lancaster City

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Lancaster County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Editor’s note:  Two Roy’s Rants thumbs up to Dr. Freedman for making an investment in the City of Lancaster and expanding his  payroll!  Small business is the key!

Dr. Matthew Freedman has sentimental reasons for keeping his dental practice at 416 N. Duke St.

He has business reasons too.

The combination is prompting him to invest $600,000 to renovate and expand the office, rather than relocate.

“At one point, I did look at other sites in the city with a Realtor.  But I didn’t find anything that hit the nail on the head,” said Freedman.

Freedman has deep roots in the North Duke Street office.  It was opened by his father, the late Dr. Edward Freedman, in 1983.

Read more: http://lancasteronline.com/article/local/794930_Dentist-Dr–Matthew-Freedman-to-stay-put-in-Lancaster-city.html#ixzz2FdCsVI9L