ALLENTOWN, PA – October 18, 2023 – The Waterfront Development Company celebrated the Grand Opening of 615 Waterfront, the first commercial building completed at The Waterfront in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday, October 11, 2023, from 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM.
Completed in March 2023, 615 Waterfront was designed by Nelson Architects (Philadelphia, PA) and constructed by High Construction (Lancaster, PA). The six-story Class A office building is approximately 120,000 square feet with 100,000 square feet of luxury office space on floors 02-06 and 20,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space on floor 01. Six Fifteen Waterfront offers unique river views, access to a half-mile River Walk, and a range of outdoor amenity spaces.
State Rep. Josh Siegel (D-22nd) said, “We’re remaking what cities can be right here … we are building the city of tomorrow that offers workers and residents the sort of amenities and access that they need, not only to return to the office but to continue to choose to live in our city.”
In 2012, The Waterfront Development Company announced plans to redevelop the Lehigh Structural Steel site into a 29-acre mixed-use campus. The proposed site stretches from the Lehigh River in the east to the RJ Corman Railroad to the west, and the Wells Warehouse in the south to the American Parkway Bridge to the north. Since its founding, The Waterfront Development Company cleared six dilapidated steel buildings from the site, installed several miles of underground conduit, constructed roadways through the southern half of the site, and received blanket Final Plan Approval for on-site development.
Zachary Jaindl, The Waterfront Dev. Co. COO and Co-Founder shared how inspiration was drawn from the success of other riverfront cities to create an urban riverfront environment while uniting Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton with the common element that flows through all three: The Lehigh River. “Today, what we’re really celebrating is a return to that river,” said Jaindl. “Something we lost along the way in the age of industrialization that shaped our city, we’re now able to come back in the form of new jobs and new living opportunities.” Jaindl credits the Neighborhood Improvement Zone (NIZ), the special taxing district created by former State Senator Pat Browne in which The Waterfront is located, for making the project possible. Ellen Kern, the former Chief of Staff for Pat Browne, took to the stage in the 180-person amphitheater to congratulate The Waterfront Dev. Co. for utilizing the NIZ to contribute to the development and revitalization of Allentown. “The NIZ is the door to opportunity. But it takes people of courage and vision and entrepreneurialism to walk through that door.”
In 2015, the acquisition of 3.5 miles of railroad from Union Street in Allentown to Race Street in Whitehall Township was successfully negotiated to become a two-lane roadway called Riverside Drive. The construction of Riverside Drive eases traffic congestion in the area and connects part of the Delaware & Lehigh Valley Trail. “It really creates an environment for our children,” shares The Waterfront Dev. Co. CEO & Co-Founder, Mark Jaindl. “Children of the First Ward, of the Sixth Ward, that can utilize that trail to get down to Bucky Boyle Park.”
Read more on The Waterfront’s website.
