Crane in Elm Street parking lot
(Credit: Steve Thurston, 2022)
Rick Davis with Flach Crane and Rigging stands near the 210-ton crane that lifted heating and cooling equipment to the roof of the Glens Falls National Bank building, Sept. 15, 2022.
Progress at the Glens Falls National Bank building. A 210-ton crane blocked the middle section of the Elm Street parking lot behind the bank for a few hours Thursday Sept. 15.
Rick Davis, the project manager with Flach Crane and Rigging, said they lifted heating and cooling equipment to the roof of the building at 250 Glen St.
Arrow Financial, owner of the Glens Falls and Saratoga National banks, first announced the $16 million renovation of their corporate headquarters in May 2021. The people in the building have been moved to other locations or work remotely as the renovation has continued. At the time, the company estimated a move-in date in early 2023.
The crane was gone, and the parking lot reopened, by about 2 p.m.
[Read our coverage here and here. Find the Albany Business Journal article on the move here.]
Public hearing on Farmers Market
We reported last week about the issues facing the Glens Falls Farmers Market Association as the city looks to redevelop South Street near the intersection with Elm Street. The Farmers Market Association and their supporters in the community have been asking for a larger space and better parking. Mayor Bill Collins met with the membership last week, and has set two public hearings on the issue for later this month:
- Thursday Sept. 29, 7p.m. at the Queensbury Hotel
- Friday Sept. 30, 10 a.m. in Crandall Library in the downstairs community room.
The market currently runs Saturday mornings at the South Street Pavilion. It will move to a new facility a block south.
Parking Sensors–and, unrelated, parking warnings–coming to Glens Falls
The Glens Falls Common Council approved the contract with the Fybr company to deliver and install 150 parking sensors and the necessary hardware to make them work. This is part of a larger streetlight conversion project with the New York Power Authority that changed conventional streetlights to LED lights.
The sensors will deliver information about the time of day a parking spot is taken, about how long a car sits and other parking space information. The sensors will be installed under the street soon, and cones marking some city streets are preparing the way, Chip McTiernan, a special assistant to the mayor, wrote in an email today.
Eventually, the sensors will tie into a phone app to help people find parking.
“Amen that we’ve started getting our parking sensors put in,” City Councilor-at-large Jim Clark said after the vote. “Thanks to Jeff [Flagg] and former Mayor [Dan] Hall.”
The project began before Jeff Flagg was named the city’s economic director at the start of last year. At the time he said the overall lighting project will help Glens Falls set-up a “smart-city” network which will allow the city to control any number of digital devices, such as the parking space sensors.
“That’ll give us some really good data to draw from,” Clark said of the parking sensors.
[Read about Flagg’s new position here.]
The sensors are not going to be used to issue parking tickets.
“They’ll just collect data. We’re not making any other decisions other than collecting data,” Mayor Bill Collins said.
He added that he has gotten complaints from business owners along Glen Street who told him the city is not enforcing parking rules well enough.
“We are looking at how to start enforcing again,” he said. The city police had scaled back or stopped altogether issuing parking tickets. The mayor said that he has a meeting set with the police department on the issue and that parking scofflaws would likely get warnings rather than tickets for the first few months.
The cost of the sensors, according to the resolution, was $133,735, and installation is $12,375. The funds come from the New York Power Authority grant.
The city has already contracted with BFJ Planning, of New York City to study the city’s parking needs. That will be completed in the next 60 days, the mayor said.
[Read more on the parking study here.]
Editor's note: This portion of the post was updated and edited for clarity shortly after publication.