ORONO, Maine — Most of the buildings are up and framed in a new 270-unit student housing complex, and people should be able to rent the apartments in advance starting this fall, the project supervisor said Friday at the site.
“We’ll have some models ready in 10 days to two weeks,” Jason Johnson said of The Avenue Orono, which will be the largest apartment complex in town when completed. “We have 21 buildings with roofs on. There are 33 buildings altogether, with the clubhouse and maintenance building. They’re nice.”
Johnson said leasing will begin this fall, but nobody will be allowed to move in until June, which is when the approximately $50 million gated community will be completed.
The New York-based Park 7 Group, which has built student housing developments in other areas of the country, including near the University of Oklahoma in Norman, is building the clustered subdivision consisting of single and multibedroom units, expected to house up to 894 students.
“You can have it fully furnished with all the bills paid and everything or bring your own furniture and pay some or all of the bills — it’s your choice,” Johnson said. “We have one-bedroom townhouses up to five-bedroom apartments. They all have their own bathrooms and shared common areas.”
The sidewalks will be heated and the clubhouse will have several hot tubs, tanning beds, a golf simulator, media room with free Wi-Fi and a gym with “over $100,000 in equipment,” Johnson said.
The framers and heating, ventilation and air conditioning crews “travel with us” from one Park 7 Group project to the next, but most of the rest of the workers are local subcontractors, Johnson said.
Once complete, The Avenue Orono will be larger than The Grove, which opened in September 2012 and has approximately 200 units with room for 620 tenants.
Extra security, including a security camera surveillance system, is being added at The Avenue Orono in an effort to prevent large, out-of-control parties like those that have occurred at The Grove, some of which have resulted in the town billing the apartment complex for the police response. Developers, when unveiling the plans last year, also said they plan to house local police officers, at a reduced rent, at the facility to cut down on crime.
“I think that is their plan,” Bill Murphy, Orono’s code enforcement officer, said Friday.
Murphy was at the construction site Friday morning inspecting plumbing.
The complex is located on Washburn Avenue near the Rangeley Road entrance to the University of Maine beside the Washburn Place apartments at the end of the current cul de sac.
A row of trees separates the new development from Orchard Trails, which opened as the first large off-campus student development in 2006. Orchard Trails responded to news of its new neighbors by making improvements to its clubhouse last year and earlier this year got approval to add 61 units, which will be called The Edge at Orchard Trails.