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Downtown demolition to begin late next week
A 41-space parking addition will be at the site of the three buildings being demolished.
YOUNGSTOWN — The demolition of three vacant downtown buildings near Youngstown City Hall will start late next week.
The three buildings, all 89 years old, “can’t be renovated or retrofitted,” so they’ll be torn down, said John P. Coyne, whose Cleveland-base company, Coyne Investments Ltd., owns the properties.
After the buildings are down, which should take about a week, the location will be paved and become a 41-space addition to a 23-space Ampco System Parking lot on the northeast corner of West Boardman and South Phelps streets. Coyne is also vice president of business development for Ampco.
The vacant structures are located at 20 and 24 W. Boardman St. and 21 S. Phelps St.
Coyne Investments paid $324,000 to purchase the three properties, which total 13,204 square feet, between April 29, 1997, and Aug. 28, 2007, according to information on the Mahoning County auditor’s Web site.
Coyne’s companies have had 10 other vacant structures in the city demolished in the past decade, including the Jolly Bar/Valley Hotel at 31 Spring Commons and a former bar at 309 W. Commerce St. in June.
“I’m almost a one-person wrecking ball,” Coyne joked.
There haven’t been tenants in the three downtown buildings to be demolished next week in at least a year with some of the space vacant for about a decade.
Ampco and a law office used to be at 20 W. Boardman St., City Title Co. and a bail bondsman were the last tenants of 24 W. Boardman St. Former lawyer Richard D. Goldberg was the last tenant at 21 S. Phelps St., Coyne said. Goldberg was found guilty in 1999 of defrauding 23 clients of at least $4.4 million.
Ampco moved to the city-owned 20 Federal Place while City Title is on Market Street.
Coyne said he’d prefer to do something with the property besides parking lots, but doesn’t have other options now.
“There used to be a parking need [downtown] and I don’t think there is any more need for parking,” he said.
Coyne said the owners of The New Public Market building on Phelps, sandwiched between the parking lot and the 21 S. Phelps St. structure, aren’t interested in selling, which severely limits what can be done in that area.
Pro Quality Land Development, a Campbell company, is handling the demolition of Coyne’s three buildings.
Pro Quality has demolished a number of structures including the buildings where Youngstown State University is erecting its new business college, The Rayen School, and a number of school buildings in Warren, said Cosmo Iamurri, the company’s owner.
It will cost under $200,000 to demolish the three downtown buildings, Iamurri said.
The three buildings to be taken down are attached to other structures making the work “a little more time-consuming,” he said.
The company may have to block off the sidewalk during demolition, but doesn’t anticipate having to close off portions of Boardman or Phelps street, Iamurri said.
The property will be paved after the demolition work is done, weather permitting, he said. If it’s too cold to pave after demolition, Pro Quality will do so next spring, he said.
skolnick@vindy.com