Thompson's Point, Portland

mainejeff said:
You are wrong about Oxford Casino. I see tons of cars with out-of-state plates in the parking lot.
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Bentleys, Beemers, and Cedes? Not talking about the set that play the lotto every week. They are NH and Mass people who live near the border. And yes, perhaps some summer tourists staying at campgrounds, bored. Convenience is everything today. Maine always, always, always does things at the minimum. You know what I'm talking about. The best location for a Vegas scaled and styled casino in this general area would be, or would have been, Hampton Beach. No sales tax and an easy drive from the Boston, Portland, and Manchester metro areas. Although, OOB across from the train station would have been sweet (replacing that run-down section), which is an easy train ride from North Station. The Encore in Boston will bring in the BIGGER money, which includes the Chinese as well as high profile sports celebrities, who attract for events and clubs. Winter 2019-20 in Boston will be the place to be for entertainment. Have you looked at the event schedule at C.I.A. lately? Enough said. (Although Merrill Auditorium has a nice schedule.) Portland's "dream team" for the ultimate, year round entertainment complex? Justin Alfond, Lauren Wayne and the Bissell Brothers. Give them a few hundred million and they would come up with something for winter tourism.
 
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TC_zoid said:
Bentleys, Beemers, and Cedes? Not talking about the set that play the lotto every week. They are NH and Mass people who live near the border. And yes, perhaps some summer tourists staying at campgrounds, bored. Convenience is everything today. Maine always, always, always does things at the minimum. You know what I'm talking about. The best location for a Vegas scaled and styled casino in this general area would be, or would have been, Hampton Beach. No sales tax and an easy drive from the Boston, Portland, and Manchester metro areas. Although, OOB across from the train station would have been sweet (replacing that run-down section), which is an easy train ride from North Station. The Encore in Boston will bring in the BIGGER money, which includes the Chinese as well as high profile sports celebrities, who attract for events and clubs. Winter 2019-20 in Boston will be the place to be for entertainment. Have you looked at the event schedule at C.I.A. lately? Enough said. (Although Merrill Auditorium has a nice schedule.) Portland's "dream team" for the ultimate, year round entertainment complex? Justin Alfond, Lauren Wayne and the Bissell Brothers. Give them a few hundred million and they would come up with something for winter tourism.
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Oxford is popular...and a big money maker for Churchill Downs. Nice snobbish commentary though. I could care less about dealing with the traffic, parking and overdone & overpriced garishness of Encore in Everett. I understand however that they will print money with the International set & big East Coast rollers. Big whoop! I'll take the weather, convenience and fun of Vegas any day over Encore Everett. In the meantime, this non-weekly lotto player will enjoy a night of entertainment every now and then at Oxford.
 
The new Suburban Propane site on Riverside St. Is underway, and with a metal building in place there and nothing more than a slab for the new Children's Museum, my earlier prediction is correct: the first new building built by Thompson's Point is nowhere near Thompson's Point. :)
 
Frankly, I don't know much about Portland development, but Bissell Brothers is the bomb.
 
Regarding Thompson's Point, is the arena/event center part of this dead? I am still curious if a new arena will get built in Portland in the next 10 years. I know the city renovated the CCC a few years back. But that was a waste of money if you ask me. Build 10-12k seat arena with all the bells and whistles.
 
Seanflynn78 said:
Regarding Thompson's Point, is the arena/event center part of this dead? I am still curious if a new arena will get built in Portland in the next 10 years. I know the city renovated the CCC a few years back. But that was a waste of money if you ask me. Build 10-12k seat arena with all the bells and whistles.
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Amen!!! Portland and the State of Maine deserve a large (10K+) state-of-the-art arena. It's time.
 
Seanflynn78 said:
Regarding Thompson's Point, is the arena/event center part of this dead? I am still curious if a new arena will get built in Portland in the next 10 years. I know the city renovated the CCC a few years back. But that was a waste of money if you ask me. Build 10-12k seat arena with all the bells and whistles.
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It was never going to be that large; it was going to have a few thousand seats to be an intimate setting for the Red Claws and later the circus school. Whether it's still part of the deal, or part of the dead, I cannot say.
 
markhb said:
It was never going to be that large; it was going to have a few thousand seats to be an intimate setting for the Red Claws and later the circus school. Whether it's still part of the deal, or part of the dead, I cannot say.
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I think that we all know that proposal was not going to be that large.....but there should be a new arena built that is. I better place to build it would be over near Rock Row/Turnpike though.
 
I don't have the link handy, but I discovered over the weekend that the Thompson's Point developers submitted an updated site plan over the winter, and it appears to eliminate the arena. Plans are in the city's app if anyone has a chance to find them and post the link.
 
^Is any of the stuff that's proposed actually happening? My girlfriend and I stopped by Bissell on Sunday, the 14th and I see very little happening. There's fencing advertising the Children's Museum, but doesn't seem like much has happened apart from some dirt pushing. The website advertises that it'll open in the fall which seems unlikely. The website also mentions a Marriott Hotel opening in 2020, but I didn't see a construction site.
 
I'm with you Lrfox, it's been almost 12 years since the initial announcement. I do think when all is said and done there will be a Children's Museum, a 100 room hotel, a small office building along with some type of residential project. Great intentions by the developers and they have made considerable improvements to the property over the years but I'm not getting any younger! What's the latest in New Bedford?
 
Portlander said:
I'm with you Lrfox, it's been almost 12 years since the initial announcement. I do think when all is said and done there will be a Children's Museum, a 100 room hotel, a small office building along with some type of residential project. Great intentions by the developers and they have made considerable improvements to the property over the years but I'm not getting any younger! What's the latest in New Bedford?
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Thanks. I'm impressed by the ambition for the plans. Frankly, it's a tough location. It's not far from downtown, but it is isolated in that it's cut off by an active railroad, water, and an interstate highway. So a museum, a hotel and an office and residential component would be a net win in terms of activating the area better (which was pretty lively the other Sunday even without those things).

I'm not in the New Bedford area much (I've lived in Somerville for the past 4 years), but it's plugging along slowly. A new boutique hotel opened downtown this year, a bunch of restaurants and new retail have moved into the center of town, a few significant building renovations/additions, and some small new construction proposals, but I don't have too many details on any of them. It's still nice to visit though!
 
Thanks for the NB update, you've been an appreciated contributor to this site for a long time.
 
Portlander said:
Thanks for the NB update, you've been an appreciated contributor to this site for a long time.
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Thanks! Same to you. I'm up in Portland a few times a year (usually passing through on the way to Bethel) and always make a point to stop somewhere in town. I'm really impressed with the way the area east of Franklin is filling in. It's come a long way since I lived there. I'm also extremely impressed with the way the Washington Ave. has filled in with retail. A few months back we stopped into Oxbow since we wanted fries and the wait at Duckfat was 2+ hours. Oxbow apparently has a fry window which is ingenious. I couldn't believe how much is over there now.
 
Let me know the next time you visit Portland, I'll round up Patrick and we'll get lunch somewhere downtown.
 
Rock Row just published this aerial photo of the site on social media. Looks like the Market Basket is well underway and the site for the concert venue is being cleared.

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Could a moderator please move this to the Maine forum? Thank you!
 
I drove by on 295 yesterday and steel is going up for the Children's Museum! First all new construction on the Point since the project was first floated.
 
I just hope the downtown museum reopens before this one is finished; I want to see the camera obscura before it's gone (the plans for the new building appear to have a place for it, but there's nothing to look at).
 
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