Tagged: central new york

The month of March is around the corner, and in the minds of auto dealers, it not only brings warmer temperatures, but also customers back to their lots.

And after a few years of hard times and sluggish sales, they’re more optimistic going into their busy selling season.

“The spring season is one of our best parts of the year for selling vehicles. And I think this year we have something to look forward to,” East Syracuse Chevrolet salesman Perry Richardson said at this past weekend’s Syracuse Auto Show. He’s worked the show for two-decades.

The move to downtown Syracuse was three years in the making for Nicole Samolis. That’s how long it took her to convince her husband to forgo their home in the suburbs.

The couple lives in the newly renovated Dey’s Plaza. The building was once a large department store, and then failed as an office building.

But since it was converted to apartments a few years ago, there’s been a waiting list to get in. Samolis was sold on the place by its view of Syracuse landmarks like the county courthouse.

They weren't quite the Transformers from the movies, but once the bell rang inside the Museum of Science and Technology in Syracuse, the robot's wheels turned, gears spun and metal arms extended.

The VEX Robotics Competition was the culmination of weeks of engineering and problem solving for central New York students. 

For property developers Rich DeVito and Bob Doucette of Paramount Realty, the motivation for taking on large scale renovations of downtown Syracuse’s previously empty buildings was this:

“We wanted to make money,” says DeVito flatly, though Doucette chuckles at the simplicity of the answer. “It’s where the market is,” DeVito goes on to say.

And make money they did.

The pair took the former Dey Brother’s department store in Syracuse two years ago and turned it into upscale apartments with a few office suites.

Its residential units are currently fully leased.

New York’s Canal Corporation was 0 for 3 in its efforts to find someone interested in redeveloping Syracuse’s Inner Harbor.

Their last request for proposals, a few years back, garnered zero submissions.

But now, the City of Syracuse is in charge, after stepping up and asking to be put in charge of the project. And today the city made public its ambitious new plan to redevelop the harbor.