The H Mart opening in Somerville’s Davis Square appears stalled, similar to delays on a Medford location announced a year ago that has seen no visible progress in several months.
Though the Somerville community was excited to see a branch of the Asian grocery store open at 240 Elm St., replacing a bfresh store that closed Oct. 12, there is no word on an opening date. The city of Somerville has no information to share, a spokesperson said.
“Economic Development has had no updates. That’s normal at this phase,” said spokesperson Denise Taylor on Sept. 24, referring to the municipal department. “Once work starts, they generally only hear from them if a project needs help navigating a permit.”
A crew member at the site Davis Square location said to look for an opening in June, but work has gone silent. The site has received little enough care that the paper covering its windows has begun to droop, allowing passersby to peek in to see progress – what there is of it. A look Sept. 20 revealed unfinished floors and unpainted walls and some shelving in disarray, uninstalled.
The images were shared with the manager of a Cambridge grocery store that has undergone renovations recently. By their assessment, the H Mart wouldn’t be ready for an opening until at least 2025, despite what managers at other H Mart locations said: That workers are still “preparing for opening” in Davis Square that could come as soon as Sept. 5, or this month. (The name of the outside manager is being withheld because they were not authorized to speak for either chain.)
H Mart has not responded to questions about progress at the store.
Efforts by the City of Somerville to get answers for the community were also unsuccessful. “Economic Development sent a request for connection to H Mart via text, phone and email,” Taylor said Sept. 27.
“How much they share about the status of their work with the public is their choice. It’s their proprietary information. Some projects choose to share a lot of progress updates publicly. Others prefer to wait and just announce an opening date when they are ready,” Taylor said, noting that “it takes time to outfit a large retail space like 240 Elm, especially when a food-based business is involved. Contracting, workforce, supply chain, etc., all play a role. This space is in progress.”
The grocery store location is just one of several empty storefronts in Davis Square, most of them resulting from two developments that got far enough along to uproot shops, bars and restaurants before pausing indefinitely for lack of office or lab tenants planning to move in when the projects were finished.
The H Mart website does not have information on the 25,000-square-foot Middlesex Avenue location on the Medford-Malden line, despite its earlier announcement in May 2023, but advertises that the Somerville location is “coming soon.”
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The situation in Davis is a shame and it is the city’s own doing. Loosen the ridiculous zoning restrictions and allow apartment buildings to go up with first floor retail.
If the city is responsible for zone blocking they NEED to examine the MBTA Communities Act, which specifically encourages the existence of retail space on street level and housing above and such properties towards the compliance rules.
Cambridgejoe: Somerville passed new zoning to comply with the MBTA Communities Act back in November 2023. To do that, it legalized triple-deckers in all residential zones by right, and eliminated the four-unrelated-persons rule and permits for steep slopes.
https://www.somervillema.gov/news/public-hearing-zoning-change-proposals-meet-mbta-communities-requirements-housing-needs
https://www.bizjournals.com/boston/news/2024/09/06/somerville-triple-deckers.html
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/33-towns-in-full-compliance-with-mbta-communities-law-eligible-for-15m-in-grants/ar-AA1rzRK4
cambridgeresident: This building is already zoned Mid-Rise 4, which allows residential upper stories. Residential first floor is prohibited because Elm is a designated Pedestrian Street. It’s up to the owner of the existing 2-story retail+office building if they want to demolish it and replace it with a 4-story building.
Most of this block and about half of Davis Square is zoned Mid-Rise 4; the other half (like the other side of Elm Street) is Commercial Core 4, which allows 4 stories but does prohibit residential uses. I agree this does not make much sense, especially given that demand for offices has significantly declined post-pandemic. Why allow housing on one side of the street but not the other? It’s going to be just as noisy either way, and housing keeps Davis active and safer later at night.
There are links to the map (Zoning Atlas) and the Zoning Ordinance requirements at: https://www.somervillezoning.com/