Telegraph file photo by DEAN SHALHOUP Mayor Jim Donchess, right, speaks with John Flatley Company officials Kevin Walker and Brian Pietz during last December's groundbreaking for a cluster of R&D buildings at 23-43 Innovative Way. The project recently changed to residential housing, but the city Zoning Board denied the company's request for a variance. (Telegraph photo by DEAN SHALHOUP)

NASHUA – The Flatley Company, developer and builder of thousands of housing, retail, commercial and mixed-use units, many of them in the southern part of Nashua, was planning to construct a new apartment and townhouse complex – until a couple of weeks ago.

That’s when the city Zoning Board denied the company’s request for a variance, stalling the project the company had eyed for 200 Innovative Way, a hilltop location that’s part of Flatley’s Nashua Technology Park off of Spit Brook Road.

Zoning Board members, at an April meeting, denied the company’s variance request by a unanimous, 5-0 vote. They stated in their collective narrative that they “are concerned about a negative impact on surrounding properties,” and that the request “is contrary to the public interest.

“The board found that property values will be negatively impacted by this request … the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some other method,” the members wrote.

Just five months ago, it appeared as though the hilltop location was about to become home to the first of three research and development (R&D) buildings.

Several Flatley executives, including John J. Flatley, the son of the late company founder Thomas Flatley, hosted a symbolic groundbreaking at the site in mid-December 2020, to which they invited city officials and members of the local media.

When, and why, those plans apparently changed to residential, rather than commercial, development, or whether the apartments and townhouses project is in addition to, rather than in place of, the proposed R&D construction, isn’t known. A call to Flatley headquarters seeking comment wasn’t immediately returned.

According to the Zoning Board, the project for which Flatley sought the variance involved the construction of 294 housing units – 266 apartments and 28 townhouses.

At the time of the groundbreaking in December, construction of one of the three proposed R&D buildings was well underway. The project was to be named the Nashua Micro-Tech Center, and each building would feature “incubator spaces” for the “start-up companies” that Flatley said he and his company wanted to attract.

John Flatley, meanwhile, said in December that the project was planned and has gotten underway “in spite of COVID,” a reference to the pandemic that, at the time, still held much of the population in its grasp.

Mayor Jim Donchess praised the project, saying he viewed the project as a sort of beacon for “attracting new businesses to Nashua.”

At the time, the first Micro-Tech Center building already under construction was described as “one of three separate 10,000 to 17,000 square foot flex R&D buildings” planned for the site.

Its literature touted the location as “a scenic environment … at the entrance to Gateway Hills … within one of the most affluent neighborhoods in Southern New Hampshire.”

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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