FALL RIVER ─ Alden Street in the Flint neighborhood will get a sprucing up thanks to a $5 million grant from the state’s Community One Stop for Growth program that will mean repaving the thoroughfare and installing new sidewalks.
Mayor Paul Coogan said they picked Alden Street because of the number of mill redevelopments occurring in that area of the city that includes projects like Alden Lofts, Cornell Mill Lofts, and the former Flint Mill property.
The road and sidewalk improvements at Alden Street will complement his administration’s ongoing revitalization on Pleasant Street that includes the Love Your Block Initiative run by the Fall River Community Development Agency that provides $200 to $3,000 mini grants to local non-profits and community groups to fund volunteer-led projects like for park revamps, community gardens, street cleanups, and block beautification.
There are also private redevelopment efforts on Pleasant Street in the Flint with the rehabilitation of the blighted building at 1616-1622 Pleasant Street that will be adding both affordable and market rate housing and funding of restoration of commercial storefronts.
“I think this will give people a sense of pride,” said Coogan.
The Flint neighborhood was once a bustling commercial and social hub during Fall River’s 19th- and early 20th-century cotton and textile heyday, it was long considered the city’s “second downtown.”
