MIDDLETOWN — Commercial real estate broker Dan Wham has seen the building boom in Middletown firsthand as someone who grew up there and a change agent, working to bring national brands to Middletown’s west side.
He grew up off Port Penn Road, on the quiet east side of the Middletown-Odessa-Townsend area, disturbed by the light traffic that drove by on U.S. Route 13. If you asked Wham when he started working at DSM Commercial whether a grocery store like Weiss would come there, he would have thought it was impossible.
“Five years ago, it made sense with the sheer growth there. Middletown used to be a bedroom community, where people do their shopping outside of town. Now, you can really live, work and play there,” Wham said.
He’s one of the main brokers that helped sign national and regional brands to the fastest-growing areas in Delaware, working the phones on a weekly basis with tenant representatives to keep Middletown on the top of mind. It paid off in the last five years, with the “west side” of Middletown along Middletown Warwick Road that ends with the U.S Route 301 bypass.
What Wham finds surprising is the blossoming success around the Westown Shopping Center, anchored by Walmart and Kohl’s. A few years ago, there was a Greene Turtle and a Kiku Japanese Steakhouse.
Now, it’s been built into a Main Street concept with 16 other stores, ranging from a ramen restaurant to a dentist’s office. Further back on the property are more restaurants and shops, hidden from Delaware Route 299 but still a short walk from the nearby apartment complex developed by Capano Residential.
“It’s almost like you turn a corner and there’s more. The only exposure these guys get are either people visiting that place or visiting those stores that back into the apartments,” Wham said. “That’s telling about the growth there. There’s not many places you can get a national brand to sign off on where they don’t have any visibility off the main thoroughfare. That’s pretty rare.”
Middletown has changed in the blink of an eye, with a population estimated at 24,000, a 27% jump than what it was 15 years prior, and more in supporting communities from Odessa and Townsend. The commercial sites at Westown are almost completely filled, but its success has drafted a blueprint for other neighboring towns that are now faced with questions on how to manage their own growth.
Laying the foundation
While the commercial development along Route 299 seems like a natural step for Middletown, it is recent history in the mind of lifelong residents like Wham. In the 1980s, it was all open farmland with Ronny’s Garden World as the last landmark just north of the ramp onto Delaware Route 1.
Middletown Mayor Kenneth Branner said what really lit the spark was that prominent developer Anthony Fusco came down and bought four farms with the intent to build homes. But he needed the sewer infrastructure to serve it.
“We called Tony and told him it’ll cost $5 million and he had a nephew run the cashier’s check the next day. That’s what got us started,” he said.
Middletown then partnered with New Castle County to secure federal funding and the town successfully passed a $28 million referendum to build the sewer treatment plant with 250,000 gallons of water. It was the dawn of the millennium and Branner had only been mayor for a few short years. He and the council vowed from that point on the residents would have to pay for the growth. At the time, the town budget was $250,000 per fiscal year, the mayor said. Now it’s $62 million in fiscal year 2025.
But what made that promise easier to fulfill was the next major infrastructure project: the transportation improvement district (TID) along Middletown Warwick Road. It was the first of its kind back in 2004, with 19 developers, the town and the state agreeing to a fee formula to pay for a traffic study and future road improvements.
“It was like herding cats,” Branner said. “The developers thought it was a great idea, but
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The Westown Shopping center has now evolved to a series of retail stores along a "main avenue" that connects to the Reserve at South Ridge apartments. | DBT PHOTO BY KATIE TABELING[/caption]
then someone said someone would get more than they got and that started the arguments. Since it was the first one, the intersections and the lights were all paid 60% by the state.”
Louis Ramunno of Lenape Properties Management was one of the developers in the first agreement. At that time, he’d been building 800 for-sale homes just south of Armstrong Road in a much smaller community. For him, the TID was a perfect solution to major impediments a developer faces: the traffic study and road improvements on a large scale.
“Middletown did have the tremendous foresight to establish this, because it streamlined development with a wide-range study versus something piecemeal studies of individual pieces of the development pie,” Ramuno said. “You're not duplicating efforts and you’d save money through bulk purchasing.”
By then, other national companies started to see future possibilities at the Westown Shopping Center. Walmart opened one of its superstores the same year the TID was settled after years of legal delays slowed it down. It was the first anchor tenant in Westown, with 190,000 people within a half-hour drive in Maryland and Delaware.
“That’s really what established Westown and created all that synergy with other commercial properties. Then it just became a critical mass,” Ramunno said.
State of synergy
In the early 2000s, Middletown was known as a bedroom community with small-town charms and excellent schools. That’s what drew developers like Ramuno to keep building apartments and homes back then. It’s also what brought Capano Property Management to build Dove Run Shopping Center, and, years later, the Reserve at South Ridge apartments.
But when it comes to major commercial and industrial development, it’s all about access to the highway – and that’s exactly what brought the $90 million Amazon distribution center to Middletown in 2012. By then, the transportation infrastructure was mostly in place. Amazon also paid to construct Merrimac Road so the e-commerce company could reach major highways so its drivers could easily access five other states within a three-hour drive.
The biggest hurdle, Branner said, was convincing Amazon executives that they could get the site plan approved and underground utilities moved within 10 months. The Middletown mayor remembers being at a golf tournament with then-Governor Jack Markell and former Delaware Economic Development Office Director Alan Levin while waiting for a call with Amazon’s top executives.
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Louis Ramuno was one of the first developer to come to Middletown in the early 2000s. He bought into the public-private agreement for road improvements along Middletown Warwick Road, and close to 20 years later, there was enough traffic to attract a Target on his property. | DBT SUBMITTED PHOTO[/caption]
“We were in the back of a clubhouse, and Jack said to me, ‘Tell them how long it’ll take and what we can do,” Branner said. “It’s only two months and three meetings to get final plan approval and they can start then. Everybody says, there’s no way you can do that. But we did it for Amazon.”
Today, in a state where developers strive to have shovels in the ground within six months, people still ask Branner how he sealed the deal, and the pavement, with Amazon. It’s about finding solutions instead of arguments between the state agencies and the developers, he said.
“Why am I going to fight somebody that makes approval? We have to work together. Every developer that’s come here will tell you, we tell them the way it is and we will tell them the truth. Just be open and honest about what you’re doing- that’s why we’re successful,” he said.
The Amazon success story caught the eye of other companies, helping Middletown land other deals like Datwyler Pharma Packaging USA and more retail stores in the Westown Shopping Center. Middletown’s west side was firmly established as the epicenter for growth when the Route 301 bypass opened in early 2019.
“That really made it much easier to get to the west side,” Ramuno said. “If I have to guess, national brands take a ring and mark drive times within a 20-mile drive from where they’re looking, and that made a difference.”
The final frontier for Westown?
Ramuno has since successfully landed Target as an anchor for his commercial properties on the northern end of Middletown Warwick Road. The promise of reaching 280,000 people in a 30-minute drive also enticed PetSmart, Sprouts, First Watch and Hobby Lobby.
His development is one of the few left on the northern side of the Westown TID while developers like Bob Stella have their eyes set on the south side approaching the Route 301 toll. Like many other developers, Stella bought land 25 years ago after handling successful projects in northern New Castle County.
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The U.S. Route 301 Bypass has made it attractive to push commercial development south on Middletown Warwick Road. Recent plans include a shopping center, apartments and a daycare center. | DBT SUBMITTED PHOTO[/caption]
Among his property in Middletown, he’s now built Summerton Place and Summerton East, two luxury apartments off Levels Road. Combined, both have 100 units although Summerton East also has first-floor retail. Stella wants to cater to young professionals that may want to enjoy top-notch amenities in a two-bedroom unit and older tenants in need of downsizing in the growing market. Most, if not all of the units are leased.
“Studio apartments weren’t heard of in Delaware until Buccini Pollin Group did it in Wilmington. I threw a few of them in there, and everybody, even my empty nesters, wanted studios. I don’t understand it. I had to keep pushing the number because I had to slow down the demand,” he said.
Stella has plans for Summerton Suites, a boutique short-term rental place that will offer rooms like a nice apartment for two to three weeks at a time. It’s not the only development in the works, as a daycare is opening up at Levels Road near the 301 Bypass, as well as a new shopping center and storage facility, all deals Wham and DSM Commercial helped craft.
“They’re not making any more land, so as you approach the Maryland line, that development keeps pushing. Maybe then we’ll see more activity in Smyrna because it’s naturally pushing down further south,” Wham said.
