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In its ongoing search for additional office and operational space, IndyGo is considering the purchase of the former Celadon Group Inc. headquarters at 9503 E. 33rd St., which is listed at $4 million.
The property includes three buildings totaling 110,910 square feet on a 10-acre parcel just east of Post Road. It housed Celadon’s corporate offices before the trucking company filed for bankruptcy protection and ceased operations in December.
The site was one of several noncontiguous parcels that made up Celadon’s east-side corporate campus. Celadon put all those parcels, 96 acres in all, up for sale as part of the bankruptcy.
On Thursday, IndyGo’s board voted unanimously to seek two independent appraisals of the Celadon site, and to enter into a purchase agreement for the property based on those appraisals.
As a public entity, IndyGo is prohibited from paying more than the appraised value if it acquires real estate. The agency must secure two independent appraisals, and the average of those two appraisals becomes the maximum purchase price.
This is the third site IndyGo’s board has been asked to consider in recent months.
On May 28, the board voted 4-3 to secure appraisals for the former Harrison College site at 550 E. Washington St., a 50,000-square-foot building on a 0.92-acre lot with a list price of $7.5 million. But several board members expressed concerns about the suitability of that site, and IndyGo later dropped it from consideration.
At its June 25 meeting, the board voted unanimously to seek appraisals for 3049 Post Road, a site not far from the Celadon property IndyGo is now considering. The transit agency had been considering both leasing and purchasing the Post Road site, a 246,088-square-foot building on a 17-acre lot with an asking price of $3.5 million. But the property’s owner decided to lease the site to another party, forcing IndyGo to consider other options.
IndyGo says it needs more space because it has outgrown its current headquarters at 1501 W. Washington St., just west of the Indianapolis Zoo. The transit agency’s staff and bus fleet have grown in recent years due to the launch of the Red Line and other route changes.
IndyGo has 897 employees, up from 627 in 2017, and the agency says the only way it can practice social distancing is to require some of its administrative employees to work from home. Its current fleet of 209 buses already crowds the West Washington Street facility, especially overnight, and the fleet is expected to grow to 271 buses once the Purple Line and Blue Lines are built.
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With 897 employees and growing and ridership shrinking, soon they will have more employees than riders.
Way to go IndyGo!
Throw as much money into this disaster as possible. Love it!!!
It doesn’t really make sense to put the bus depot so far out toward the edge of the city, if that’s what they intend to do. Diesel fuel, extra mileage, and driver time getting from there to where routes start and end will add up to a lot. (For the electrics, it will add a lot of non-revenue miles and run the charge down without actually taking anyone anywhere.)
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It would make a lot more sense to buy the scrapyard or lumberyard next door for additional bus storage space, move the office workers elsewhere, and convert the whole building to service bays.
Good suggestion and thoughtful reasoning Chris. With declining ridership they should put a hold on this for now.
Declining ridership that will continue for the remainder of Indy Gos life…..What a waste of money and just another example of the Govt taking off the tax role taxable properties to support a union shop of drivers etc etc etc…Covid isnt going to exist forever ! The scrap Yard makes more sense but would not be in keeping with the Taj Mahal concept used by Govt agencies…
I also thought Eldon Palmer was buying the sight for the Kenworth Dealership ….
That site seem far out and inconveniently located. If public transit is to grow as ir should it seems that better location should be the goal. I’m glad to see the growth. It’s too bad the pandemic put a crimp in all our plans. Ignore the nay sayers!