Pair of warehouses proposed for former Marvine colliery site in Scranton

The former Marvine colliery, a significant site from Scranton’s coal-mining past, continues to evolve from a culm wasteland to mixed uses.

In the latest such development, a Berks County company plans to build a pair of industrial supply warehouses on part of the former Marvine tract in North Scranton near Interstate 81.

A “Scranton City Business Park” here would contain a 351,500-square-foot building and a 143,775-square-foot building on 55 acres in the 3400 block of Olyphant Avenue, which is in a commercial-industrial zone.

The larger warehouse would go next to the United States Armed Forces Reserve Center, while the smaller warehouse would go behind the Reserve Center. The project area is bounded by I-81 and Olyphant and Boulevard avenues.

A rendering of where two warehouses would go, next to and behind the Armed Forces Reserve Center in middle of aerial photo, on part of the fomer Marvine colliery site in North Scranton, bounded by Interstate 81, at right, Boulevard Avenue at left, and Olyphant Avenue, at bottom. (IMAGE COPIED FROM ELECTRIC CITY TELEVISION VIDEO)

An aerial view of the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center on Olyphant Avenue in Scranton Monday, February 12, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG)

The Scranton Planning Commission on Wednesday heard preliminary plans for the pair of warehouses from C&B Development LLC of Wyomissing.

“We just started the development process. We’re really early in on the design side of this,” Andy Baldo of C&B Development told the commission, according to an Electric City Television simulcast and video of the meeting posted on YouTube.

C&B would build the warehouses first and then find users in the warehousing market.

“It’s a speculative development. We don’t know who’s going to be there,” Baldo said. “Until you put a shovel into the ground and there’s a sure point when the building’s going to be up and operating, nobody’s going to sign a lease and take that development risk.”

Commission member Joseph Murphy asked what kind of businesses C&B looked to attract there.

Baldo said tenants might come from traditional industrial, retail, consumer-products, office, medical or contractor-equipment supply firms. There also could be multiple tenants in the two buildings, and they would not be mega-warehouses or data centers, he said.

“This is not going to be a big Amazon warehouse. It doesn’t have that kind of square footage associated with it,” Baldo said. “We’re hoping to attract local, regional guys, as opposed to big national players, because of the location, because of the size of these buildings.”

The project could take about 18 months to plan, and construction could take 12-18 months, depending on when it would start, he said.

“It will probably be at a minimum of three years until they open the doors for something like this,” Baldo said.

Commission members also raised questions about traffic flow and other details. Trucks would access the site via Boulevard Avenue, in an area across from Mike’s Scrap Recycling, and come and go to I-81 via Dickson City. A secondary driveway for emergency traffic would access the property from Olyphant Avenue.

C&B will return to the commission in the future with more information as project details are refined.

“We just wanted to introduce ourselves and the project. We’ll be back when we’re ready with a more detailed analysis,” Baldo said.

Commission Chairman Todd Pousley said, “We appreciate that. Coming sooner rather than later is always helpful just so we can get a peek” at the plan.

For about a century, the Marvine colliery on Boulevard Avenue marked the landscape with breakers, culm banks and rails. Operations involved mining and processing of millions of tons of anthracite coal at the site, which employed thousands during its heyday in the early 1900s.The Marvine Colliery on Boulevard Avenue in Scranton in the mid-20th Century. (Lackawanna Historical Society)

Little of that bustling past remains, except for a few remnants of railroad and coal mining history along the Lackawanna River and Lackawanna River Heritage Trail, and near the Parker Street Landing.

Over the past few decades, developments have cropped up on sections of the former Marvine site, including the Lackawanna Recycling Center and a cell tower; the Green Ridge Care Center nursing home and affiliated Gardens of Green Ridge assisted living center; and Mike’s Scrap Recycling facility, all on the western side of Boulevard Avenue.

Fronting on Olyphant Avenue on the former Marvine site, the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center opened in 2011.

A few years ago, the heritage trail created a new 1-mile section routed through the Marvine site, where this new paved path between the Parker Street Landing and Boulevard Avenue hugs the river and wraps around the Lackawanna Recycling Center.

The Lackawanna River Heritage Trail’s Marvine Colliery section off the Parker Street Landing in North Scranton, on Thursday, June 29, 2023. (JIM LOCKWOOD / STAFF PHOTO)

Meanwhile, last year a firm of Louis and Dominick DeNaples called APHC II, which owns 8 acres of the former Marvine site between the river and Boulevard Avenue near the Lackawanna Recycling Center, completed reclamation work on those acres to facilitate unspecified commercial or industrial land use on that site.

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An aerial view of the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center on Olyphant Avenue in Scranton Monday, February 12, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG)

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An aerial view of the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center on Olyphant Avenue in Scranton Monday, February 12, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG)

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An aerial view of the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center on Olyphant Avenue in Scranton Monday, February 12, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG)

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An aerial view of the U.S. Armed Forces Reserve Center on Olyphant Avenue in Scranton Monday, February 12, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG)

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