WHITEHALL TWP., Pa. – The owners of the former Lehigh Valley Dairy site in Whitehall Township are just about done clearing the property. Now they have to decide what to do with it.
Gus Elias, of Elias Property Group, which bought the property in 2019, told 69 News recently that demolition at the site is about 90% complete.
Gone is the majority of the hulking, 350,000 square foot brick complex with the towering art deco-inspired facade.
What will rise next at 1026 MacArthur Road? That has yet to be determined.
“We figured we’d demolish it, and then once we see the property and see the land, how it sits, then we can decide on what we’re going to do,” Elias said.
Elias Property Group owns a 14-acre, L-shaped portion of the property that butts up to MacArthur Road. The back of the property is owned by a different developer.
Highs, lows, and Watergate
The building, constructed in 1920, was originally a silk mill that was converted into a dairy in 1934, thanks to the efforts of the Lehigh Valley Cooperative Farmers group. By 1944, more than 450 local farmers had joined the collective, and the dairy was pumping out milk, ice cream and cheese.
The dairy was doing big business in the 1950s and was considered one of the leading industries in the Lehigh Valley. In 1956, the dairy even brought cowboy star William Boyd, also known as Hopalong Cassidy, to lead Allentown’s Halloween Parade.
But things began to change in the 1970s. The co-op found itself wrapped up in the Watergate scandal that brought an end to the Nixon presidency, 69 News reported in its History’s Headlines series.
By the end of the decade, the dairy was losing money. In 1980, stockholders voted to dissolve the Lehigh Valley Cooperative and sell its assets to a new company named Atlantic Processing.
The dairy laid off the majority of its workers in early 1989 and closed soon after. It’s been empty ever since.
The next chapter
Demolition began in April of 2024. The Lehigh County Redevelopment Authority has been assisting in the transformation of the property.
“It’s really encouraging, particularly looking at where we were a year ago with the building still standing in a deteriorated state,” said Chris Gulotta, the executive director of the redevelopment authority. “I think good progress is being made, and more to come.”
Last year, the agency worked out a grant agreement to pay for an environmental assessment of the site. Elias said those studies have come back “good and clean.”
Traffic studies will come next, along with township approvals for whatever plans the Elias Property Group decides to pursue.
The property is zoned as C-2, or regional / community commercial.
“All of the ideas are open, whether it’s a mixed-use, commercial-residential, whether it’s just commercial,” Elias said. “All the ideas are still open. We won’t say no to anything, we just have to see what is the best option.”