Putnam Green, the longtime apartment complex at West Putnam Avenue and Western Junior Highway, has been part of Greenwich’s rental landscape for about 50 years — and it may be about to change dramatically. I pulled the pre-application filing now in front of Greenwich Planning & Zoning: it proposes replacing the existing 66-unit complex (built in 1976, with 28 studios and 38 one-bedrooms) with 176 apartments in a six-story building on the same 2.7-acre site at 7 and 9 Western Junior Highway.
I'll say it plainly: I was floored scrolling through the renderings. (Swipe to see the proposed plan 😱) But before you picture bulldozers next week, know this is still early — a pre-application, meaning it's up for preliminary feedback, not approval.
The existing complex sold for $20.7 million in June 2025.
Here's what's driving the numbers: 30% of the proposed 176 units would fall under Connecticut's 8-30g affordable housing provisions, the state statute that lets developers bypass certain local zoning restrictions if a set share of units are deemed affordable. That's the mechanism making a jump from 66 to 176 units possible on 2.7 acres.
The existing complex sold for $20.7 million in June 2025 — a sale that, in hindsight, now reads as the first domino.
Between this proposal and other major residential projects being discussed downtown, Greenwich is looking at a genuinely different housing landscape than the one most of us grew up with.
So I'll ask you directly: smart use of downtown space, or too much density for Greenwich?
PROPOSED RENDERING — Courtesy of Design Development Architects.
One important distinction worth repeating: what you're seeing is the current proposed design, not an approved or final building. This is still a pre-application — the project is being presented for preliminary feedback only, and nothing has been approved.