Concord receives federal funding to clean old stables, paving way for stagecoach museum

Mark Sanborn, EPA Regional Administrator for New England, takes a look inside the Concord Stables building on Friday, recently awarded federal funds for cleanup.

Mark Sanborn, EPA Regional Administrator for New England, takes a look inside the Concord Stables building on Friday, recently awarded federal funds for cleanup. SRUTHI GOPALAKRISHNAN photos / Monitor staff

Mark Sanborn, EPA Regional Administrator for New England, takes a look inside the Concord Stables building on Friday, recently awarded federal funds for cleanup.

Mark Sanborn, EPA Regional Administrator for New England, takes a look inside the Concord Stables building on Friday, recently awarded federal funds for cleanup. SRUTHI GOPALAKRISHNAN—

Concord Mayor Byron Champlin talks with EPA administrator Mark Sanborn outside the Concord Stables on Warren Street Friday morning.

Concord Mayor Byron Champlin talks with EPA administrator Mark Sanborn outside the Concord Stables on Warren Street Friday morning.

Concord Stables building on Warren Street, for which the city of Concord received a grant to clean up contamination.

Concord Stables building on Warren Street, for which the city of Concord received a grant to clean up contamination. SRUTHI GOPALAKRISHNAN—

By SRUTHI GOPALAKRISHNAN

Monitor staff

Published: 06-27-2025 4:36 PM

Lead-based paint, asbestos and other hazardous building materials are one step closer to being removed from the Concord Stables — once home to the city’s workhorses — bringing the site closer to its transformation as a space to display historic Concord stagecoaches.

The half-acre site on Warren Street will undergo a major environmental cleanup, made possible by a $678,000 grant the city has received from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Beth Fenstermacher, the city’s director of special projects and strategic initiatives, said the goal is to prepare the building for use as either a museum or a community space once the cleanup is complete and the site is safe.

“It’s just sort of forgotten back here,” Fenstermacher said at the site on Friday. “We’re trying to make it a gem of the city once again that we can use.”

The funding will allow Concord to safely remove decades-old contaminants from the long-abandoned structure, which has been designated a Brownfield site — a term used for properties where redevelopment or reuse is complicated by the presence of pollutants.

Mark Sanborn, EPA regional administrator for New England and former assistant commissioner of New Hampshire’s Department of Environmental Services from 2021 to 2023, said the building’s cleanup perfectly illustrates the purpose of the Brownfields program.

“We come in, we help with the cleanup and provide help, provide the opportunity for future use,” said Sanborn.
“It’s a great example of what these dollars can do when leveraged properly.”

Built in 1905, the Concord Stables originally served as housing for the city’s work horses.

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Later, the city’s public works department used it as an office and storage space.

Though the different uses over the years, remnants of the building’s past remain vivid.

Old desks and file cabinets still sit inside, offering a glimpse into its former life as office space.

Wooden posts at the base show the marks of horses that once chewed on them, the floorboards creak with age, and parts of the structure are now too unstable to enter safely.

The Concord Stables building was designed by local architects James Randlett and George Griffin.

In 1994, the stables were transferred to the Concord School District, primarily to provide additional parking space for the nearby high school.

In 2024, the Concord School District transferred the former stables, along with parking for eight cars, to the city for $1.

With the grant awarded, the city is expected to issue a request for proposals in October to find companies for the cleanup work. It may take several years before the structure is ready for public use.

Concord Mayor Byron Champlin said the vision for the future is to display the Abbott Downing Historical Society’s stagecoach collections in this structure.

“The American West was opened with stagecoaches from this city. They were all manufactured here,” said Champlin. “That’s down the road. First thing we have to do is to clean it up, get it ready for public use, make it safe and habitable.”

Sruthi Gopalakrishnan can be reached at sgopalakrishnan@cmonitor.com