The site of the former Pillsbury factory on Springfield’s northeast side could be leveled and developed for future residential, industrial or commercial use – maybe even become a solar farm – in the next five years or more.
Those are among the hopes of Moving Pillsbury Forward, a Springfield nonprofit that recently acquired the 18-acre site from P-Mills LLC after years of both legal and illegal scrap removal since then-owner Cargill shut the site down in 2001.
But first, MPF, which bought the site at 1525 Phillips Ave. for $1, plans to hire the Fehr Graham Engineering & Environmental firm to evaluate the soil, groundwater and remaining 500,000 square feet of buildings.
The firm’s report, expected by the end of the summer, will guide decisions related to future development and hone cost estimates of demolition and cleanup ranging from $8 million to $12 million.
“That environmental work will tell us how contaminated the soil is and what we can do at this site,” said Chris Richmond, a Springfield resident and retired firefighter who is president of MPF and helped launch the group in 2019.
State and federal grants would fund most of the site preparation and development, he said. Depending on what the environmental study reveals, the site could be ripe for development, Richmond said. It’s already near major electrical, rail and water lines, he said.
The group wants to hear more from Springfield residents about their preferences. MPF plans to hold a public hearing on the issue from 6 to 8 p.m. April 27 in the commons area at Lanphier High School.
The group says on its website that it wants to “redevelop the largest single blighted property in our city.” Debris and overgrown weeds and brush already are starting to be removed by volunteers.
Richmond, whose father worked at Pillsbury, said MPF, supported by financial and in-kind contributions from volunteers, wanted to have control over the site.
“We felt that as a local not-for-profit that had a stake in the community, we would have the best chance of having the outcome the community would like to see,” he said.
Pillsbury Co., which was acquired in 2001 by Minneapolis-based General Mills, built the Springfield plant throughout the 1920s and opened for business in 1929, Richmond said.
The rows of 100-feet-tall bins on either side of the 14-story “head house” held as many as 3 million bushels of wheat brought to the site by trucks and rail cars, he said. The plant at first ground the grain into flour that was shipped to general stores and other users in 100-pound sacks, Richmond said.
After World War II, Pillsbury expanded its production to cake mixes and eventually brownie mixes, and flour began to be packaged for sale in five-pound bags. Pillsbury products produced in Springfield were sold throughout the country.
The neighborhood surrounding the site grew along with employment at Pillsbury, which peaked at more than 1,500 in the 1950s, Richmond said.
The neighborhood grew and prospered along with the plant, but it also declined along with the plant’s fortunes, according to Polly Poskin, a member of MPF’s executive board and vice chair of the steering committee for Springfield Inner City Older Neighborhoods.
Pillsbury sold the site to Cargill in 1991 for $19 million, according to Sangamon County property records. Cargill ran the plant as a 3 million-bushel grain storage facility for about 10 years and the facility then sat vacant until 2008, when the site was sold to the first of a series of owners who removed scrap metal.
Illegal removal of asbestos from copper pipes led to a court injunction filed by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency in 2015, and the U.S. EPA paid for $3.2 million worth of asbestos cleanup in 2017. During those years, around half of the original 850,000 square feet of building space were demolished and removed, Richmond said.
Moving Pillsbury Forward still deals with “thrill-seekers” and “scrappers” who have snuck in through holes in the perimeter fence, he said. No one has been seriously injured, but the group is looking forward to seeing the site razed, he said.
“The structures are in a state of partial demolition currently, and they’re in a state of serious disrepair,” Richmond said. “Basically, the structures are all very dangerous at this point.”
Clearing the site of the hulking cluster of steel-and-concrete buildings that extend as tall as 14 stories would provide an emotional and economic reset for the city and especially for residents of the struggling neighborhood, Poskin said.
The Pillsbury site represents the decline in heavy manufacturing and the good-paying jobs that went with it, that Springfield and many other communities in Rust Belt states have endured, she said.
“People would like to see the site cleared of these abandoned buildings,” Poskin said. “They’re unsafe. They’re an eyesore. And I think they’re also a painful reminder of what was – an economic driver in this city.”
And though the smell of baking bread with Pillsbury’s Best flour is long gone from the property, Poskin said the demolition of its buildings “will change the vista on the northeast side of Springfield.”
Poskin, who lives in the Harvard Park neighborhood, said “gentrification” is not one of MPF’s goals for the Pillsbury site and surrounding neighborhood. Basic improvements and a halt in economic decline are what Springfield’s older neighborhoods need, she said.
“I think our city has long neglected the north and east and southeast ends of the community, and this is a chance to change the focus,” she said. “If we’re going to maintain a viable city, then we’ve got to ensure the residential integrity of all aspects of our community.”
Dean Olsen is a senior staff writer for Illinois Times. He can be reached at dolsen@illinoistimes.com or 217-679-7810.
This article appears in Spring Home & Garden 2022.
