cleanup · Erie County
Pierce-Arrow Manufacturing Complex
Buffalo
Former luxury-automobile manufacturing complex around Great Arrow Avenue and Elmwood Avenue. State records identify petroleum impacts, industrial fill, metals, PCBs, solvents, underground tanks, and later hazardous-material storage across separately managed brownfield parcels; investigation at 157 Great Arrow was updated to include PFAS sampling.
The documented story
What happened here?
Pierce-Arrow's former automobile works occupied a large complex around Great Arrow and Elmwood avenues. State records date the first buildings to 1907 and most of the remaining factory to 1916; automobile production continued until about 1938. Automotive manufacturing, fuel storage, metalworking, painting, electrical equipment, and later hazardous-material storage left different environmental conditions across separately owned parcels.
The modern cleanup story did not begin with one coordinated redevelopment. EPA removed approximately 3,000 drums of hazardous waste from the wider complex in 1999, but that emergency removal did not include subsurface remediation. A 2007 Brownfield Cleanup Program application covered only 6.5 acres of a roughly 16-acre proposed project, and that earlier agreement was later rescinded without completing its planned remedy.
State brownfield records document petroleum impacts, industrial fill, metals, PCBs, solvents, and underground tanks. A 2024 investigation addendum for 157 Great Arrow also added PFAS sampling, but results must be interpreted parcel by parcel.
A celebrated automobile came from a neighborhood-scale factory
Pierce-Arrow's prestige rested on thousands of hours of Buffalo factory work
1907-1938Pierce-Arrow production era at the Great Arrow complex
1907-World War I
A daylight factory was built around skilled automobile production
The company opened its large Elmwood Avenue works as it moved from bicycles and small cars into the luxury market. Pierce-Arrow became a Buffalo name recognized internationally, while wartime demand added trucks and other heavy vehicles to the factory's output.
1920s-1938
Prestige could not protect the workforce from industrial collapse
Pierce-Arrows served the White House and elite buyers, but luxury-car sales weakened through the Depression and competitive automobile market. Bankruptcy and liquidation ended local automobile production in 1938 and displaced the remaining workers.
Later ownership and cleanup
One famous factory became many environmental parcels
Successor manufacturers and property divisions introduced their own operations and conditions. Modern brownfield investigations document petroleum, metals, solvents, PCBs, industrial fill, and tanks on particular parcels; those findings should not all be assigned to Pierce-Arrow or to the entire historic complex.
Atlas classification: agency investigation.
Historical records and sampling information are being reviewed. This page does not present the property as a confirmed PFAS source.
Compounds and evidence
Sampling planned or required; no result established
Medium: groundwater
The work plan and 2024 addendum require PFAS sampling; the plan is not a laboratory result.
Evidence limit: No compound-specific detection is presented until laboratory results and DEC interpretation are available. APFO and PFOA use are not inferred from the former manufacturing operations.
C8 and APFO: PFOA is often called C8. APFO is the ammonium salt of PFOA, but a PFOA environmental result does not identify APFO as the original product or prove where it came from.
News record
Major news events
Coverage selected here marks a turning point in public awareness, policy, enforcement, employment, or cleanup. Links open at the original publisher or archive; WNYAtlas does not reproduce restricted articles or images.
Pierce-Arrow turns a North Buffalo complex into a nationally known automobile works
Foundry, machining, painting, fuel, and maintenance operations created the industrial processes that later cleanup investigations had to reconstruct across multiple parcels.
New York State historic and brownfield records ↗Drum removal and phased brownfield investigation follow decades of divided reuse
EPA removed hazardous containers at Great Arrow Plaza, while later state investigations addressed soil, groundwater, vapor, and emerging contaminants parcel by parcel rather than declaring the entire historic factory uniformly contaminated.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ↗Chemical guide
Chemicals named in this record
These links explain potential hazards and exposure pathways. A chemical named in a record does not establish that anyone was exposed or harmed.
Health context
Why PFAS are a long-term concern
PFAS are a large family of manufactured chemicals. Many are highly persistent, and some can remain in the environment or build up in people and animals over time. Persistence can allow releases to move through groundwater, surface water, waste systems, food, and fish long after the original use has ended.
Human studies have found associations between increased exposure to certain PFAS and higher cholesterol, lower antibody response to some vaccines, changes in liver enzymes, pregnancy-induced hypertension and preeclampsia, small decreases in birth weight, and kidney or testicular cancer for PFOA. Evidence differs by compound, and research continues. A site detection does not show that a particular person was exposed or that PFAS caused an illness.
Chronology
Timeline
- 1907–about 1938
Pierce-Arrow built out the Great Arrow works and manufactured luxury automobiles there.
- Later industrial reuse
Subdivided buildings supported varied manufacturing, storage, and commercial uses.
- 1999
EPA removed approximately 3,000 drums of hazardous waste, while leaving subsurface conditions for later investigation.
- 2007 onward
Separate parcels entered New York's Brownfield Cleanup Program; the first 6.5-acre project did not complete its proposed remedy, while later parcel applications followed their own tracks.
- December 2017
New York issued a Certificate of Completion for the separately numbered C915312 parcel.
- 2024
The 157 Great Arrow investigation plan was expanded to include PFAS sampling.
Environmental record
Documented impacts
- Petroleum, tanks, and industrial fill affected multiple former manufacturing areas.
- Metals, PCBs, and solvents were identified in state brownfield records.
- PFAS investigation at one parcel does not establish complex-wide PFAS contamination.
- A federal drum removal reduced an immediate storage hazard but did not answer what remained in soil or groundwater beneath every parcel.
Response
Cleanup and controls
- Each brownfield parcel receives its own investigation, remedy, construction controls, and completion decision.
- Tank removal, soil excavation, covers, vapor evaluation, and groundwater management are used where required.
- Environmental easements and site-management plans preserve restrictions on residual contamination.
Then and now
The site today
The former complex is a mosaic of reused, remediated, and still-investigated parcels. It should never be presented as a single cleanup with one status.
That uneven record is the human-scale story of the complex today: neighbors and tenants can stand beside a completed brownfield parcel while another address in the same historic factory footprint is still being investigated.
School-map connection
See the documented campus relationship
The schools research map explains the documented property, adjacency, or mapped-parcel relationship without treating proximity as evidence of exposure or present school conditions.
Linked schools mapTAPESTRY CHARTER SCHOOL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL / TAPESTRY CHARTER SCHOOL →Research status
Open questions
- Create a parcel matrix covering every brownfield site number, address, remedy, and completion certificate.
- Add PFAS findings only after the laboratory results and agency interpretation are public.