The new Registry of Motor Vehicles is situated in a long empty, 6,983 ft’ free-standing building in the Danvers Crossing Shopping Plaza, 8 Newbury St. (Rt. 1), Danvers, Massachusetts. The Hardcover and Costco are across the highway. Businesses sharing the parking lot include Ann & Hope, Dollar Store, David’s Bridal, and Monkey Joe’s. (I didn’t know there were still Ann & Hopes.) A number of vacancies remain. The shopping center was originally built out in 1990.
Prior to this move, the RMV had landed at Liberty Tree Mall. This new branch was expected to receive 500 visitors per day. It’s open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. rather than the 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. broadcast ahead of time. We have been a couple of times recently to this new one; they were quite helpful. (Make certain to arrive by 4pm on any given day or you’ll have to make a second trip. We learned this the hard way arriving for the first time at 4:35pm.) I never visited the RMV when it was in the mall. I have mostly been to the Revere location.
Reporter Paul Leighton followed the RMV Danvers relocation for the Salem News,
“The good news for North Shore residents is that the Registry of Motor Vehicles is finally planning to open a branch in Danvers after two years without one in this area. The bad news? The new place will cost taxpayers a lot more than the old one.
The registry announced last week that it had signed a 10-year lease to open an RMV branch in a former restaurant building at the Danvers Crossing shopping plaza on Route
The rent for the first year will be $350,616 — nearly 10 times as much as the $41,729 that the state paid in the final year of its lease at the Liberty Tree Mall.
A spokesman for the Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance, which handles leasing for the state, said the agency does not comment on lease negotiations.
Danvers state Rep. Ted Speliotis acknowledged the new lease payments will be much higher at Danvers Crossing. But he said that’s more a reflection on the great deal the state had at the Liberty Tree Mall.
Speliotis said the registry moved into the mall during tough economic times, when malls and other retail landlords were desperate for tenants. Liberty Tree even offered the space for free for the first three years, from 2010 to 2013.
“We were in the worst recession of our lifetime and the mall needed the foot traffic,” Speliotis said. “That was a once-in-a-lifetime deal.” Read the full article, “RMV deal finally done, but taxpayers will pay” April 30, 2018: here
The Danvers RMV wasn’t busy the times we went December 2019. Still, it remains a bit of a slog* to get to that RMV (or Revere or Wilmington) from Gloucester. Having been to this new one, I’m not sure why there can’t be a branch in Gloucester as well, perhaps at Gloucester Crossing.
*Having to go 5x in the past two months plus needing to get there by 4pm makes it a slog. Revere and this are a toss up.
Gloucester Crossing
Photos below: Gloucester Crossing December 2019 looking in the direction of Starbucks (on right) and future pharmacy (free standing building on left, next to Aspen Dental)
Before the Danvers build out- What about a DMV at Gloucester Crossing post here
The decision on the location for a new North Shore DMV registry branch remains undecided. There are service centers on the other peninsula, Cape Cod. Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard host full DMV service centers as do towns with smaller populations, like Greenfield and North Adams. There isn’t a uniform state model.
Good Morning Gloucester 