JamesE
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Posts posted by JamesE
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It looks like the former Mountain Inn site is up for sale.. Hopefully this will wind up being something interesting. Given the asking price, I imagine it would need to be at least five-six stories to justify the asking price.
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I hate the Vue. Its just not a very good looking development for something that takes away from the mountain scenery. I don't remember the renderings being that ugly, so I looked it up. Here's what the initial renderings showed:
I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder... I happen to really like the Vue; I see it coming & going everyday and I can think of a lot of other things that are way uglier on MLK. I like that is't pearched on the hill - we need a bit of a skyline in Fayetteville, especially given that many of our few highrises, with notable exceptions such as The Chancellor, are hideous 60's-era monstrosities.
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Oh, jeebus, the state wants to "Siloam Springs" Wedington from the overpass to Salem. This is going to go over well.
The final decision to move forward with two-laning Rupple south to MLK should lessen the "need" for too much widening along Weddington.
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I've liked their projects they've worked on before in the past. Although as you mentioned, this will be something rather different than those other projects. Should be interesting to see what they do though.
I wonder when the tremendous increase in student population density along MLK will begin translating into new commercial & retail space that cater's to residents? I'd think that S. School would be a perfect place for student bars, coffee shops, quick dining, a grocery store, etc. - it's closer to the majority of the students than Dickson St, with (soon to be) great bike path access and with much less expensive rents.
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Maybe part of the issue is that the west Fayetteville has largely flown under the radar the last few years, as many of the headline grabbing developments have been the big dollar multi-family complexes close to campus. Regarding the growth of the area, most of the subdivisions that were started back in the '05 - '07 boom that went bust and stagnated for years are now booming with activity. So much so that many are completely built out, or are well on their way. Even subdivisions as far out as Double Springs Rd. (e.g. Legacy Heights) which stood almost empty for years are now full of homes.
From a commercial standpoint, The Wedington corridor is very strong right now... Off the top of my head I know of the following businesses that have either recently opened or are under construction:
Walgreens
Slim Chickens
First Security Bank
Northwest Health Clinic
Freddy's Frozen Custard
Super Cuts
Great Clips
Dickey's BBQ
Hilton Gardens Hotel
Casey's Convenience Store
All of these are on a stretch of Wedington about a mile long. Where this area ranks with other areas of the city, I don't know, but it seems pretty strong to me.
Another point that bears mentioning is that, as we all know, the city council recently passed new rules for downtown multi-family development which will make future downtown developments very difficult. It's probably a safe bet that this will push more multi-family developments out to areas like west Fayetteville, which already supports a few successful multi-family developments. Thus supporting the case for stronger infrastructure development in the area.
With regard to parks -- while I appreciate the parks we have I'd like to point out that the parks you mentioned are "pocket parks" that were built in tandem with subdivisions that were developed in the area. These parks were developed with little or no cost to the city. All but one are less than an acre. Some don't even have playground equipment. Bryce Davis park, while nice, comes in at a whopping 2.5 acres and is very difficult to get to, as it is flanked by The Links golf course to the west and a 100-yard trail access from the east. There certainly aren't any "regional parks" in Fayetteville west of 540 like the ones I mentioned in the post above.
There are no baseball fields in west Fayetteville. (The closest ones are at Holcomb Elementary - a mile north of Mt. Comfort Rd.)
There are no tennis courts in west Fayetteville.
There are 2 soccer fields at the Boys and Girls club -- but that requires a membership.
West of I-540, there is less than one mile of public trails in the city limits.
Please understand that I'm not trying to be abrasive - just trying to be the squeaky wheel.
Excellent points. The other wards often seem to treat the west side as the City's stepchild; the Flyer tends to fill up with comments about how Weddington is all "sprawl" (seeming to forget that residents there pay taxes, they don't think of it as sprawl and with a bit of infrastructure and planning, it would be every bit as well integrated as the rest of the city). The west side should be getting a lot more trails soon, after the Town Branch & Tse-La-Gi trails finish up. The regional park & Mt Kessler acquisition, in time, gives west Fayetteville the region's best park and widening Rupple will make it readily accessible from Weddington. My impression is Ward 4 needs residents to really turn out to council meetings; Central Fayetteville is always well (too well) represented at these meetings, which tends to lead to a bit of bias in planning & priority.
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There is some info on the city website in the Tech Plat & committee agenda items about the Specialized project off MLK. There aren't renderings or anything, but it appears to be some form of duplex/townhome project based on the proposed layout.
Sounds like smart diversifacation from their usual (successful) concept.
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Got to agree with you. I don't really have a problem with the current proposal of affordable housing, which is better than the do nothing alternative. But I do have to say I think it would be a better investment to the city to put in condos as well. As long as you don't go the top market route and have them sit empty because they're overpriced to most of the market. Over all I'm still rather disappointed with the condo market in general. Most of the condos in the area seem like they're built with people high up in Tyson or Walmart in mind. There's only so many of those people and there's still plenty of empty condos for them to look into.
Fayetteville has had a few developers who epitomized how not to do condos; done correctly, they ought to be a bit less expensive than similar square footage at a comparable location, not three-four times more expensive. My wife has a very nice condo a few blocks from Powerhouse - it was very reasonably priced when she bought it. Fayetteville needs more like hers and fewer like the one's Brandon Barber (mis)developed. Good point about these being targeted to Wal-Mart executives; no one wants to commute 45 minutes+ after working a 10 hr+ day when one has very good options in Bentonville/Rogers. When it comes to large-scale condo developments in/near downtown Fayetteville, if a U of A assistant professor can't afford it, then it probably shouldn't be built.
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I've been reading about plans for the new parking deck behind The Walton Arts Center. Seems an idea is being floated to put row houses along the east side of it instead of a liner bldg. for City staff. The deck has turned out to be more costly than thought and a scaled back liner bldg. was considered but the row house idea might be better. It would involve selling the land that the row houses would be on to a non-profit that builds affordable housing and letting them do the work. This seems upfront like a great idea- it add affordable housing in an area that needs it, it would remove the cost of the City building on that plot of land and would ensure that the deck isn't just a barebones structure.
It sounds like a pretty good idea to me - it could be a nice model to follow when West Ave and the current WAC surface lots get redeveloped. I'm pretty liberal, just throwing that out so I don't sound too much like a Teapartier... IMO, the City would get a much better return on our investment if they offer these to developers to build them out as full-priced condos. I love the idea of affordable housing, quite a lot of it is being developed just a few blocks from my home, but I think the concept is better suited to redeveloping blighted neighborhoods and not for developing prime real estate in the heart of downtown. If this parcel was sold for market value, the revenue could jump-start further improvements along West Ave, such as the long-awaited downtown park, and/or may close the funding gap for the parking deck.
Whether they build affordable townhouses or market-priced townhouses, I hope the concept spreads. Building something like these around a renovated Hillcrest towers, for instance, would help tie West Ave in to its two main anchors, the library and the WAC, insure Hillcrest's future as low-income housing and beautify the area.
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What's really telling in all of this, is that in Fayetteville there's certainly a segment of the population that are against chains and in favor of locally owned businesses. Yet you hardly hear anyone supporting ONF. And one of the few times that most people in Fayetteville seemed rather excited about a 'chain' coming to town.
Yep. ONF seems to have really squandered whatever goodwill they used to have with the community over the past few years.
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James,
I believe that it is the area where the Sud's carwash is and includes some of the old warehouse space behind it. Or just east of University House complex (used to be called the Domain). I have not heard any of the specifics on it yet.
Thanks Strmchsr77!
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I read a passing burb on Fayetteville Flyer that Specialized Real Estate Group is working on a new project on MLK. Does anyone know any details?
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They will close. The comment about that's why communism didn't work made me spit my tea.
My Mom has is so good where she lives in Memphis, She's got a huge new Whole Foods and a Fresh Market less than a mile from her driveway.
ONF appears to be very poorly managed. However, it's a very nice building at a good location - if we get a WF and ONF closes, hopefully Harps or someone takes over the ONF location.
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Call it a very early, vague report: the broker who sold me my new house recently sold two large lots near the Coop/Mill in the Mill District. He says that the lot adjacent to Greenhouse Grille is expected to be a 2-3 story structure with retail or offices on the lower level, topped with apartments. The larger, arguably better located lot right on the bike trail is expected to be somewhat similar to what Jacobs & Newell is putting in across the street, albeit it will be built by a different developer (that's disappointing). It will likely be a dense 2-3 story, possibily 4 story mixed purpose structure(s). The buyers are still very early in the development process so I have no hard details yet on what it will look like, but my understanding is they are already working with the city planning commision. The link below is to what Jacobs + Newell is currently building in the Mill District:
http://www.jacobsnewellcompany.com/in-progress/
Some older homes recently sold on the north side of MLK, adjacent to J+N's Church St project. The rumor is the buyer plans to demo the houses and then sit on the lots; either he'll flip them or develop them later for in-fill housing.
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I'm pretty Fayetteville-centric, but even I can admit that Bentonville has several good local restaurants now. Bentonville is doing things right in their downtown, too. D
A agree Bentonville downtown is great - the new WAC & kids museum is going to make it even better.
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Quite honestly there's lots of comp around there, Something like that would likely Found a niche on MLK or Wedington., need more non drive thru fare along MLK quite frankly
That's something something I don't get about restaurant development in Fayetteville; it seems uptown has too many restaurants and the rest of town has too few. These restaurants cannibalize each other's business and they aren't too convenient to people on the west, south, and east sides of town. The only other place where there is a significant concentration of restaurants is on Dickson, which has issues of it's own. Go south of Archibald Yell, and it's mostly tumbleweeds with the exception of Green House Grille and it's mostly fast food places east & west. Having recently moved to the south side of town, I've also become accutely aware of the fact that there are no decent grocery stores around here either. Hopefully Southgate will get redeveloped soon - that would seem to be a great location for a few good restaurants and a grocery store.
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HuHot Grill is closing for good 12/12/13 Wednesday
Call me a history nerd, but I've never gotten the concept of a Mongol-themed grill that doesn't serve Mongolian food.
It seems as though a bunch of stir fry Asian places have come and gone from that location.
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James, if that was you that posted that summary at the Flyer, good job.
Thanks TRB! Yes, that was me.
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The ordinance review committee's proposal was presented as an amendment, but shotdown by the entire council, minus Sarah Marsh & Matt Petty. That version would have made sense. Why Mark Kinion and the other idiots supported the Kit Williams proposal is beyond me. I think they are just too stupid to understand what they were voting for.
A better option would have been to leave the existing zoning in place; Marsh & Petty's proposal strikes me a plan to eat a lite portion of turd, as opposed to the full, all-you-can eat buffet that passed. And it was her idea to eat turd in the first place. I agree that they are too stupid to know what they were voting for; this mess exposes our entire city council for the incompetent political hacks they are.
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And yet Sarah was shocked over folks losing their property rights on the 15' setbacks. yet she was likely higly supportive of the streamside ordinance which was basically feel good green activism and a resume padder for a gal that's since split the scene.
Agreed. I don't know many of the details about the stream ordinace apart from that Ms Marsh advocated it and that it effectively confiscates a lot of personal property along streams, but I do know a lot about cleaning up pollution in blueline streams having managed a number of cleanups before in my job as an environmental manager. If anything the ordinance increases pollution, but I'm assuming the goal here was to protect the riparian zone by stealing people's private land, which I'm pretty sure the average Fayettevillian doesn't get.
The biggest pollutant in urban streams comes from fertilizers and other yard chemicals, and petrochemicals. The former comes from big sod yards and the later from large engines from vehicles on roads & parking lots and from small engines, again mostly from yards. Trash can blow in from anywhere; it's unsightly, but it's easy to clean up, as opposed to chemicals. Buildings, conversely, don't produce chemical pollution; they do add to stormwater erosion issues by displacing permeable land, but that's easily solved with proper design & rain gardens. Most pollution in streams originates from further away, carried into the stream by storm water, and not from homes and other structures adjacent to the stream itself. If one really wants to protect streams, the way to do it isn't by banning structures, but rather by banning sod lawns, roads and parking lots, which of course most homeowners/voters won't support. As you said, it is feel good green activism that accomplishes very little to show for all the property it has appropriated.
It's highly disengenious for Ms Marsh to act as if she cares about property rights now after what she's done previously. And of course, she more than anyone is to blame for our effectively banning large scale development downtown (where it belongs) and for effectively banning all new student housing near campus. Of course, we'll hardly be surprised when she rallys to the cause of those complaining of sprawl...
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It appears the first casualty of the horrendous new ordinance is the Harvey Hill development. It's been tabled instead of going to planning commission. It was to be the sister building of The Cardinal.
As for those for that Food Truck idea. I envisioned this type of thing along the Razorback Greenway. Just think, instead of that recycling facility by the train track on North, it could have been something like this. I could see this around the trial and MLK. That piece of land that got turned down as a paid parking area across from FHS on the south side of MLK bordered by the train track to the east would be a good place.
They really ought to call this the "Anti-Specialized Real Estate Group Ordinance." Running Seth Mimms out of town is the dumbest thing possible if one is genuinely pro-infill and pro-LEED, as most of the city council members claim. I expect the Collier Place development is doomed too, provided that one was actually still progressing.
Regarding the parking lot on MLK, I expect that one got shutdown by the streamside protection ordinance, given that there's a blueline stream running the length of the property. If so, then that lot is all but unbuildable.
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I think a seating venue for food trucks would be a great concept for Fayetteville. add it to a park that has summer concerts, outdoor movies, evening lighted hours, etc.
I would attend that.
Gully Park has a very nice outdoor concert series - phase II of the new regional park is going to include an ampitheater for mid-sized outdoor concerts.
The Yacht Club is a great venue for food trucks; it would be a great idea for an indoor/outdoor seating area to get added, if room permits.
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Gotta break the hammering of stupidity, here's a neat concept being pitched for a midtown location in Memphis
I'm trying to follow your advice here...
Next spring, we should see the preliminary designs for the new West Ave project that the Community Design Center has been working on, and the U of A's new Art & Design district. These will go a long ways towards shaping the future of our city.
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I'm trying to figure out where they came up with that 15 feet for setbacks number. It wasn't in the original or amended version of the ordinance, was it? Surely someone realized how overreaching that distance is. Considering how small some of the vacant lots where houses once stood in downtown Fayetteville it is not reasonable to expect that 30 feet across one dimension of a lot is now unusable for building. Moratorium or not, more time should have been spent looking at the consequences of what was being considered. In fact- this ordinance as is could be considered a ban on much development of any sort so it will hurt more than the moratorium would.
Yep, the setbacks are certainly a de facto ban. The sprawl developers probably wet themselves given that they now will have little-to-no competition from infill developers, and most likely they played a big role behind the scenes in getting this final mess passed. Based on Marsh & Petty's recent actions, I now think they were patsies; pro-smart development folks who very naively listened to the usual foaming-at-the-mouth, anti-development NIMBYs who protest everything, who were (over) reacting to Specialized, et al. Marsh & Petty saw this as an opportunity to encourage smarter development and got the ball rolling on an ordinance that wound up being a complete pro-sprawl, anti-downtown turd; effectively shifting most denser, future development to uptown (and into the sprawl developers bank accounts).
If there's a silver lining here, we may see denser development move to the Mill District, S. School & MLK; away from downtown but still close to it. I expect it will be much easier to comply with the new ordinance a bit outside of downtown, the zoning is more favorable in areas, there's a lot more derelict buildings that could be redeveloped and it will be more likely to get an variance.
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Yeah, if people around here cannot deal with height downtown--even the marginally high buildings that would happen in a college town--well, that's a really bad sign. Maybe there's some good-ole-boy corruption behind this. Otherwise it makes so little sense.
That's what galls me the most. If someone chooses to move into a low-density, single use zoned suburban subdivision, they don't get to complain about the nearest store, public library, restaurant or bar not being in walking distance of their home. That's the compromise they made when they bought into the low traffic and quite lifestyle out in the 'burbs. But when people choose all the conveniences of living downtown, they also have made compromises. When living downtown, which every reasonable person knows is zoned for high density, multi-use developments, one must expect more traffic and noise, and also expect that a mix of medium to large commerical, office, residential and public buildings will be sharing their neighborhood with them. New buildings being built similar to what already exists only a block or two away is a very real and likely possibility. Most people who choose to live downtown are not NIMBYs; they knew what they were signing up for and that's what they love about downtown living. And yet the few NIMBYs we have who are so unreasonable as to expect downtown to be just like the 'burbs, get pandered to by the likes of Sarah Marsh when they start complaining about what their neighbors can and cannot do with their land.
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Fayetteville, Arkansas
in Northwest Arkansas
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I live in the Walker Park neighborhood - I was skeptical at first of an at-grade crossing, but I really like how they've pulled it off. In another decade, we may regret having not put in a tunnel here, but for now it's perfect.