urbanMSP

Snelling and Ashland, where the larger Cheapo location on the strip mall to the east used to be (they consolidated into the smaller Cheapo location across the street).

I've heard some rumor's that the Cheapo records locations may see some development in the form of a Buffalo Wild Wings. Pure rumor.

There's plenty of room in the immediate are for new "trendy" (they were like 15 years ago) apartments. And in any case, why not keep the original and just build off of that? At least leave the facade on. It's not like retro-fitting older shorter buildings for taller ones has never been done before...but maybe that's the case in St Paul.

I suspect there are three primary reasons retrofitting won't be happening here. First, turning a bank into a grocery store sounds like a recipe for a messed up grocery store. Second, the new building will be covering a much larger portion of the block bordered by Dayton, Snelling, and Selby. As in, almost all of it. And third, the bank building is hideous and nobody in the neighborhood that I've met is interested in keeping it.

Next Tuesday the district land use committee will (hopefully) be getting our first look at the site plans from Ryan as well as an update on their discussions with nearby businesses about parking. Also the latest on Snelling BRT, the West Midway Zoning Study, Habitat for Humanity, and Episcopal Homes.

And Buffalo Wild Wings will now be opening on the 24th without any substantial limits on hours or liquor service (the biggest sticking point is putting an iron fence along Ashland - BWW, neighbors, and the City want the Ashland access to the lot closed, MNDoT wants it to stay open, and it now sounds like a compromise has been reached and it will be shifted west for some arcane reason only MNDoT engineers will be able to understand).

And on the topic of traffic on Snelling, here's MNDoT's study and plan from a couple months ago. Appendix D is where it starts getting interesting. http://www.dot.state.mn.us/metro/projec ... report.pdf

BWW, neighbors, and the City want the Ashland access to the lot closed, MNDoT wants it to stay open, and it now sounds like a compromise has been reached and it will be shifted west for some arcane reason only MNDoT engineers will be able to understand).

There's currently a house directly across the street from the Ashland driveway; I recall reading that there were concerns about headlights shining into peoples' windows. Moving it west a bit would mean that the headlights shine down an alley rather than at a house.

That's why the neighbors wanted the driveway closed (well, one of the reasons). But I've been told that MNDoT's reason to shift it was due to some sort of traffic flow concern, that cars wouldn't be "backing out" onto Snelling.

On Tuesday the developer at Snelling and Selby met with the district council and neighbors to give us the latest. 200 market rate apartments and one single ground floor retail tenant in a building on the NE corner of the Snelby intersection. He didn't mention a grocery store this time, but it seems like it's probably still a safe bet given the size they're talking about. Parking for residents and the retail anchor will be in a ramp(s?) either underground or contained within the structure. He was fairly clear that it will not be a simple parking ramp nextdoor, repeatedly using the phrase "contained within the structure". The site plan and renderings for that structure have been delayed while they try to get some other kinks worked out satisfactorily, but he promised some sort of very basic renderings at the August Land Use Committee meeting. The big hurdle at the moment is parking for nearby businesses who have had a verbal agreement with the bank to share their parking lots. The Snelling-Selby Business Association is really anxious about losing free off-street parking and some neighbors expressed concern that parking would be shifted down the block and prevent them from parking in front of their homes (driveways being insufficient for the job, one assumes). Ryan Companies and Associated Bank have been in talks with experts at the City of Saint Paul about doing something akin to the lot at Grand and Snelling behind Dunn Bros., although they haven't ruled out any possibilities yet. I suggested perhaps follow through on their earlier mention of a PID and not replacing free parking with free parking, and got the "it's still early" line. Yesterday Ryan and the City met with the Business Association, though I've no idea how that went. Ryan Companies is emphatic that they will work on a community solution, but the other businesses have to take a major role in planning and financing because Associated is not going to be financing their parking again.

North of Dayton, plans for the new bank branch have changed from an L-shaped one-story structure on the NE corner of Snelling and Dayton to a rectangular two-story building that they imagine as being a bit more impressive and a better anchor. East of that they will have 50 parking spots for bank customers (down from over 150). East of THAT is a chunk of land they are holding on to as the presumed site of the community business parking.

No demolition of the current bank and lots will occur until the new bank branch is completed, so the mixed-use portion of the development is still at least a couple years off. All together they're looking at a roughly 5-acre redevelopment.

Oh, and everyone is freaking out about more traffic at the Snelling Selby intersection. There doesn't seem to be any real solution, though, as long as Ayd Mill exists.

Parking, parking, parking, the broken record spins round.

Get 'em hooked when it's free/cheap, then they freak out when it runs out and they're asked to pay more it.

Wait, that sounds like something else...

Version two of a post I finished just as my computer crashed...

The Strib article gets a few details slightly wrong, so I'll just repeat everything I can remember or find in my notes from Tony Barranco's presentation to the Union Park LUC about 36 hours prior to that article's publication.

Phase 1 will not include demolition of the current bank building. That will not happen until the new branch is operational. That'll be a 13,000 square foot two-story rectangle on the current Getten Loan lot east of Snelling and north of Dayton. 4 drive-thru lanes will be retained as well as a 50 car lot, both accessible only from Dayton. East of that is a 1-acre parcel shaped like the Nepalese flag thanks to a stretch of land to the north owned by Soo Lines that they will only sell "for an insane price". More on that acre in a minute. East of THAT is a little triangle of green space.

The main dish is the block between Snelling, Selby, Saratoga, and Dayton (with the exception of three remaining private structures in the south-east corner). There were some massing posters but unfortunately I wasn't able to get any photos. The entire block will be one structure, 5-stories and 53 feet tall throughout. The western end on ground level is a two-story, 1-level "boutique" grocer yet to be named. That will occupy the entire stretch of space along Snelling and will be the only retail tenant in the development. The corner of Snelling and Selby will NOT have a primary entrance, but Tony was as clear as he could be given the early date that there will be some sort of street engagement at that corner in the form of either cafe seating or a smaller secondary grocery entrance. The primary entrance will be in the south east corner of the grocery store with pedestrian access from the street and from a parking lot for grocery customers only which will occupy most of the rest of the block. Entrance to that lot will be from two points on Selby and one on Dayton which will double as the loading dock area. The two entrances on Selby will be flanked to the west by the grocer and the apartment lobby which will be the focal entrance of the structure, and to the east by the lobby and a row of four two-level townhomes occupying the SE corner of the development along Selby and incorporated into the overall structure. There will be a pedestrian cut-through of some sort to allow customers heading to the south side of Selby (Neighborhood Cafe, Cahoot's, etc.) to avoid going too far out of their way. A ramp down to 270 residential parking spaces will be off of Dayton at the far NE corner of the development. So altogether there will be essentially no view of a parking space and only two breaks in the sidewalk along the entire stretch of Snelling and Selby involved - not bad at all! The grocery/apartment building will have two floors that will be similar in style and appearance to the building across Snelling (Patina/etc.), and something else above the setback. Tony was clear, repeatedly, that it won't be "multicolored metal sheeting" or the like, and when I asked him if we could expect something like all the stuff going up around the U he said no. Hopefully that stays the case as the project moves forward.

Above all of that is a not-yet-settled number of market rate units. Somewhere between 206 and 212 in sizes ranging from studios all the way up to a handful over 3,000 square feet. That works out to fewer than 2 parking spaces per unit, which is still confusing to some neighbors apparently, but it's pretty clear they've got a specific sort of resident in mind and they're still planning to incorporate whatever happens with the Snelling BRT Selby stop if it ends up on the NE corner of the intersection. Anyway, there will be one split-level courtyard in the middle of the Snelling side and a larger courtyard in the middle of the Selby side, each two stories up and surrounded by walk-out patios. The Snelling side will also have an unknown number of rooftop garden plots for residents who miss yards. The Selby wide will have a pool and club room. It sounds like every unit will have a patio or balcony of some sort, but I'm not positive about that. Traffic and shade studies will begin soon.

So that leaves that 1 acre parcel north of Dayton. That's where community business parking will be if it gets worked out between all parties involved. Craig Blakely from the city has apparently been working on this in an unofficial capacity and presented just before Tony Barranco with his suggestion for how the neighborhood should deal with parking going forward. He started out by pissing off most of the assembled neighbors by explaining that parking isn't free and nobody has a guaranteed right to park on the street directly outside their house. I had to try really hard not to laugh. I did get a couple glares, probably because of the huge grin on my face. Ah well. His plan is to emulate Old Pasadena. We'd put in around 70 shared parking spaces in that 1 acre and POSSIBLY add a surface lot where there are currently two somewhat dilapidated houses owned by the bank on Selby mid-block between Snelling and Fry. That'd be free for the first 90 minutes. Then a PID would be created for the blocks between Hague, Saratoga, Marshall and Fry and that on-street parking would be given over entirely to metered customer and employee parking. A second zone outside of that one would be set aside to the west, east and south and managed without meters for residents and a few employees with a permit system. All violations would be handled with tickets, not towing. Since very nearly everyone within both zones has private off-street parking, this should be a simple issue (should). This would also involve removing the current residential permit parking, which exists only on Hague between Snelling and Saratoga (this is a stretch of street whose "block captain" is constantly complaining about a lack of parking on, proving both that she is a thoroughly disagreeable person who cannot be appeased and that the permits aren't working there anyway). All of this would be in place from 10 am to 6 pm. Blakely estimates this would yield up about 226 on-street metered spots in the PID giving the local business association roughly 64k a year for operating the lot(s) even if the metered parking is barely used at $1 an hour with 15% occupancy and 20k of operations and maintenance on the meters.

Most in attendance were not amused. I can't wait for the voting.

^^^^^^
People live in a city of over 200,000 and they think they all get to park for free! Go figure! The street is public not private!

F&C version of the story: http://finance-commerce.com/2013/07/rya ... n-st-paul/ (unlocked)

Specifically mentions speculation over Whole Foods as the grocer. It sounds like Ryan Cos. is using the exact same team as the 222 Hennepin development. I don't buy the Whole Foods rumor, since their current store in St. Paul is less than 1 mile away, at Fairview and Grand. Unless of course they plan on leaving that location and its ample surface parking lot. There doesn't seem to be any advantage in doing so.

Kowalski's also has a store in the area at Ayd Mill & Grand (just east of Hamline). Lunds appears to be the only prominent grocer without a location in this area. There's a Lunds on Ford Parkway and the Byerly's on Suburban Ave on the far east side, but that's it. Lunds is my bet for this location, unless Whole Foods is indeed moving.

Regarding the desire for "free" community parking for the small businesses, couldn't they just work something out with O'Garas? I'd guess their parking lot only fills up at night, when most of these small businesses are closed. Do people go to O'Garas for dinner, or only to get white-girl-wasted?

O'Gara's is about 1/3 full during the day and then fills around 5. I know this because I can see the lot from my bedroom window. But O'Gara's is also one of the businesses worried about not having enough since they're primarily responsible for the non-bank parking at the bank lot that DOES get used, which is somewhere under 3/4 even at the busiest times by my count.

Regarding Whole Foods, I agree that Lund's makes the most sense, but I've been told that Whole Foods has been wanting more space for a while now. The new store would be nearly twice the size of the Grand Ave store they currently have. If that happens, I have no clue what will happen to the old lot. Is it realistically feasible to retrofit grocery stores for other uses?

I'd love to see that existing Whole Foods parking lot get developed with nice frontage on Fairview and Grand. But I'm not sure that would be finacially viable at four stories unless the commercial intersection exemptionapplies here.

On the other hand, the Ryan project is only 5 stories on a similarly prominent intersection.

I've heard rumors that Whole Foods will be the grocery tenant, which makes sense to me. The current store is tiny and crowded, and the parking lot is almost always full and probably only has 50-60 spaces.

Whole Foods confirmed:
http://www.startribune.com/blogs/217933161.html

http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/b ... lling.html

"The existing store, at 30 S. Fairview Ave, will remain open until the new store opens in early 2016. The new store will be approximately 38,000 square feet, compared to 22,000 square feet at its current location. The store will increase its number of employees at the new store accordingly."