Portico at the Falls - 4737 Minnehaha Ave

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twincitizen
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Portico at the Falls - 4737 Minnehaha Ave

Postby twincitizen » June 26th, 2018, 12:33 pm

Greg's Auto repair at 4737 Minnehaha (Minnehaha & Nawadaha, across from the falls) has been sold....apparently to Lander Group, based on Hennepin County Property info. Lander paid $500k for it. The Nextdoor post from which I gleaned this information also suggested that he purchased an adjacent house (not sure if north or east of the site), but property records do not reflect that, not yet anyways. https://gis.hennepin.us/property/map/de ... 2823120027

Absolutely incredible site for housing development. The front yard is Minnehaha Falls. Cub Foods mixed-use development happening a block up Minnehaha. I hope Lander goes big on this site, in terms of building scale. The neighborhood will probably freak at anything over 4 stories, so I hope he starts at 6 and sticks to his guns or backs into 4-5 stories as "compromise". Ideally he will pick up at least one adjacent house, as that will allow for a larger building and likely improve circulation / parking access, etc. This site screams million-dollar condos rather than "just another apartment building". While it's not exactly vogue around here to wish for large/expensive condo units (rather than an apartment building with more, smaller units), my preference on this site would be the expensive condos, because it would likely mean higher quality building materials. This is a million dollar location...the quality of development put here should reflect that.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby mattaudio » June 26th, 2018, 12:46 pm

Isn't that the block that had a fit over people parking Car2Gos in on their blocks to walk to Minnehaha Falls? I'm sure they'll embrace new development.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby niaxilin » June 26th, 2018, 1:07 pm

Interestingly, even in the Minneapolis 2040 Draft plans, where 15-story zoning is one block to the West, this particular corner is only Corridor 4 (4 story max).

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby twincitizen » June 26th, 2018, 3:58 pm

I noticed that too. On the Land Use map, on Minnehaha Ave, only the Greg's Auto and DQ sites are designated 'mixed use', whereas everything else is 'urban neighborhood'. The built form map has the whole block as Corridor 4, except for the first couple of lots in from 46th St, which are 'Corridor 6'. Then immediately to the west you have the old strip mall and now-closed SomTaste restaurant property, which are designated 'Transit 15'. As general statement, this is a pretty good future guidance for the area, but it is odd to have '15' and '4' directly abutting. That said, it clearly states in the Built Form map that heights can be increased if it furthers other Comp Plan goals.

I hope Lander has something special in the works for this property. I don't mean to oversell, but this is truly a one-of-a-kind property. This is as close to the falls as anyone can build, ever. This parcel (and DQ) are it. The houses fronting on Nawadaha are too valuable/stable to be acquired/redeveloped.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby amiller92 » June 27th, 2018, 9:28 am

The houses fronting on Nawadaha are too valuable/stable to be acquired/redeveloped.
What are you talking about? Evil, greedy developers are going to force all those people to sell and build corporate-owned fourplexes there!

(Sorry, I'm suffering from comp plan trauma)

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Avenue Development & Grain Elevators/Freight Corridor

Postby exiled_antipodean » June 27th, 2018, 10:47 am

While it's not exactly vogue around here to wish for large/expensive condo units (rather than an apartment building with more, smaller units), my preference on this site would be the expensive condos, because it would likely mean higher quality building materials.
I wish for more large expensive condos to prove my point that the relaxation of single family zoning will let rich people build the townhouses they cannot at the moment.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby minneboom » June 27th, 2018, 5:19 pm

Lander Group Shares Plans for New Apartment Building at 4737 Minnehaha Avenue:

https://longfellow.org/2018/06/27/lande ... ha-avenue/

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby mattaudio » June 27th, 2018, 6:42 pm


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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby Silophant » June 27th, 2018, 9:21 pm

Ah. Disappointing.
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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby Bob Stinson's Ghost » June 27th, 2018, 9:53 pm

They are proposing an installation of gray fiber cement lap siding which will be in the same league with 2309 Lyndale.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby xandrex » June 28th, 2018, 8:08 am

Ugh. Not a looker at all.

Also a disappointment to see that they're "exploring" adding bike storage...in the form of hanging racks at the back of a parking spot. That's literally the worst sort of parking, because 1) they're difficult to put your bike in/get your bike out of when your car is parked there, and 2) I suppose this means you've gotta rent a spot if you want to lock your bike up. :roll:

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby HiawathaGuy » June 28th, 2018, 8:25 am

Hopefully this gets a lot of good feedback from the Longfellow Neighborhood to influence it to be better. I am completely underwhelmed - this location deserves something much better! More glass, more in touch with the surroundings, more organic.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby MNdible » June 28th, 2018, 8:41 am

I don't know, I think it's mostly just fine. It's certainly suffering from a first-pass rendering that doesn't do it any favors -- if they spent a little more time on that, added some landscaping, etc., I think it wouldn't have raised many eyebrows here.

The scale seems good. Only quibble is the weird 'L' off the back, which really seems to be adding insult to injury for the neighbor immediately to the north.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby mattaudio » June 28th, 2018, 9:05 am

On social media, I saw someone else say that they wish for some sort of bike shop / coffee shop in this project. I have to agree, it would be nice to have some park-oriented retail in the bottom.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby SurlyLHT » June 28th, 2018, 10:40 am

I found it interesting that they're targeting empty nesters and seniors. Why not target a younger crowd given the location? It also seems like there is an opportunity maybe some minor office space with retail and etc? I'm not sure if that would get approved, but I could see a small business enjoying a location on the park near the LRT and bus lines.

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Re: Hiawatha-Minnehaha Ave Development & RR Corridor/Grain Elevators

Postby amiller92 » June 28th, 2018, 1:02 pm

They don't seem to have designed it with any expectation of view toward the park/falls. Maybe there's not much beyond trees to look at, but it seems like you could both give a little relief to the house to the north and add park-facing views for more units if the back of the building angled out to the north. Also weird that the park-facing balconies aren't bigger.

Or maybe I'm wrong about that being the preferable side of the building.

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Re: 4737 Minnehaha Ave - Lander Development

Postby twincitizen » July 10th, 2018, 10:37 am

The Neighborhood Development & Transportation Committee will hear a presentation from Lander Group on Tuesday, July 10th regarding the developer’s proposal for a 37-unit, 4-story apartment building north of Minnehaha Falls Park. Lander Group is responsible for previous developments in or adjacent to Longfellow, including West River Commons, 38th Street Station, and Parkway West Apartments.

Anyone interested in learning more about the proposal is welcome to attend the NDTC meeting on July 10th at 7:30 at Longfellow Park.
Meeting is tonight. You can assume there will be some anti-development folks there, but given the pro-development slant of the PC/CC, input from anti-development types is largely meaningless. Let's get a couple folks there who can speak in support of development here, but demand a better project. I'm planning to attend and speak to the uniqueness of this site and ask for a higher quality project. Lander has done better on past projects.

Also, I think that narrow "wing" they plan off the back of the building is just greedy AF to get a couple more units squeezed in. That looks like garbage and is totally unnecessary. If they need the units to make the project work, I'd rather see them add a 5th story.

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Re: 4737 Minnehaha Ave - Lander Development

Postby minneboom » July 10th, 2018, 6:59 pm

It would be great to encourage them to look at adding commercial space too!

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Re: 4737 Minnehaha Ave - Lander Development

Postby twincitizen » July 25th, 2018, 2:21 pm

F&C (locked): https://finance-commerce.com/2018/07/la ... haha-park/
Feedback from the neighborhood meeting was “predictable,” Lander said. Residents told him the building is too big, too modern looking and that it would add to heavy vehicle traffic near the park, he said.

Lander is scheduled to present the project at a second community meeting on July 31, with the hope that more residents will attend.
Apparently the first meeting that Longfellow Council had him attend was one of their regularly scheduled committee meetings, and they only allocated like 20 minutes total for Q&A. They then asked him (at that meeting) to hold a meeting specifically for this project. :roll:

Random Google search resulted in this document about the project: https://www.vmwp.com/wpress/wp-content/ ... ge_web.pdf
No new information, except a rendering angle we haven't see previously. I think you can ignore the aspect of this rendering showing the Nawadaha cul-de-sac being opened to Minnehaha Ave. That was not shown at the LCC meeting and I don't think is an actual proposal. All vehicle access to this proposal is via the alley anyways, so I'm not sure why they'd bother, or why any nearby residents on Nawahada would ever agree to that change. Those cul-de-sacs help keep stray park traffic out. If you could turn onto Nawahada from Minnehaha, I'd bet tons of park parkers would do so.

Aside from my above comments that "this project is fine, but not high enough caliber design for this preeminent site", I think what I don't love about it is how little frontage there is on Nawadaha Blvd. I really wish they'd acquire one more lot to the east so this has a larger southern-facing facade. Seems unlikely a 2nd development is ever going to buy up those 4 houses to replace with a project that would truly face the park.

Sidebar: It seems that high acquisition costs are going to rule out just about any development in already valuable, well-kept areas. Nice houses in nice neighborhoods just don't seem to get torn down for development. Crappy-to-mediocre houses get torn down all the time, and depending on location, either get replaced with McMansions or larger-scale development

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Re: 4737 Minnehaha Ave - Lander Development

Postby minneboom » July 27th, 2018, 9:32 pm



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