Southdale Area - Edina

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Tcmetro
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Southdale Area - Edina

Postby Tcmetro » July 30th, 2012, 7:49 pm

A thread for Southdale Mall as well as other nearby developments not deserving of a separate topic.
Discussion of One Southdale Place (69th & York) and the Southdale Transit Center is included in this topic.

A few Southdale area developments have sprouted their own topics however:
Lennar's mixed-use project at 6725 York
71 France (Byerly's redevelopment)

I went to Southdale recently, and that place is dead now because of the ongoing renovations. Hopefully business picks up when they're done.

Anyways, I was looking around on the Edina Planning Commission website and found a staff report on the proposed apartments on the 69th & York corner of Southdale. The proposal is for a 10 story building, a 6 story building, and a 3 story townhouse with 232 units altogether and underground parking. Looks like they will also be killing off the Metro Transit park and ride.

http://edina.granicus.com/MetaViewer.ph ... a_id=36547

min-chi-cbus
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Re: Southdale

Postby min-chi-cbus » July 30th, 2012, 8:48 pm

I went to Southdale recently, and that place is dead now because of the ongoing renovations. Hopefully business picks up when they're done.

Anyways, I was looking around on the Edina Planning Commission website and found a staff report on the proposed apartments on the 69th & York corner of Southdale. The proposal is for a 10 story building, a 6 story building, and a 3 story townhouse with 232 units altogether and underground parking. Looks like they will also be killing off the Metro Transit park and ride.

http://edina.granicus.com/MetaViewer.ph ... a_id=36547
Oh yeah.......I totally forgot about that proposal! I thought the proposal included upgrading the park 'n ride, but maybe not? Southdale is a major transportation hub actually and the entire Metro Bus Transit system wouldn't operate well without Southdale's transit station.

If I remember correctly, the Edina Master Plan for that area includes building out any/all vacant corner lots currently being taken up by parking lots or other underutilized development. There's also a proposal at the Edina Byerly's to redo the grocery store..................AND add two 8-10 story apartment/condo buildings on top of it. Between these two proposals the Southdale/Galleria area of Edina is all of the sudden becoming the Minneapolis-St. Paul equivalent to Arlington, VA!! :shock:

This area could/should be a serious contender for a SW Corridor spoke route, connecting maybe France & Excelsior to Southdale/Galleria and ending at Penn & American ("downtown" Bloomington) or Normandale Office Park.

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Re: Southdale

Postby mattaudio » July 31st, 2012, 9:25 am

Maybe someday France Ave could become a multiway boulevard to still handle traffic volumes but provide for development opportunities fronting the roadway. Then, an extension of Greenway Streetcar via Linden Hills to France, then south to 494!

NickP
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Re: Southdale

Postby NickP » July 31st, 2012, 9:35 am

This sounds awesome! I agree that the Southdale Transit center is needed, but it could do with a nice facelift. Is there a botox equivalent for development? :D

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woofner
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Re: Southdale

Postby woofner » July 31st, 2012, 10:30 am

Good god. I know I shouldn't have expected much out of Edina, but this is disappointing even for them. They could fit an entire apartment building within their setbacks! A 55-space parking lot between the building and the street? What century are they developing this in?

Edina added a 10-point policy objective to their zoning code specifically to encourage better development within the Southdale area - this proposal seems to go against six of them:
C. To encourage a mixed use shopping, living and working environment that meets the needs of residents and visitors and helps mitigate the effects of traffic by reducing vehicle trips and miles by allowing residences in close proximity to employment and services.
E. To reduce setback requirements from public street rights of way in order to encourage and permit a closer relationship between storefronts and streetscapes.
F. To ensure that residential development in the PCD-3 subdistrict is compatible with non-residential uses.
G. To more efficiently utilize public infrastructure by taking advantage of peak demand variations among land uses.
H. To allow a density of development that improves the feasibility of mass transit services utilized by residents, shoppers and employees of the Greater Southdale Area.
J. To encourage development of an active pedestrian environment and pedestrian accessibility to and among developments.

I expect this kind of dreck from the schmucks at Stuart Co, but I hope it is keeping David Motzenbecker awake nights.
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Re: Southdale

Postby mulad » July 31st, 2012, 11:04 am

I had gone to Southdale about a month ago to see a movie and noticed they had some boards up with renderings of their planned new transit station. Didn't look like much -- just some fancier shelters, as far as I could tell.

Killing off park-and-ride lots at shopping malls seems to be a theme -- Rosedale's agreement ended this year, probably because there's a new P&R ramp over by I-35W and County Road C.

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Re: Southdale

Postby mattaudio » July 31st, 2012, 11:16 am

Maybe if the faces of the Southdale block (along France/York/66th/69th) eventually see dense urban development, it could sort of be said that Victor Gruen's vision will finally be realized and the era of auto-dependency of the enclosed shopping center would be waning.

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woofner
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Re: Southdale

Postby woofner » July 31st, 2012, 11:26 am

it could sort of be said that Victor Gruen's vision will finally be realized
This site plan does resemble something that would have been built in the suburbs of Vienna in the 50's and 60's, only in Vienna the parking lot wouldn't have been so large or obtrusive (or possibly even existed).
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Tcmetro
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Re: Southdale

Postby Tcmetro » July 31st, 2012, 11:09 pm

The new transit center is going to wrap around the edges of the parking ramp near JC Penney. The loss of the park and ride will likely mean a restructuring of the 578 and 579 bus routes.

As for the design of the site of the apartment buildings, the layout leaves a lot to be desired. They really couldn't place the 55 extra spaces underground??

As for the Byerly's project, reading from old Planning Commission minutes, the city wasn't to thrilled with the suburban layout of the project and the lack of access to the bus stop. IIRC, the proposal was for a 7 story and a 6 story building.

min-chi-cbus
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Re: Southdale

Postby min-chi-cbus » August 1st, 2012, 11:07 am

The new transit center is going to wrap around the edges of the parking ramp near JC Penney. The loss of the park and ride will likely mean a restructuring of the 578 and 579 bus routes.

As for the design of the site of the apartment buildings, the layout leaves a lot to be desired. They really couldn't place the 55 extra spaces underground??

As for the Byerly's project, reading from old Planning Commission minutes, the city wasn't to thrilled with the suburban layout of the project and the lack of access to the bus stop. IIRC, the proposal was for a 7 story and a 6 story building.
Thanks for those details....I couldn't remember specifics. Does that mean the developer is back at the drawing board or have they given up? I thought it WAS a suburban design, but then again......Edina IS a suburb! I don't care if it's suburban-looking, but it should make transit access easy and it should be pedestrian-focused (especially if its primary residents will end up being seniors!).

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1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby bandar_seri_begawan » December 12th, 2012, 10:43 am


twincitizen
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Re: 1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby twincitizen » December 12th, 2012, 11:22 am

You beat me to it. We had some preliminary discussion going on here: viewtopic.php?f=17&t=257

There's probably not enough interest to warrant separate threads for Southdale Mall, new Southdale Park & Ride, 1 Southdale Place, etc. I propose we merge all the talk into a single thread.

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woofner
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Re: 1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby woofner » December 12th, 2012, 11:52 am

I almost think that 1 Southdale Place is a stupider name than WaHu or ElseWareHouse. Almost.
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bandar_seri_begawan
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Re: 1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby bandar_seri_begawan » December 12th, 2012, 11:53 am

You beat me to it. We had some preliminary discussion going on here: viewtopic.php?f=17&t=257

There's probably not enough interest to warrant separate threads for Southdale Mall, new Southdale Park & Ride, 1 Southdale Place, etc. I propose we merge all the talk into a single thread.
Ah yes, I should have checked that thread I suppose. Now we await the merging of this thread.

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Re: 1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby beykite » December 12th, 2012, 6:59 pm

Render

min-chi-cbus
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Re: 1 Southdale Place (Edina)

Postby min-chi-cbus » December 12th, 2012, 8:18 pm

This is one project I can see looking MUCH better in reality than in pictures.

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Re: Southdale

Postby twincitizen » December 18th, 2012, 2:18 pm

F&C has the deets on the renovation: http://finance-commerce.com/2012/12/ren ... le-center/

ztr421
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Re: Southdale

Postby ztr421 » December 28th, 2012, 10:20 am

For the most part, I think the renovations have been great at Southdale. The new wood-facing on the columns give a nice clean modern-yet-vintage look, and taking down the enclosure on the upper floor walkway across the main court area really opens up that space.

But... ;) Has anyone else entered through the new entrance between JC Penney and Macy's? It's such a weird design to me - I feel like I'm entering a hospital there. And it has a very uninviting traffic flow - you enter the doors and are greeted by a wall (it might be frosted glass, I don't remember) - you have to immediately have to turn left or right to go around it.

I wonder what the plans are for the old third floor food court... that whole wing is dead, and they haven't made the upgrades to the columns in that area...

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Re: Southdale

Postby Didier » December 30th, 2012, 11:26 am

As a general statement, since suburban transit centers are going to be a reality, doesn't it make a certain amount of sense to tie them into shopping malls?

Shopping malls are already a center of commerce, and lots of people naturally have to go to malls either to work or to shop. I'm not suggesting this model has been effectively executed (I have no idea), but in theory I'd think a transit center affiliated with Rosedale is a more effective and efficient location than anywhere else in that area.

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Re: Southdale

Postby MSPtoMKE » December 30th, 2012, 2:42 pm

For the most part, shopping malls are already used as transit centers. Rosedale, Southdale, MOA, Maplewood, Northtown, etc. So, yes, I think they are logical places for transit centers. They aren't always well connected to the mall, though, they are often at the periphery.
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