Wooddale Station Area / PLACE - St. Louis Park

Twin Cities Suburbs
rmc
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Re: PLACE Proposal / Wooddale Station area - St. Louis Park

Postby rmc » August 25th, 2016, 8:53 am

With the outlook for SWLRT not looking clear, this has to change the scope of the PLACE development. All of the traffic plans for PLACE have dependency on SWLRT-Woodale intersection improvements being made. I don't know how much breath-holding is going on, but I wonder how this could change the site plan.

Anondson
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Re: PLACE Proposal / Wooddale Station area - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » August 25th, 2016, 8:56 am

None, they said. It would change their programming of non-transit offerings. Maybe more specifically increase car sharing and shuttles to nearby work concentrations.

Anondson
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Re: PLACE Proposal / Wooddale Station area - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » December 5th, 2016, 10:46 pm

A soils engineering report came back with more soil pollution, likely from past railroad activity, that will need cleaning. No matter what development happens it will need remediation.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2016/12/05/inve ... ouis-park/

Cleanup funds are going to be applied for from the county and state.

Anondson
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PLACE Proposal / Wooddale Station area - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » January 17th, 2017, 4:46 pm

1/2 block from the station across W36th from Hoigaard Village, the American Legion site coverage in Biz Journals. Image

http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/n ... ml?ana=twt

Main Street Companies is developer.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » February 2nd, 2017, 7:00 pm

The Wooddale bridge widening looks to cost $2.2M.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/02/02/wood ... 2-million/

The bridge was just completed in 2010. It will need widening to handle the expected traffic effects from rail crossing closings that LRT will create, the widening includes the future stop lights being added on the bridge.

mattaudio
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby mattaudio » February 3rd, 2017, 11:34 am

The last thing Wooddale needs is more lanes. It needs less chaos, not more. It should have never been built with 6 intersections and a railroad crossing within a 1000 ft distance.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » February 3rd, 2017, 4:39 pm

I think the hope is two stop light intersections will tame the chaos. The widening is to give space for queued up cars space to wait their turn through and move peds and bikes into a more visible spot to oncoming drivers.

Anondson
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Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » February 4th, 2017, 6:53 pm

City Council approved tax-exempt municipal bonds for the P.L.A.C.E. project 6–1 to help finance the affordable housing portions.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/02/03/most ... e-project/

Sue Sanger maintains her concern trolling over concentration of poverty at the site. Seriously. 200 units of of 300 plus 110 hotel rooms, will be preserved as "60% area median income" affordable. Next to the LRT station and regional bike trail. She'd rather it spread out other places where transit is bad I guess?
“It’s just simply too high a concentration of low-income people in one small area,” Sanger said. “If you have that high a concentration, it means that the management will not be able to raise the rent very much, which then leads me to be very concerned about the long-term maintenance issues of this development.”

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » March 17th, 2017, 1:46 pm

The Elmwood, a six-story apartment, was approved by the city council 5–2.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/03/17/st-l ... e-elmwood/

Across from Hoigaard Village and a block from the future SWLRT station, it will replace the American Legion. 85 units restricted to 55 and older, 20% of the units for people making 60% of area median income. 63% will be two bedroom units, which seems interesting for a senior housing facility of empty nesters.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » March 23rd, 2017, 6:30 pm

On the 15th the city planning commission heard public testimony about the Wooddale State P.L.A.C.E. proposal and ultimately voted to approve it.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/03/22/st-l ... e-project/

Whew.

min-chi-cbus
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby min-chi-cbus » March 24th, 2017, 12:25 pm

Some very dramatic responses from the citizens, as usual:

"Traffic is a nightmare" -- that was true last year when Hwy. 7 was shut down and Wooddale Ave was the last exist off of the highway before the closure, and there were lines backed up for a mile at times. Also, when a choo-choo train rolls across the street traffic will obviously halt, but that doesn't change with this project.

"The building is too tall" -- complaints about 6 floors when the existing precedent in the neighborhood is 5 floors is moot, especially when it conforms with a zoning code allowing up to 110 feet. Additionally, there are buildings that are 10+ floors directly across from Hwy. 100 from this area, so it's not like an unheard of size, and if anything I think it's a bit under-utilized for such a prominent site along a (hopefully) future LRT station.

"Affordable housing will lower my property values" -- there are apartments scattered all around the neighborhood flanking Dakota Ave, including several that are directly on Dakota Ave, where the person who complained about affordable housing lives. Furthermore, this is on the other side of the highway from the homes on Dakota, so I really have a hard time believing that the presence of some affordable apartments across the highway from a neighborhood will have a dramatic impact on the values within that n'hood. To top it all off, the complaint came from somebody who recently lived in an affordable rental home....

It's so predictable.

Looking forward to seeing the designs!

Anondson
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Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » March 24th, 2017, 5:00 pm

The responses were amusing. And in some ways infuriating, such as how a single building with 200 (out of 300) 60% median income affordability units adjacent to a LRT station counts as "concentrated poverty".

I'm seeing a trend in well off suburban neighborhoods latch on to the research around concentrated poverty having negative effects, but only hearing the name of the phenomenon not understanding what it actually was.

Anondson
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Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » April 12th, 2017, 7:56 pm

There is an online petition against the P.L.A.C.E. proposal by the station, and though you'd think the city council might support this, after the Bridgwater proposal collapse under NIMBY weight, you can never be too sure anymore.

P.L.A.C.E. is seeking letters of support to present to the city for this development at Wooddale and 36th Ave. If you believe density adjacent to the Wooddale Station is worth supporting, you can email a letter of support to: info @ welcometoplace.org by Thursday the 13th, or Thursday the 20th at the very latest.

seanrichardryan
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby seanrichardryan » April 12th, 2017, 9:09 pm

We should start an online petition against P.L.A.C.E. the name. Horrible marketing.
Q. What, what? A. In da butt.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » April 19th, 2017, 7:45 pm

The Elmwood received city council support 6-1 in favor, the one vote against remained against because the lack of significant street retail space in an area that will need it soon.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/04/19/the- ... l-support/

Hysterical quotes from Councilman Lindberg being chastised by his elderly mother for his earlier votes against the affordable senior housing.
“She said, ‘I was reading the Sun Sailor. What are you doing voting against that?’” Lindberg said to laughter from other council members as Mayor Jake Spano responded, “I can just hear, ‘What did I do wrong? What did I do?’”

Lindberg said his mother has been a widow for about seven years and that maintaining a house has become more and more expensive for her.

“She said to me, ‘I could afford those rents, Gregg.’” Lindberg said. “And I said, ‘I know, Mom, but here’s what I was thinking.’ And nevertheless, I don’t want the perfect to be the enemy of the good – and I’m a mama’s boy by definition – so I’m changing my position on this.”

Spano joked, “If you want to have turkey at Thanksgiving, you should.”

Councilmember Tim Brausen also chimed in, “I’d certainly be supportive of this project, too, and Gregg’s attempt to get in his mother’s good graces again.”
Go Greg's mom!

grant1simons2
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby grant1simons2 » April 19th, 2017, 8:14 pm


min-chi-cbus
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby min-chi-cbus » April 20th, 2017, 8:23 am

I agree about the objection for lack of street-facing retail. This corridor has the potential to be a local retail draw.

*Edit: though after looking at the plans, it seems like there is a lot of street-facing retail. So I'm not sure what exactly the objection was about.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » April 20th, 2017, 10:30 am

I believe the objection was that most of the "street facing" was going to be building offices and resident community rooms.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » April 27th, 2017, 1:15 pm

A significant profile on the P.L.A.C.E. Wooddale station proposal.

http://finance-commerce.com/2017/04/pla ... ouis-park/

The article restates some previously stated plans. Some things have been dropped. Currently.
$123 Million complex
Mixed income, Mixed use
200 below market rate
99 market rate
110 beds at a Fairfield Hotel by Marriott
Indoor bike storage
Bike shop
447 total car spaces for parking
$70/month stipend if going car free
Green house to grow food
Green roofs
Helix wind turbine for electricity
Wants bike share partners and car share partners

The final city vote is this coming Monday.

Anondson
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Re: Wooddale Station Area / PLACE Proposal - St. Louis Park

Postby Anondson » May 2nd, 2017, 10:12 pm

The final vote was 6–1 for the last approvals.

http://sailor.mnsun.com/2017/05/02/desp ... s-forward/

Sue Sanger unloaded. And still clings to the idea that 200 below market rate units in a single building in a very well off neighborhood qualifies as dangerous "concentrated poverty". That mixing below market rates with market rates will lead to Cedar Riverside types of decline.

Sigh.


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