FAYETTEVILLE -- Planning commissioners signed off on Specialized Real Estate Group's latest apartment project and permitted a new farmers' market Wednesday.
The apartment project, called Harvey's Hill, will consume the entire block bounded by Center Street, Hill Avenue, Treadwell Street and Duncan Avenue.
At A Glance
Commission Action
Also on Wednesday, Fayetteville planning commissioners approved a permit for a rainwater shed at Tri Cycle Farms. According to Don Bennett, founder of the organization, 12,275-gallon tanks will capture as many as 3,300 gallons of rainwater up to five times each year. The water will be used on crops at the farm.
Source: Staff Report
The land, across the street from another Specialized complex called The Cardinal at West Center, currently features two multifamily dwellings, a triplex and 10 single-family houses.
Plans commissioners approved Wednesday show a five-story structure with 640 beds being built around a 512-space parking garage.
"The project is another walkable, urban, infill, high-density, clustered-near-an-employment-center (project)," said Seth Mims, group partner and president. "I think this project is superior to those that we've done in the past."
Specialized is the same company that opened Eco Modern Flats at Hill Avenue and Putman Street in 2011. The company partnered with the Dinerstein Cos. of Houston to build the Sterling Frisco apartments, at Lafayette Street and West Avenue, in 2013. The Cardinal opened last month.
Construction has begun on another, 670-bedroom complex called Beechwood Village south and east of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Beechwood Avenue, where several warehouses and industrial buildings once stood. Beechwood Village is scheduled to open in time for the fall 2015 semester.
Mims said earlier this month construction should begin on Harvey's Hill after the first of the year. It's targeted for a fall 2016 opening.
Kyle Cook was the only commission member to vote against Specialized's project Wednesday.
"While I do like infill and I do like increasing density, to me, there's a point where it goes too far," Cook said.
"I know we want to keep students around campus. I think that's important. I'm not disagreeing with that," he added. "But we're loading up those streets that are old streets in Fayetteville. They're not the biggest streets.
"I know this is going to be more of a walkable development. I agree with that. But there's a breaking point, and it's different for everybody else. But for me, this project, and with the Cardinal put together especially, has hit that breaking point, and I'm concerned about that."
As a condition of approval for Harvey's Hill, developers will be required to repave adjacent streets and build 10-foot-wide sidewalks around the perimeter of the 3.4-acre site.
Don Bennett with Tri Cycle Farms requested the permit for the new farmers' market the commission approved Wednesday.
The market, called Crossroads Farmers' Market, will be allowed to operate up to three days per week in the gravel parking lot on the east side of Trinity United Methodist Church, 1021 W. Sycamore St.
Bennett said he plans to offer a Friday evening market from 3 to 7 p.m. starting Oct. 3.
"We're going to start slow, maybe one day a week, to get this thing rolling," Bennett said. He said the market will move indoors to Trinity Methodist's fellowship hall during winter months.
Produce grown at the roughly 2-acre Tri Cycle Farms, 1691 N. Garland Ave., will be sold at the market. It will also feature food that others in the community grow.
"This ... would allow anybody farming in the neighborhood to come and have a way to market their food on an ongoing basis," Bennett said.
He said the market will begin with three vendors, but could expand to 10 or 20.
"This isn't intended at this point to be ... a regional market like the square farmers' market has become," Jesse Fulcher, senior city planner, said, "but really a neighborhood farmers' market."
The effort is being paid for using a 2013 Energize NWA grant from the Endeavor Foundation.
NW News on 09/25/2014