Mike Greenberg: 'River North' concept needs discussing
Web Posted: 03/12/2006 12:00 AM CST
http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertai...g.8336d96.html
San Antonio Express-News
Architect Andres Andujar of the local office of 3D/I has been spending most of his free time of late touting an idea he calls "River North." It's worth your attention.
River North is a concept for a "mixed-use, mid-rise, high residential density, urban neighborhood" flanking the San Antonio River at the north end of downtown.
Andujar says that he has no client for River North and owns no property in the study area. His firm hatched the vision as one of its annual public-service efforts.
He's presented the idea to dozens of civic, business and media organizations.
The San Antonio Conservation Society and the Downtown Advisory Board have endorsed the idea.
Though not explicitly endorsing River North, the executive committee of the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce in December proposed a city task force to study incentives for "the development of mixed-use multi-unit housing in and around downtown."
A Tax-Increment Reinvestment Zone or some other type of public incentive is central to Andujar's concept. The idea is that a modest public investment can leverage immodest private investment, help give it a beneficial form and yield tax revenues that would be far larger than the up-front public costs.
The area that 3D/I studied is bounded by Broadway, McCullough Avenue, St. Mary's Street and Interstate 35. The San Antonio Museum of Art stands near the northern end; an AT&T office complex, built originally for Valero Energy Corp., anchors the southern end.
But Andujar observes that most of the property in the study area is zoned light industrial and will be prime for intensive redevelopment once river improvements, already planned, pull the 100-year flood plain back from that property.
"My argument is, why don't we dream of what we would like there and invest time and energy and maybe dollars to make sure that what is built there reflects the dream that the community dreams together?"
As a first stab at that dream, Andujar and 3D/I offer this vision:
•Broadway would be narrowed to four traffic lanes to allow wider sidewalks — reduced to almost nothing in street widenings before the McAllister Freeway removed much of the traffic from Broadway — and put in a landscaped median.
•Arden Grove, now a dead end between St. Mary's and the river, would be reconfigured and extended to Jones Avenue, with the art museum forming a grand terminus. Andujar imagines this street being something like Barcelona's delightful La Rambla.
•A few significant buildings, including a historic VFW Hall, would be retained, but Andujar sees most of the property redeveloped as three- and four-story apartment blocks with some street-level retail and interior parking garages. He sees taller residential and office buildings at the northern end, along the freeway.
•Avenue B would get wider sidewalks and pedestrian amenities befitting its role as the major residential spine of River North.
Andujar says a deep-pocketed investor — he's not at liberty to identify him or her — has already acquired considerable property in the study area and is interested in redeveloping it in accordance with the River North concept.
So it may be that a very modest public investment would do the trick for the entire area. Two critical pieces:
First, if City Public Service could live without its facility next to the museum, that property could be leveraged for private development.
Second, it's vital that the city find a way to pay for sidewalks and amenities along the river north of downtown. It's plain dumb to leave the design and funding of the public right-of-way to private interests, as the city now proposes.
In general terms — the only terms currently available — Andujar's vision is similar to Addison Circle, a high-end, mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented project in an otherwise sprawling suburban wasteland north of Dallas. The city of Addison invested in infrastructure and amenities to help make it happen.
If a mixed-use urban neighborhood worked in Addison, it should certainly work in this area, with the river and a major art museum in its midst, a short stroll from downtown and a future mixed-use neighborhood at the former Pearl Brewery.
Experience here and in other cities suggests that demand should be strong. Experience also teaches that, without a guiding public vision, redevelopment can trip over itself and fall short of its potential.
That doesn't mean Andujar's vision is necessarily the right one. It shouldn't be the end of discussion. But it is a good start.