| |
Posted Nov 19, 2019, 3:31 PM
|
|
BANNED
|
|
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,902
|
|
Wall street journo article about a project I've never heard of in Tempe.
Also, per usual, the article is full of misconceptions about this city, its climate etc etc.; The ignorance of the comments is almost astounding. Did you know its 112 all year hear and that itll be impossible for people in this development to get food and water without dying in the heat?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-arizona...nging-cars-11574164801?mod=hp_lead_pos10
Quote:
A $140 million Arizona development is banning residents from bringing their own cars on site in favor of scooters, bikes and ride-sharing, testing demand for a new type of walkable neighborhood.
The 1,000-person rental community, which broke ground this month in Tempe, won’t allow residents to park cars on-site or in the surrounding area as a term of their lease. The founders say it will be the first of its kind in the U.S.
The scale will be modest, with mostly three-story buildings. In place of parking spaces, the development known as Culdesac Tempe will feature significantly more retail and open spaces than a typical one of its size. It will include a market hall for food vendors, coffee shop, plazas, communal fire pits and a building that residents can rent to host events.
The site is next to a light rail that connects residents to a grocery store, Arizona State University, downtown Phoenix and the airport. There will also be designated spots for ride-sharing and an on-site car-sharing service for residents traveling to other neighborhoods.
Changing tastes and new technologies have fueled demand in recent years for neighborhoods downtown or in inner-ring suburbs where residents can walk to amenities. Concerns about the environmental and health impact of automobiles and worsening congestion have taken the sheen off driving for more people. Millennials in particular are choosing travel and other experiences over the costs of car ownership.
“Transportation has changed a lot over the last decade and real estate hasn’t kept up,” said Ryan Johnson, co-founder and chief executive of the new developer, Culdesac. “Now there’s the chance for us to build the first post-car development.”
The Phoenix area might seem an unlikely spot for such an experiment, but Tempe is something of an outlier among its neighbors. The 190-000-person college town has a median age of less than 30 years old, and younger people are less interested in driving than they were in the past. Only about a quarter of 16-year-olds had a driver’s license in 2017, down from half in 1983, according to an analysis of licensing data by transportation researcher Michael Sivak.
San Francisco-based Culdesac hopes to use the Tempe project as a model for bigger ventures around the country in talks with cities like Denver and Dallas. The company was started by Mr. Johnson, a founding member of Opendoor, a marketplace for buying and selling homes, and Jeff Berens, a fifth-generation Arizonan and former McKinsey & Co. consultant.
The developer has raised $10 million of venture-capital funding and plans to raise additional funds from real-estate investors for each project. The developers have raised $140 million of debt and equity from traditional real-estate investors for the Tempe project.
Far from everyone is convinced there are enough people in Tempe ready to toss their car keys. Most trips to restaurants, fitness centers and grocery stores require taking a freeway. Temperatures in the summer often climb north of 100 degrees Fahrenheit, which could make excessive walking or biking a strain.
“Quirky is probably the right word,” said Robert Dietz, chief economist at the National Association of Home Builders. “People are more adaptable in terms of taking Uber and public transport, but a lot of households still want one car.”
One of the biggest obstacles developers face is local parking requirements. Most municipalities require at least one parking spot per unit to ensure that new developments don’t contribute to gridlocks and parking shortages.
Culdesac, along with its local partner Sunbelt Holdings, negotiated with the city of Tempe to waive parking requirements for this 16-acre site, an unusual concession made easier by the development’s location.
Pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods may be gaining some momentum. A 2019 survey by the National Association of Home Builders showed that 60% of home buyers want to live in a walkable neighborhood—one of the top five desired qualities.
Townhouses, which tend to be in more dense, walkable neighborhoods, represented about 13% of new-home construction in the second quarter, up from about 10% five years ago, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data by the association.
Mark Mitchell, Tempe’s mayor, said the population of the city’s urban core is poised to double to 90,000 from 45,000 by 2040 and congestion is a major concern. “We’re trying to get individuals out of the car as much as possible,” he said.
Daniel Parolek, the founding principal of Opticos Design, the project’s architect, said he designed the project with plenty of shaded spots to combat the desert heat, inspired by a Greek or French village.
“They’re meandering, informal, there’s a sense of discovery,“ he said. ”They’re shaded. You’re not miserable.”
|
Last edited by Obadno; Nov 19, 2019 at 3:50 PM.
|
|
|
Prev
Linear Mode
