This Big Box May Be the Last: SuperTarget OK’D, but City Rethinking Development As It Plans for Light Rail
By Jason Hoppin, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
May 27–Mayor Chris Coleman has ruled out a building moratorium along University Avenue but said the city will work “aggressively” to encourage transit-oriented development there as the clamor for a light-rail line along the corridor intensifies.
His remarks came in connection with final approval for Target Corp. to build the Twin Cities’ first urban SuperTarget. The City Council approved the plan Wednesday, and Coleman gave his stamp of approval Friday.
He also issued a strong statement suggesting that the days are numbered for big-box retail with sprawling stores and giant parking lots along University Avenue.
Coleman said that development plans will be subject “to the highest degree of scrutiny” as the city focuses on transit-oriented projects that would be more pedestrian-friendly and bring higher-density land uses.
The mayor also said St. Paul would move to protect small businesses and workers and to make the city’s main commercial corridor home to living-wage jobs and small businesses.
In the process, Coleman took off the table the idea of a building moratorium similar to one in place along Grand Avenue.
The SuperTarget’s approval culminated weeks of delays in which the City Council negotiated several commitments from Target to make the 186,000-square-foot retail and grocery store more pedestrian-friendly and visually appealing. The store would open sometime next year.
In many ways, the issue evolved into a battle over the future of University Avenue. Community groups and Coleman’s administration say higher-density development is a better match for a future mass-transit line than big-box retail stores.
“Developing the Central Corridor will change the face of our city, and our work must reflect the values of our community,” Coleman said in a statement.
The statement also casts doubt on rumored plans for a Best Buy and Lowe’s, which have been discussed for the corner of Snelling and St. Anthony avenues, the site of a former Metro Transit bus facility.
Asked for his assessment of the mayor’s big-box statement, Brian McMahon, executive director of the community-planning group University United, said: “Dead. We’re done with that kind of deal.”
The mayor’s Central Corridor Task Force is beginning work on development guidelines for University Avenue with a year-end goal for completion. McMahon said the work needs to be finished sooner, and he’s working on his own set of land-use recommendations.
Such rules for developers would avoid another situation like the Target deal, McMahon added. Council members had worked to tweak plans days before a final vote, even huddling with Target representatives in the middle of a public meeting.
“Consistency and clarity is what you will hear over and over from a developer: ‘Just tell us what to do,’ ” McMahon said.
Larry Dowell, president of the St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce, also called for clarifying expectations on University Avenue. In the Chamber’s weekly news alert Friday, he said the process should be fixed.
In a separate development, Don Seaquest, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 789, called on the city to reject a $200,000 grant from Target to St. Paul’s Safe Cities Initiative, an anti-crime measure. The grant is part of a resolution approving Target’s plans and was added to the deal during negotiations before the City Council’s vote. Local 789 was one of three groups to appeal the Planning Commission’s go-ahead.
“If Local 789 had donated money around the time of the appeal, I can assure you that eyebrows would have been raised,” Seaquest said.
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Copyright (c) 2006, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
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