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My usual rant about the Pembroke area. I am sick and tired of seeing all of the vacant land across from Town Center. To add insult to injury all we're getting out of the deal is a WalGreen's and a Target on the side of the mall, and absolutely nothing on the other side of the street.
If the city is not going to develop these vacant lots they should turn them into parks and get rid of some of the blight. Plant some trees, put in a complex of single-family homes, put in a mid-rise condominium development, create a new neighborhood, park, anything but the urban blight that is a continuous reminder that as great as Town Center is, it is not enough. I know the city has a strategic growth plan for Pembroke, and is holding out on an extension to Town Center before anything else takes place, but that extension could be another decade or so regardless of what happens with the referendum. This is Virginia Beach, not Detroit, or Cleveland, OH.
My usual rant about the Pembroke area. I am sick and tired of seeing all of the vacant land across from Town Center. To add insult to injury all we're getting out of the deal is a WalGreen's and a Target on the side of the mall, and absolutely nothing on the other side of the street.
If the city is not going to develop these vacant lots they should turn them into parks and get rid of some of the blight. Plant some trees, put in a complex of single-family homes, put in a mid-rise condominium development, create a new neighborhood, park, anything but the urban blight that is a continuous reminder that as great as Town Center is, it is not enough. I know the city has a strategic growth plan for Pembroke, and is holding out on an extension to Town Center before anything else takes place, but that extension could be another decade or so regardless of what happens with the referendum. This is Virginia Beach, not Detroit, or Cleveland, OH.
The main problem with this is that the city does not own all the land in the area. The city can rezone land all they want but if the land is privately owned there's really nothing that can do about it. If privately owned land was zoned for suburban development at the time of purchase, then the owner can develop that land to the original zoning standards regardless of the city's intent to rezone this land for higher use. A primary example of this is Michael Sifen. He is the developer/owner of the Office Max property by the Old HQ store. The city approached him to try to get him to develop his property in a more mixed use and urban manner similar to Town Center. There was even a project called "City Walk" that fit the criteria that was pitched for that land. Sifen flatly refused and developed a strip mall instead. There was nothing the city could do as Mr. Sifen was perfectly within his rights to do so. I'm afraid that until the city acquires more land around Pembroke, you'll see similar development in the future.
There really is plenty of land ripe for urban development if the owners go that way. The old Bills Flea market comes to mind. I heard once a 2 story Walmart was going there. Glad that never happened.
"Strip Mall Hell," was what my friend foretold before I relocated to the area. Wal-Marts and their denizens are a blight on our physical and cultural landscapes.
Why would Sifen have refused a project like "City Walk"? If it means some additional landscaped areas, like the name implies, it must have come to a question of getting regulated to pieces/hemorrhaging money over the easy alternative (or would that be "normative").
There really is plenty of land ripe for urban development if the owners go that way. The old Bills Flea market comes to mind. I heard once a 2 story Walmart was going there. Glad that never happened.
There are urban WalMarts in DC. Those are the only type they will allow in the city. A mixed-use project that is not just a WalMart, but contained office space and residential would be interesting. Look up urban WalMart, and see what they are doing in White Plains, NY, Chicago, and Washington DC.
The stores located at 1st and H st, and the one in the Fort Totten neighborhood will be urban, the other four will not. Georgia Ave, depends on who you ask.
At the time that WalMart was built in Hampton Roads, they were still using their older, suburban model, which is what we're stuck with. However, if restaurants like McDonalds can incorporate an urban model, which is more in lines with an Internet cafe than a fast food joint, surely WalMart could do the same here. It will never happen though because this area already has enough WalMarts as it is per capita.
The problem is not the stores, it is the design. WalMart is synonymous with nineties suburban design. What bothers me, is that cities like DC and LA get urban concepts, but HR does not. Those cities are already urban, HR is trying to enter into the next stage of urban development.
Chances are the developers are only going to go with the most profitable concepts, instead of the most forward thinking concepts. So if people are okay with archetypal suburban design, that is what you'll get. We have "urban" retail in HR, but who supports these stores. Norfolk had an urban grocery store in a mid-rise downtown, but that has closed. Could be that no one knew it was there, could have been a bad location or the food could have been priced too high and was out of reach. OTOH, Hilltop does not have any problem with the grocery stores in that neighborhood.
The main problem with this is that the city does not own all the land in the area. The city can rezone land all they want but if the land is privately owned there's really nothing that can do about it. If privately owned land was zoned for suburban development at the time of purchase, then the owner can develop that land to the original zoning standards regardless of the city's intent to rezone this land for higher use. A primary example of this is Michael Sifen. He is the developer/owner of the Office Max property by the Old HQ store. The city approached him to try to get him to develop his property in a more mixed use and urban manner similar to Town Center. There was even a project called "City Walk" that fit the criteria that was pitched for that land. Sifen flatly refused and developed a strip mall instead. There was nothing the city could do as Mr. Sifen was perfectly within his rights to do so. I'm afraid that until the city acquires more land around Pembroke, you'll see similar development in the future.
Does the city intend to purchase these properties from developers so that they can execute their master plan or will we continue to have the same type of hodgepodge development that ruled VB for three decades? It sounds as though the city is beholden to the developer's wishes, even if those wishes are not in the best interests of the city or its citizens.
I would absolutely support eminent domain for the whole area. Truthfully, the area needs to be redone all the way east to the library, and west to at least Witchduck. However, at minimum, we need to get rid of the blight of Pembroke Mall, which is pretty much dead any way, those Pembroke towers buildings and the "automotive mile". Also the various strip malls need to go.
What we could put there could be mixed use buildings, sort of like Towncenter now. I think its also important to have mixed income housing as well, so that maybe some of those people who work in those endless restaurants might be able to live somewhere close to where they work.
I think Va Beach Blvd and Indpendence is a challenge to making an area like this walkable, but if both sides of each road could be developed, several sky walks could probably be built, so the existing traffic pattern didnt have to be disrupted.
I think its extremely important to get some newer, and centralized office space up, that is also affordable, because areas in Chesapeake, especially the Greenbrier area, are building like gang busters, and taking a whole lot of businesses out there, that could have been in the Virginia Beach Towncenter area, much closer to the core of Hampton Roads population.
I would absolutely support eminent domain for the whole area. Truthfully, the area needs to be redone all the way east to the library, and west to at least Witchduck. However, at minimum, we need to get rid of the blight of Pembroke Mall, which is pretty much dead any way, those Pembroke towers buildings and the "automotive mile". Also the various strip malls need to go.
What we could put there could be mixed use buildings, sort of like Towncenter now. I think its also important to have mixed income housing as well, so that maybe some of those people who work in those endless restaurants might be able to live somewhere close to where they work.
I think Va Beach Blvd and Indpendence is a challenge to making an area like this walkable, but if both sides of each road could be developed, several sky walks could probably be built, so the existing traffic pattern didnt have to be disrupted.
I think its extremely important to get some newer, and centralized office space up, that is also affordable, because areas in Chesapeake, especially the Greenbrier area, are building like gang busters, and taking a whole lot of businesses out there, that could have been in the Virginia Beach Towncenter area, much closer to the core of Hampton Roads population.
There are plans to remove lanes from Virginia Beach Boulevard in Pembroke and make it 3 lanes each direction instead of 4, to put it in line with development patterns in older cities in the nation that are either 4 lanes going one way only, or 3 lanes in both directions. These superwide, 4 lanes in each direction roads are primarily in the South that have newer, suburban development patterns where there are actual left hand turn lanes to prevent the left hand side traffic from the constant stop and go you might see in a city like New York.
Crossing three lanes is a lot easier than crossing 6 lanes (2 turn lanes, 4 straight lanes). Virginia Beach would have to take some of these cars off of the road in order to accomplish this though, which means they would have to blanket the area in public transportation in order to encourage people to get out of their automobiles. You couldn't even build a skyway the way it is now because of the enormous distance between the Pembroke Mall and Town Center without placing a support in the middle of the road.
Perhaps the Pembroke Towers could be rebuilt, or at least updated and brought out of the seventies. They aren't that high as it is and you could double the number of floors in the buildings and attract new tenants to the area. Removing Pembroke is going to be controversial. Personally, I think the height of Pembroke should be raised; instead of making a superblock out of Pembroke Mall you could raise the entire project to 6 stories and put in a multi-level parking garage and the whole mall would only occupy the area that Sears occupies now. Detach Target, and fill in the rest of the area with mixed-use projects and pave new streets where the parking lot exists now.
I have mixed feelings about the use of eminent domain to the east of Pembroke because that would mean rebuilding the high-school and it would remove a lot of homeowners from the area that simply are not going to come back to the neighborhood (though they may remain in Virginia Beach). You end up with even more transients than we have now, and that may contribute to the economic instability of the area if there aren't jobs to keep them in Virginia Beach, even though a few might rough it out because of the new urban look and feel of Pembroke.
Crossing three lanes is a lot easier than crossing 6 lanes (2 turn lanes, 4 straight lanes). Virginia Beach would have to take some of these cars off of the road in order to accomplish this though, which means they would have to blanket the area in public transportation in order to encourage people to get out of their automobiles.
Yeah, thats the problem, that corridor is so congested now, that taking away a lane without eliminating the traffic would be crazy, that traffic would be backed up past Mt. Trashmore coming up towards the BLVD.
Quote:
Originally Posted by goofy328
You couldn't even build a skyway the way it is now because of the enormous distance between the Pembroke Mall and Town Center without placing a support in the middle of the road.
Why not? You could build it like a suspension bridge.
Quote:
Originally Posted by goofy328
Perhaps the Pembroke Towers could be rebuilt, or at least updated and brought out of the seventies. They aren't that high as it is and you could double the number of floors in the buildings and attract new tenants to the area.
I also agree with making them bigger, but if youve been in those towers, Im not sure they are even salvageable, and Id be very scared to try to add weight on them. Id almost think rebuilding would be the option.
Quote:
Originally Posted by goofy328
I have mixed feelings about the use of eminent domain to the east of Pembroke because that would mean rebuilding the high-school and it would remove a lot of homeowners from the area that simply are not going to come back to the neighborhood (though they may remain in Virginia Beach).
I imagine we could probably keep the school, it would seem out of place, but I dont think it would be financially logical to rebuild it. As for the houses, it depends on how close to Va Beach Blvd they are. From what I can tell, there is very limited housing along VA Beach Blvd. I think, really, the biggest issue would be the area right around Thalia Station, and really, even south to Bonney doesnt have THAT many houses. With that, you could extend Town center east and north of Bonney out as far as Lynn Shores without much impedement, and you could also extend it north of Virgina Beach Blvd out to the river around Princess Anne High. You could probably leave the high density apartments alone that are across the street from Princess Anne.
To the west, its almost nothing but car dealerships and run down strip malls, nobody would much miss those.
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