By Craig Boerner, cboerner@nashvillecitypaper.com
June 17, 2005

The Nashville Sounds’ $80 million proposal for a downtown ballpark with accompanying residential and retail has nearly tripled into a $230 million development that includes 600 residential units, 125 of which would be affordable housing.

Baltimore-based Struever Bros., Eccles & Rouse has increased its investment significantly since December 2003 when the project was $80 million and 225 residential units.

A sticking point in negotiations over the ballpark was tax increment financing. Points of disagreement have centered around the city’s contribution of the former Thermal site and whether $20 million in tax increment financing needed to make the deal work includes that land value. Expanding the scope of the project helps make the numbers work.

Alex Washburn of New York-based W Architecture, who is working with Struever on a master plan for the downtown development, participated in a five-member panel discussion Thursday at the Nashville Civic Design Center.

“The great thing about it is it has this mix of all of these pieces and attractions,” Washburn said.

“And the fact that it is on the water … it doesn’t happen very often that you get people together where the good idea actually has market forces behind it and these other players, community groups.”

Other members of the panel discussion focusing on downtown’s relationship to the Cumberland River included Sounds General Manager Glenn Yaeger, MDHA Executive Director Phil Ryan, Tom Turner of the Nashville Downtown Partnership and Burdell Campbell, who focused on the Cumberland River Compact.

“The developer just came on line late last year and that’s when we started talking about possibly more retail and affordable [housing] part,” Ryan said.

“The developer, I think, likes a big project with a lot of synergy, energy.”

Washburn focused his discussion on the ballpark’s relationship to both the river and a vibrant downtown area, saying Nashville will be the first city where a ballpark is located adjacent to a greenway.

The transition from a bustling entertainment district will occur through the ballpark and into the greenway and edge of a tremendous natural setting.

Washburn said the Sounds franchise is one of few that has been “foresighted enough to realize they didn’t have to sit in a parking lot” with their new facility, adding that the ballpark will make a “world class transition” from nature to the urban edge.

“The double bottom line is a way of accounting both the market success and community benefits,” Washburn said.

“It means being able to assess how much park land have you added, how many jobs have you made for local people, how many people have you trained out of the community to work with you, how much affordable housing, how much luxury housing, how much retail is national tenants, how much retail is mom and pop.”

June 06, 2005

Duplexes are a thorny issue in some Nashville neighborhoods. As neighborhoods age and land becomes scarce in high-priced neighborhoods, more and more developers are thinking about stylish duplexes to replace aging single-family homes.

But while many developers are trying to make sure the new structures match the style and feel of a neighborhood, others are not so careful, which has neighborhood leaders worried that their streets will become a hodge-podge of styles and home sizes.

The Metro Planning Department is recognizing a train wreck is in the making if local codes and restrictions for duplexes aren’t spelled out clearly.

They are rewriting and toughening an ordinance drafted last year that would limit the number of duplexes and attached homes that can be built on one street and regulate the design of driveways, garages and entrances.

Under the new plan, developers would have to build duplexes that complemented existing structures and would have to submit design plans for approval.

Duplexes are not automatically ugly as some residents in densely populated areas such as Green Hills are finding out. On many Green Hills streets there are now attractive brick duplexes that look more like single-family homes.

These new duplexes are an effective way to add density to an area while keeping housing in the same style of the existing homes.

But Metro Planning is thinking ahead of the curve to make sure the rules about duplexes are consistent and lend value to the neighborhoods in which duplexes may be built.

Merit over complacency

Metro should consider dumping its system of giving across-the-board pay increases and go to a merit system instead.

An across-the-board system in which every employee gets the same raise does not foster creativity and hard work. Instead it does the opposite.

It is also inherently unfair for those making less than others. The slacking manager who makes $80,000 gets the same percentage raise as the industrious office clerk making $25,000, but it translates into a lot less money for the clerk.

It would take more work to give merit raises, but it would improve the city’s workforce.