I know you’re all waiting with bated breath for me to comment on Bob Manning’s proposal to District 150. I’m deliberately holding off until the whole plan comes out, instead of the bits and pieces that have been reported in the paper the past couple of days. It looks interesting, doesn’t it?
Daily Archives: July 15, 2006
One World Café to expand with a little help from the city
One World Café, established in 1994 at the corner of Main and University, recently purchased the former Lagron-Miller building to their immediate east and is trying to secure financing to expand their restaurant:
Their expansion plans include the relocation of the kitchen and upgrade of appliances, reconfiguration of the dining room to increase customer capacity, creation of a separate smoking friendly dining room/bar, improvements to a privately owned parking lot and a modification to the building’s façade to conform to the proposed Renaissance Park design guidelines.
They also want to add more staff — 8 full-time and 6 part-time employees — to meet the demands of the increased customer capacity.
They’re on the city council’s agenda for Tuesday because they want to borrow money from the city’s Business Development Fund (BDF). According to the Request for Council Action, the BDF’s purpose is to provide “a secondary or ‘gap’ financing source for local businesses,” especially those in the city’s Enterprise Zone.
One World owners Husam and Salam Eid (brothers) are putting $47,200 of private equity toward the expansion and have secured a $372,000 loan from Princeville State Bank. But with the project cost estimated to be $519,200, they’re $100,000 short. That’s where the city’s BDF loan comes in.
“The BDF is a separate and dedicated account, whose sole purpose is to provide secondary financing to local companies.” In this case, the city would loan One World $100,000 at 4.25% interest for 5 years. It’s a good deal for One World and a good deal for the city — more private investment in Renaissance Park and increased employment.
As a side note, did you catch the “smoking friendly dining room/bar” in their plans? Some people think business owners shouldn’t be allowed to permit smoking on their own property.
Hey Bloomington, hurry to Peoria! Gas is only $2.96/gal. here!
This is a pretty funny story from today’s Pantagraph — especially the comments section. Apparently, a rumor got started in Bloomington-Normal yesterday that gas prices outside of the twin cities, from Champaign to Peoria, were up to $4 per gallon! So, everyone was rushing to the gas stations to fill up at $2.96 per gallon before their gas prices rose as well.
What do you want to bet some enterprising gas station owner started the rumor? Don’t these people have any friends in Peoria that they could call and check?
My favorite comment, no doubt referring to Bloomington-Normal’s recent ban on smoking at restaurants: “B/N is so big on banning things these days, how about a ban on raising gas prices? Now THERE’S a ban I’d support!”
Bradley’s 1991 Plan an interesting read
Bradley University first filed an Official Development Plan (ODP) in 1991 when the city created the N1 (Institutional) zoning designation. Since then, it has been amended four times, expanding their institutional boundaries each time, but the balance of the plan is still in effect. The largest addition was the St. James apartments east of campus.
There are several things that are notable about the university’s ODP, which you can read in its entirety by clicking here (1.71M PDF).
NEIGHBORHOOD COLLABORATION
First, there was considerable collaboration between Bradley and the surrounding neighborhoods. An institutional planning committee was established through the West Bluff Council, which included representatives from Bradley-West (Arbor District), Moss-Bradley, and the Uplands neighborhoods, as well as representatives from Bradley University.
This process of collaboration was praised throughout the document, such as these statements:
The Committee frequently acknowledged that the University will not be as prominent an institution, nor will the Neighborhood maintain or improve its character, without cooperation and consideration of the needs of each other.
The University is furthermore committed to continue to exchange information and have open dialogue with Neighborhood representatives which will hopefully lead to further improvements toward resolving quality of life issues.
The document concluded by saying the process “reaffirmed the need for ongoing dialogue between the Neighborhoods and the University.” I wonder at what point the university decided to start stonewalling the neighbors until they’d acquired a critical mass of properties in the area where they wanted to expand?
PARKING UNDER ELMWOOD?
Another fascinating part of the document is their plan to solve Bradley’s long-term parking needs. They hired a consultant to assess the immediate and long-term needs and come up with solutions. The short term solution was to reconfigure existing lots (including widening Elmwood Ave.), lease space from owners of nearby lots, and better utilize on-street spaces within the institutional district. That added 305 spaces by the Fall of 1992. But the long-term solution was really interesting (emphasis mine):
Subject to further specific study and of course financing, the ultimate solution for additional parking supply appears to rest with construction of a parking structure. The proposed structure concept would lie underground from Main Street to Bradley Avenue under what is now Elmwood Avenue. The facility, which would be at least one level underground, would be accessible only from St. James (the campus entranceway). Surface parking would be retained.
In providing this solution, there is the related effect of improving parking to the central campus without encouraging additional neighborhood traffic. The plan would also allow the University to remove campus internal parking on the ODK circle (in front of Bradley Hall). Furthermore, the additional capacity of approximately 600 spaces could allow the University to vacate Fredonia Avenue for use as a pedestrian mall and also alleviate (or eliminate) the need for ancillary lot usage of the St . Mark and Newman Center lots.
Now that’s an ambitious plan, isn’t it? I wonder whatever became of it? I’m going to guess that cost was a major factor. In 1997, Bradley built an above-ground parking deck near the Global Communications Center instead. This provided an additional 690 parking spaces — almost a hundred more than the underground deck plan — and cost $4.5 million to construct.
LONG-TERM BOUNDARIES
The plan, and specifically the boundary of the N1 district, was designed to be “useful” for “at least 20-25 years.” That would be at least until 2011-2016. Now, I realize that no one in 1991 had a crystal ball, and that significant changes could have occurred between 1991 and 2006 that require the plan to be modified. But that begs the question: What has changed? Enrollment hasn’t dramatically increased.
The only thing that’s really changed is that the men’s basketball team gained nationwide recognition this year when they made it to the Sweet Sixteen. The university wants to take this opportunity to attract top-caliber athletes, and the way to do that is to have top-caliber training facilities. That means (to the university) replacing the aging Robertson Memorial Fieldhouse, which began life as a WWII airplane hangar.
But the replacement building will be larger and wipe out what little parking exists, thus the need for a new parking deck. The university wants to put that on the west side of Maplewood, where those big, historic homes stand now.
THE BOTTOM LINE
In the end, I think a lot of controversy and hard feelings could have been averted if the university would have continued their dialog with the neighborhoods instead of quietly buying up homes along Maplewood and keeping their plans a secret. They may have had to compromise — only use half of the frontage along Maplewood, for instance — but would have formed a stronger bond of trust with the surrounding neighbors.
The university’s plans, as far as I can discern them, are pretty modest as far as expansion goes. But they’ve created a climate of suspicion now that won’t be easily overcome. That’s unfortunate.