THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, July 9, 1996 TAG: 9607090234
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ALEX MARSHALL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 99 lines
The city's Design Review Committee recommended approval Monday of the basic layout of the proposed MacArthur Center mall.
The decision was made without allowing public comment. Some who believe the design fails to adequately tie the mall into surrounding streets came prepared to present their case and left vowing to continue their efforts to make the $300 million downtown mall more pedestrian-friendly.
The Planning Commission will consider the committee's recommendation Thursday. After it votes on the design, city officials said, either City Manager James B. Oliver or the City Council will decide whether to allow the developer to begin laying foundations for the mall as early as August.
But development officials with the Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority, which owns the site, are not expecting problems. Some site preparation work is already underway.
And on Saturday night, motorists will get a taste of what life will be like with the mall. The city will be blocking off Market, Bank and Court streets leading into the mall site, said Dennis Richardson, one of the mall project managers at NRHA. Although the streets are being closed now so the city can tear down parking booths and other structures on the lots to prepare to turn the site over to the developer, they will never reopen, Richardson said.
That will prepare drivers for mall traffic patterns, he said.
It was unclear Monday night whether a vote by the City Council would be necessary for the project to proceed, should the Planning Commission approve the design.
City Attorney Philip R. Trapani said Monday evening he would decide soon whether a vote by council was made necessary by substantial changes made in the mall's design since its original approval in 1994.
The council approved a Downtown Development Certificate for the mall in September of 1994.
Since then, the Macy's department store chain dropped out in spring of 1995. About the same time, a new developer, The Taubman Co. of Michigan, took control of the project, which is to be anchored by a Nordstrom store.
When Dillard's department store signed on as the second anchor, the site design was redrawn to make the mall face Monticello instead of City Hall Avenue. The interior of the mall was also redesigned, and the location of the parking garages and department stores moved.
The site was also enlarged to include the property now occupied by a fire station and the SMA tower.
The original development certificate was designed so that the city manager, not the council, would approve the final design of the project, Trapani said.
On Monday, the Design Review Committee approved the basic plan for the mall. This included the location of the department stores, mall entrances, interior walkways and parking garages - even the heights of the buildings and preliminary landscaping.
Among the features approved Monday were outdoor dining on the third level of the mall overlooking Monticello Avenue and a multiplex movie theater on the same level.
But the committee and Planning Commission have put off until fall considering what the outside of the mall will look like, including how many windows, if any, it will have facing the city streets.
Critics of the mall's design said Monday they would continue their campaign to change the design. They have suggested putting more windows on the buildings and breaking it into smaller blocks.
``It's too bad that the most crucial aspect of the design of the mall is allowed to be approved without public comment,'' said Patrick C. Masterson, a local architect.
A Design Review official said the public was given the chance to speak at a joint meeting of the committee and the Planning Commission held last month.
The Planning Commission will decide whether to allow the public to speak about the design on Thursday, Dugan said.
A public hearing is not required for this project, he said, so the commissioners do not have to allow public comment.
Masterson, David Levy and Mark Perreault, who are leading an ad-hoc campaign for a more pedestrian-friendly mall, say they will still hold an open design workshop on the mall for architects and citizens July 20.
The group passed out 4,400 fliers over the weekend urging citizens to lobby the council to change the design, Levy said.
Perreault, who has attended many of the design workshops as a representative of the Norfolk Historical Society, said the basic layout of the mall has never been discussed.
``It's always been accepted as a given,'' Perreault said.
NRHA's Richardson said he expects to hand the site over to the mall developer in mid-August. Final leases between the NRHA and Taubman, as well as the leases with Nordstrom and Dillard's, have not yet been signed, said Stephen W. Cooper of the redevelopment authority.
Richardson also gave a rough timetable for the mall's construction. Tenants are scheduled to leave the building once occupied by Systems Management American on Sept. 30, and that building and the adjacent parking garage and bank building should be torn down before Thanksgiving.
The fire station on Cumberland Street, which is being torn down, will be vacated by Nov. 1, Richardson said. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]
MIKE HEFFNER
The Virginian-Pilot
Architect David Levy, one of those leading the charge for a more
pedestrian-friendly mall, could only observe Monday's meeting of the
Design Review Committee, which didn't allow public comment.
KEYWORDS: MACARTHUR CENTER by CNB