Nashville Post Boom 2016

fall 2016

Healthier arteries

Ideas for three thoroughfares

Clifton’s coming boom An important North Nashville road rises

THE FRESH FACES OF DEVELOPMENT

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PIONEER, ADVOCATE Mark Deutschmann on rebuilding our corridors, his greenway vision and having more fun

Codes looks to keep up Beyond the core

Visions for Donelson, Ashland City, Lebanon

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INTRO

XXXXX

CONTENTS

INTRO

28

new faces of development

Showcasing some rising stars in Nashville real estate

36

Split personality

Mid-section of 12th Avenue evolves in quirky manner

42

‘As a city, we have to have some backbone’

Mark Deutschmann on rebuilding our corridors, his greenway vision and having more fun

2 BOOM

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NASHVILLEPOST.COM

DANIEL MEIgS

8/24/16 11:41 AM

LEADING

URBAN DEVELOPMENT

IN NASHVILLE FOR MORE THAN 20 YEARS UNDER THE LEADERSHIP OF MARK DEUTSCHMANN

EAST NASHVILLE

DOWNTOWN

@ maxwell

HILLSBORO VILLAGE 2206 21st avenue south nashville tennessee 37212 615.383.6964

MIDTOWN

WEDGEWOOD HOUSTON

gentry yvay

EAST NASHVILLE

615 woodland street nashville tennessee 37206 615.369.3278

12SOUTH

2814 12th avenue south suite 101 nashville tennessee 37204 615.369.9868

FRANKLIN

202 church street franklin tennessee 37064 615.790.3400

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INTRO

CONTENTS

Andrew Steffens of Alliance Residential Co. is one of our New Faces of Development Read more on page 28

open

09 YOU SHOULD KNOW Chase Gilbert, Built Technologies

10 tech @ work TracerES

12 DATA BANK

Big numbers and knock-on effects

14 THREE QUESTIONS

Mark Cleveland, Hytch

15 COMPANY & PEOPLE INDEX features

16 Running on empty

With few options left for industrial development near downtown, a new dynamic is in play

20 Runaway train P lan to relocate Radnor Yard for mass transit may be derailed quickly

21 Permitting the boom

Metro Codes grapples with Nashville’s rapidly increasing construction rate

25 Build it again, SAM Masonry company Wasco puts new bricklaying robot to the test

26 ‘direct action to fill the bench’

Construction on the 505 tower at Fifth and Church yields unusual building methods Read more on page 22

4 BOOM

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A look at the ACE Mentor program at MTSU’s Department of Engineering Technology

27 Pondering the future of housing

Competition reimagines the home for all generations

33 Recreating Clifton

Under-the-radar North Nashville street poised for new form, function

38 Shifting Sidco

South Nashville street sees industrial buildings transition to creative spaces

40 Understated trio

Midtown’s Hayes, Patterson and Church streets will see change — but how much?

48 Civic duty

Gary Gaston moves Civic Design Center forward as Nashville changes

51 The Sky is the Limit High-rise development pro Tony Giarratana sees Nashville as primed for large-scale buildings

54 From Nashville to Ashland City

Could county’s northwest quadrant use rail to spur growth, improve connectivity?

56 Development driven by transit

Nashville could look to Philly project for TOD cues

58 Setting the stage

Lebanon’s ECD plan eyes balanced growth

60 A new-look TIF Subsidy primed for future redevelopment districts in city’s outlying areas

62 Parking evolving

Two Nashville designers discuss the future of structures, requirements

65 WHEN NEW MEETS OLD

Nashville’s growth yields historic change

72 Data Bank

Crunching some numbers on large-scale construction projects in urban Nashville

73 Self-Driven Future

Is a driverless vehicle culture on Nashville’s horizon?

74 An outsider’s take

Placemaking expert Gabe Klein offer ways to improve Nashville

CLOSE

76 Reforming the arterials An excerpt — penned by former Metro Planning chief Rick Bernhardt

78 ‘Walkable urban development has returned’ An excerpt from Foot Traffic Ahead, a new report from George Washington University

80 What else can we do better?

We offer ideas to help keep Nashville on the right path

TOP: DANIEL MEIGS; BOTTOM: AeRIAL INNOVATIONS

8/24/16 11:41 AM

1201 DEMONBREUN 615.250.1800

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8/23/16 10:01 AM

EDITOR’S LETTER

INTRO

editorial

Staying focused

A big thank you goes out to our advisory board members, whose insights and candor helped us define and refine many of the ideas for this issue: Jim Douglas Hodgson Douglas Tracey Ford EOA Hayne Hamilton Panattoni Development Kim Hawkins Hawkins Partners Michael Kenner MiKen Development Ken Larish Mainland Companies Bruce McNeilage Harpeth Development Matt Nicholson Turner Construction Mickey Sullivan Gresham Smith and Partners McLain Towery Towery Development Ronnie Wenzler Cushman & Wakefield 6 BOOM

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Talk of Nashville’s ongoing boom produces some big numbers these days. There’s the recommended plan to spend $6 billion for a transit network worthy of a 21st-century city on the move. There are the more than 3 million residents Greater Nashville is expected to have by 2040.

And there are the $3.7 billion worth of construction permits issued by Metro Codes in the last fiscal year.

Context can quickly be lost when talking about large figures such as these or trying to answer the big questions they bring with them. Still, it’s always worth the while to stay grounded and focused on how Music City’s oftfrantic development touches people every day, be it via a freshly laid sidewalk, a shiny new office building or — not so positively — another delay on the drive home.

Those local impacts are what an exciting group of up-and-coming developers (profiles starting on page 28) are paying attention to as they look to reshape various parts of town. And paying attention to the smallest details is what Belmont officials do in keeping an eye on their energy use (page 10) and why the builders at venerable masonry company Wasco are testing a brick-laying robot (page 25).

At the Post, we also continue to be focused on the little things while we provide perspective on Nashville’s development. Next up in our magazine series is Vitals, our annual look at Middle Tennessee’s important health care sector. We’ll also be revisiting our annual In Charge list. Think we need to focus on certain people or topics for in these endeavors? Let us know anytime.

Geert De Lombaerde, Editor gdelombaerde@nashvillepost.com

Editor Geert De Lombaerde Managing Editor William Williams Contributing Writers Linda Bryant, Peter Chawaga, Nancy Floyd, Bill Lewis, J.R. Lind, Shelby Savage Copy editors Dana Kopp Franklin, Lauren Langston Stewart

art

Art Director Derek Potter assistant art director Christie Passarello STAFF Photographers Eric England, Daniel Meigs

production

Production COORDINATOR Matt Bach Graphic Designers Katy Barrett-Alley, Amy Gomoljak, Abbie Leali, Liz Loewenstein, Melanie Mays

publishing

PUBLISHER Jamie McPherson bUSINESS DEVELOPMENT CONSULTANT Jennifer Trsinar ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Maggie Bond, Rachel Dean, Michael Jezewski, Carla Mathis, Marisa McWilliams, Hilary Parsons, Mike Smith, Stevan Steinhart, Keith Wright Sales Operations Manager Chelon Hill Hasty Account Managers Gary Minnis, Sarah Richmond, Annie Smith

marketing

EVENTS DIRECTOR Lynsie Shackelford PROMOTIONS MANAGER Wendy Walker Silverman sponsorship specialist Heather Cantrell

circulation

Subscription Manager Gary Minnis Circulation manager Casey Sanders

SouthComm Chief Executive Officer Chris Ferrell Interim Chief Financial Officer Carla Simon Chief Operating Officer Blair Johnson Executive Vice President Mark Bartel Vice President of Production Operations Curt Pordes Vice President of Content/ Communication Patrick Rains Director of Human Resources Becky Turner Creative Director Heather Pierce 210 12th Ave. S., Suite 100 Nashville, TN 37203 www.nashvillepost.com Nashville Post is published quarterly by SouthComm.

Advertising deadline for the next issue is Wednesday, November 2, 2016. For advertising and subscription information, call 615-244-7989.

Copyright ©2016 SouthComm, LLC.

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Developing Nashville for 13 years under the leadership of Mark Deutschmann

gentry yva @ maxwell

Mark Deutschmann

Andrew Beaird B.A. M.A.PlAn

Kent Campbell

President

Vice President

Vice President

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corenashville.com

8/23/16 10:01 AM

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YOU SHOULD KNOW

OPEN

YOU SHOULD KNOW

chase gilbert BUILT TECHNOLOGIES

In the age of wireless communication and instant data sharing, the financing of most construction projects still moves painfully slowly. Builders request loan draws that are processed on spreadsheets while inspectors document job progress on printouts and notepads. If a builder is lucky and planned ahead far enough, that next chunk of change might arrive a week after the ask.

That won’t be the case much longer if Chase Gilbert and his colleagues at Built Technologies get their way. The company’s software — the product of a “What’s your biggest frustration?” conversation between Gilbert and local entrepreneurs Andrew and Scott Sohr — automates and speeds up those steps, giving all participants in the building process a real-time look into the funding and construction pipelines. The goal: Faster funding, more insightful risk management and better cost controls.

“So much of the fintech industry is looking to disrupt banks,” says Gilbert, who is president of the company. “We’re taking a different tack. We want to empower lenders to be better. It’s not just a lending problem we’re fixing. It’s a whole industry.”

After two and a half years of intense product development and refinement — during which it has nevertheless handled almost $2 billion worth of loans — Built is ready for the spotlight. The company now employs 26 people. Gilbert’s hiring focus of late has been on sales, marketing and customer service employees. More than a dozen banks already are on board. Pending legal review, that number is set to double in the coming months.

ERIC ENGLAND

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OPEN

Tech @ work

tech @ work

TracerES INDUSTRY PROPERTY MANAGEMENT DEVELOPER trane FOR BUILDING AUTOMATION AVAILABLE TRANE.com

Booming Belmont University has grown its footprint by more than 40 percent since 2003. But energy-efficient and sustainable design and smart process improvements over that time have held energy cost increases to just 10 percent. Mark Grones, assistant director of facilities management services and university engineer, and his team have built out an integrated campus-wide controls system that tracks energy use, proactively manages costs and drives better operational decisions.

At the core of their process is a product called Trane Tracer ES, which includes web-based tools that let them manage the operations of an individual building or make campus-wide changes from most personal computers, tablets and smart phones. A predecessor version of Tracer was first installed in 2003, controlling only a few buildings at first. By 2008, university officials began an earnest push to bury electrical lines, install sub-meters and figure out a controls system that could integrate and monitor the various tools in place.

The Tracer system lets Grones and his crew keep occupied buildings within a temperature range of 70 to 74 degrees and empty structures between 60 and 80 degrees, depending on the season. Tracking those ranges means the equipment on the 17 buildings now being monitored isn’t constantly working.

When maintenance problems do arise — or if a room’s temperature swings outside of its specified bound — the equipment sends a notification to technicians, who use their tablets to diagnose specific issues, often eliminating the need to spend extra time to go examine them in person.

Other universities are paying attention as they eye energy improvements. Officials from Tennessee Technological University have come to look at Belmont’s chilled beam air conditioning systems as they look to make their “central chiller plant” system more efficient.

Grones’ advice to them and other entities looking to go the same route: “Choose a standard and stick with it, because the workforce having to actually affect repairs cannot be productive if they are dealing with three or four different controls programs.”

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Creating Environments To Enhance Lives

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DATA BANK

SPENDING POWER

DATA BANK

Music City is quite the wealth generator: In 2015, Nashville posted growth in personal incomes, excluding transfers, that was nearly three points faster than the number of the national average.

KNOCK-ON EFFECTS

7% 6% 5% 4%

Here is the square footage worth of apartment $1,500 will get you in some of the country’s largest cities.

Nashville

Austin

Louisville

Dallas

U.S.

COST COMPARISON

St. Louis

1%

Indianapolis

2%

Memphis

3% Little Rock

The tremendous growth of Nashville since the Great Recession has long been evident in many ways, be it through crane counts, pedal taverns or traffic headaches.

The boom is working its way through all parts of the region’s economy and bringing with it both benefits and strains. Here are a few data points to help set the stage for some of the topics in this magazine.

Clarksville

OPEN

Source: Regions Bank Economics Division, Bureau of Economic Analysis

Louisville

BRIGHT OUTLOOK When it comes to home values, Middle Tennessee is expected to put up some of the best numbers in the country. Here are one-year forecasts as of the middle of 2016.

Boston SF

Charlotte

Dallas Dallas

9.6%

Nashville

Nashville

7.9%

Denver

7.3%

Tampa NYC

Chicago

Memphis

Austin

Denver

6.4%

Las Vegas

4.8%

Atlanta

4.8%

Orlando

4.1%

Charlotte

3.8%

Columbus

3.7%

Cincinnati Indianapolis Columbus

1,000 square feet

Source: RentCafé

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3.5%

Chicago

2.4%

St. Louis

1.7%

Louisville

1.6%

-0.2%

San Antonio

-0.6%

Birmingham

-1.3%

Memphis

Source: Clear Capital HDI

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DATA BANK

OPEN

SHOPPING SPREE

TIGHT CORRELATION

More than a few parts of greater Nashville’s retail real estate sector sport vacancy rates below 3 percent. They are essentially full. But there are bigger opportunities in some outlying areas.

Data is as of June 30.

The lack of housing supply is no doubt contributing to that cheery price forecast. From 2010 to 2015, every core county of Greater Nashville has seen population growth faster than housing unit growth.

County

Population Housing

Cheatham Davidson Dickson Robertson Rutherford Sumner Williamson Wilson

1.6% 0.9% 8.1% 5.1% 3.6% 1.9% 3.4% 1.9% 13.2% 8.6% 9.1% 4.2% 15.0% 10.7% 12.5% 9.9%

Southeast corridor.....................................................8.7% Hendersonville/Gallatin............................................7.4% Rutherford County.....................................................5.8% North..............................................................................5.3% Donelson/Hermitage.................................................3.9% Bellevue/West Nashville..........................................2.7% Green Hills/Belle Meade...........................................2.2%

Source: Len Kiefer of Freddie Mac using U.S. Census Bureau population and housing unit estimates

Downtown/West End...............................................2.1% Mt. Juliet/Lebanon......................................................1.9% Brentwood....................................................................1.5%

BIG SHIFT Commuting past one construction zone after another, we know apartment projects are underway all over town. But the market has now swung to such a point that there were more multifamily units being built in the first part of this year than there were regular homes. *Through April

2012 2,907

single

5,882

2013 3,881

7,729

2014 5,869 2015

multi

9,171

6,874

11,417

2016* 4,221

Source: Regions Bank Economics Division, U.S. Census Bureau

PRICEY ADDRESSES Here are the most recent average asking rates for office space around town and how they compare to early 2014 numbers.

Source: CBRE

Green Hills/21st/Music Row

Overall

North Nashville

Downtown

$5

Airport North

$10

6%

8%

Airport South

22%

$15

9%

8%

Cool Springs/Brentwood

$20

19%

MetroCenter

31%

West End/Belle Meade

$25

17% 25%

Source: Exceligent

HELP STILL WANTED The availability of construction labor has become an issue as Nashville’s boom has endured. Here’s how much construction employment grew in the year ended June 30 in a select number of cities.

MSA

3,963

$30

Cool Springs/Franklin................................................1.0%

Q1 2014

Q2 2016

Growth Workers

Orlando

16% 69,900

Austin

11% 61,300

Denver

11% 106,700

Columbus

8% 40,100

Knoxville

8% 18,500

Atlanta

7% 116,000

Charlotte

7% 60,500

Jacksonville

7% 37,700

Nashville

6% 43,000

Indianapolis

5% 49,200

St. Louis

5%

Memphis

3% 22,400

San Antonio

3%

Cincinnati

1% 44,600

51,600

Source: AGC of America

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OPEN

THREE QUESTIONS

MARK CLEVELAND Hytch

Ride-sharing services such as Uber and Lyft have thoroughly disrupted the short-distance travel market but aren’t suited to the everyday travels of suburban commuters. Enter local entrepreneur Mark Cleveland, who has been pitching his free Hytch carpool networking app to local municipalities and other transit stakeholders. Here, Cleveland lays out his vision.

How would you sum up the idea behind Hytch?

Every great story has a villain, a hero and a happy ending. Right now for Nashville, traffic is the villain. But with Hytch, Nashville can take a page from the sharing economy playbook to help solve the snarls of traffic — right now, before spending the billions of tax dollars and thousands of days that long-term mass transit solutions require. If every driver commuting to Nashville will use it, even occasionally, we will take 100, then 1,000, then maybe tens of thousands of cars off the road in no time.

What Air BnB did to match a house guest with that extra room in your home, Hytch does for empty seats in your car. Sharing the cost of a ride turns that unused asset into a money maker. Imagine 50 to 75 people in your neighborhood who are on your route to work or just a stone’s throw off your route for pickup. If you had 75 options

available for sharing a ride, would you take advantage once in a while? Once a week?

What’s a reasonable first-year expectation for adoption?

I believe in the people of Nashville to come together to solve the problem of traffic so my expectations for Hytch’s first year are sky high — say 10 percent of Nashville’s daily commuters.

Do some math with me: Research shows that taking 1,500 cars off an interstate is equivalent to adding a new lane and increasing travel efficiency by 10 percent for everyone. Today, on Interstate 24 alone, about 21,000 cars per day travel to Nashville from Clarksville, about 38,000 to Nashville from Murfreesboro. Take a mere 5 percent of those cars off the road and we’ve cleared two lanes at peak hours.

In terms of what will get people to sign up and share their cars, is it a question of karma or incentives?

Both, actually. Hytch is not a ride-forhire approach, although you can be paid up to the mileage reimbursement rate of 54 cents per mile. I think of it as paying people back their time, their safety and their convenience. Big employers and small companies have a stake in promoting this solution, too.

People fight traffic by quitting their jobs or moving to avoid long, frustrating commutes. Happier commuters make for a happier workplace.

ERIC ENGLAND

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OPEN

INDEX

INDEX

A-E

Chase Gilbert 9

Hytch 14

Murfreesboro 14, 20

Cheatham County 54

Music City Star 54, 58

T-Z

2300 Charlotte 34

Clarksville 14, 30, 35, 54

IBI Group Gruzen Samton 27

Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce 20, 54, 80

Tennessee Department of Transportation 20, 49, 73

Nashville Civic Design Center 48

Tennessee Technological University 10

Nashville Public Library 65

Terry Cobb 21, 80

O-S

The Anderson 39

Oman-Gibson Associates 38

The Del 33

oneC1TY 34

The Plan of Nashville 47, 76, 80

2700 Charlotte Ave 34

Clifton Avenue 33

222 2nd Avenue South 24

Colliers International | Nashville 17, 40

1st North 61 ACE Mentor 26 Acklen Flats 63 Adam Leibowitz 29 Aerial Development Group 28 Aertson Midtown 23

JE Dunn Construction 24 Jeff Haynes 29 Jeff Syracuse 56, 61

Crain Construction 23

Joe Cain 61

CSX 20, 54

John E. Calhoun Jr. 62

Cushman & Wakefield 17, 28, 39, 78

John E. Eldridge III 33, 37

David Dorris 36 David McGahren 17

John Schroer 73 Jones Lang LaSalle 52

Alliance Residential 29

David W. Creed 39

kennon | calhoun WORKSHOP 62

Andrew Sohr 9

D.J. Wootson 30, 61

Kim Hartley Hawkins 62

Andrew Steffens 29

Double A Development 29

Andy Sneed 25

Dwaine Anderson 39

L-N

Archer at 12th 36

E3 Construction Services 33, 37

Archer Western 22 Ashland City 54 Aspire Midtown 34, 40 Avenue Construction 34 Belmont University 10, 37 Beth Chase 38 Bill Purcell 44 Blackstone Brewing 35 Bob Mendes 60 Bordeaux Redevelopment District 61 Brian Evans 22

Edgenet 38

Lebanon 16, 55, 61 Lizabeth Theiss 23 Mark Cleveland 14, 62

Elliott Kyle 28

Mark Deutschmann 37, 42, 47

Encore 51

Mark Green 73

Evergreen Real Estate 36

Mark Grones 10

F-K Floyd Shechter 56 Gabe Klein 74 Gary Gaston 48 George Washigton University 78

Marty Heflin 29 Matt Burnett 61 Max Smith 17 McClain Towery 28 Megan Barry 37, 44, 60, 73 Metro Codes Department 21, 35, 80

The Cumberland 48, 51

Panattoni Development 16 Paseo Verde 56 Phil Bredesen 44 Radnor Yard 20 Rick Bernhardt 76 Robby Davis 39

Russ Alford 24

Tony Giarratana 23, 51

SAM100 25

Tony Harris 34

Sarah Haston 58

Towery Development 28

Scott Sohr 9

Trane 10

Sean Braisted 73

Turner Construction 24

Shaping the Healthy Community: The Nashville Plan 48

United Housing Inc. 27

SmartSpace 56

Urban Land Institute 44, 46, 57, 74

Smith Gee Studio 57, 72

U.S. Department of Transportation 32

Smyrna 17, 20

Vastland Realty 58

South Nashville 35, 38

Village Real Estate Services 36, 42

Built Technologies 9

Hawkins Partners 62

Burnett Real Estate Group 61

Hayes Street 40

C3 Consulting 38

Hayne Hamilton 16

C.B. Ragland 21, 24

Henry Menge 40

CBRE Group 17

H.G. Hill Realty 63

Middle Tennessee State University 26

Charlotte Ford 40

Hunter Connelly 36

Montgomery County 54

Steve Proctor 38

Charter Construction 23

Hunter Gee 57

Mt. Juliet 17, 54, 57

SVN | Nashville 40

SouthStar 58 Sperry Van Ness 39

Viridian 51

Stan Snipes 39

Wasco 25

Stanza 62

Werthan Lofts 42, 47

Steve Preston 17

WSP | Parsons Brinckerhoff 55

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Todd Jackovich 29

Tom Gormley 26

Hardaway Construction 29

Michael Hayes 21, 24

Tim Bolding 27

rootARCH 34

Buckingham 23

Metropolitan Transit Authority 20, 56

Thomas Gibson 38

Todd Oglesby 29

Giarratana Nashville 22, 41, 51, 72

Metropolitan Planning Organization 54

The Sheds on Charlotte 34

Ron Mitchell 35

Britnie Turner 28

Metro Development and Housing Agency 60, 75

The Row at 12th S. 37

XMi Commercial Real Estate 40

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FEATURES

INDUSTRIAL

Most of the land south of I-24 is already full with industrial developments

Running on empty

With few options left for industrial development near downtown, a new dynamic is in play

by WILLIAM WILLIAMS

There has never been a better time to develop industrial property in Nashville.

Of course, one could also argue there has never been a worse time, either.

With the local market’s vacancy rate for Class A industrial space about 4 percent, product is needed. But that need is countered by industrial developers being challenged to find suitable sites.

In general, it’s tough enough to undertake industrial development, which requires (ideally) relatively flat terrain and access to highways and interstates. But the difficulties are exacerbated because Nashville’s fire-hot real estate market has driven up land prices. Also, many of the city’s largescale sites located near the central business district that could have handled massive warehouses and manufacturing plants — for example, Capitol View, SoBro, a major chunk of the east bank and swaths of the area through which run Hermitage Avenue/Lebanon Pike, Fesslers Lane, Spence Lane and Elm Hill Pike — have long been out of play.

In short, the options are modest.

“We’ve spent the last 10 years looking for suitable sites for infill [warehouse] distribution projects in David-

son County,” says Hayne Hamilton, COO and CFO with the Nashville office of Newport Beach, California-based Panattoni Development Co. “Until the last 12 months, we couldn’t find anything where the land price allowed for an economically viable project either for new development or redevelopment.

“Finding suitable sites in Davidson County for industrial development will continue to be a challenge due to topography of undeveloped sections of the county, cost of land for redevelopment sites and difficulty in rezoning to industrial sites in developed areas,” he adds.

Hamilton says that, since mid-2015, rents for Nashville’s industrial properties have reached “historic highs.”

As such, developers are incentivized more than ever to undertake such projects — notwithstanding the difficulties in finding suitable sites.

“Accordingly, we are currently building a $40 million, three-building project at the I-24 I-65 north split,” Hamilton says. “It will be the largest Class A Industrial built in Davidson County in 20 years. The land was zoned [to accommodate industrial usage], but it has extremely difficult topography.”

Rough physical setting or not, the site is located a mere 3.5 miles from downtown Nashville and, of course, offers easy access to two interstates, always a major plus for warehouse development. One can understand why Panattoni was tempted by the opportunity.

No doubt, low vacancies and the chance to lure higher rents than in the recent past render industrial development still desirable.

At mid-year, Nashville’s industrial vacancy rate had dropped for the ninth consecutive quarter, down to 4.5 percent, according to Colliers’ numbers.

AERIAL INNOVATIONS

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INDUSTRIAL

A tightening market coupled with high demand pushed the average industrial rent to $4.81 per square foot, a 4.6 percent increase compared to the mark of the previous quarter and a 25.5 percent increase over the figure from mid-2015.

It is clearly worth noting that Nashville is not the only mid-sized U.S. city with low vacancy rates and developer concerns about finding suitable sites for industrial construction.

For example, second-quarter 2016 statistics from Cushman & Wakefield show San Jose (2.4 percent), Denver (3.4 percent), Cincinnati (4 percent) and Milwaukee (4.3 percent) are grappling with similar challenges.

Similarly, there are other mid-major cities for which the demand for (and, thus, the absorption of) industrial space during the second quarter was stronger than that of Nashville. They include Greenville, South Carolina (with 3.6 million square feet of absorption) and Indianapolis (with 2.7 million square feet).

Still, Nashville’s need for new industrial space — and the challenges of finding suitable property for such development — are unquestioned, says Max Smith, vice president at Colliers International | Nashville.

Smith offers a key statistic worth noting.

“Acreage pricing rose from $10,000 an acre to over $100,000 an acre during the past three years,” he says.

In fact, some industrial developers are willing to acquire sites that are less than ideal topographically just to be situated near Nashville’s epicenter, Smith says.

In contrast to Davidson County, the general Nashville market (which includes surrounding counties) is doing well with industrial construction. The full market boasted 4.2 million square feet of industrial space under construction at the mid-year point, according to Colliers’ figures.

About 3.5 million square feet is scheduled for completion by year’s end.

“Land is available outside Davidson County,” says Steve Preston, senior vice president with the Nashville office of Los Angeles-based CBRE Group. “The advent of State Route 840 has provided a great distribution corridor.

However, infrastructure is not everywhere, due to subsurface limestone, which requires [expensive] blasting to install water and sewer to support major development of distribution/manufacturing operations.”

David McGahren, executive managing director for the Nashville office of Chicago-based Cushman & Wakefield, says that in the first half of the year, the market absorbed 2.1 million square feet of industrial space. For comparison, in 2015 the market absorbed about 5.5 million square feet.

“The Nashville industrial market is down to 4 percent vacancy,” McGahren says. “In 2012, we showed 8.4 percent vacancy. I think these numbers tell a pretty good story of what has been happening in Nashville.”

McGahren says industry professionals as early as 2014 began forecasting what has become the current state of low vacancies and diminishing development options.

“In 2014, you saw developers talking about building smaller buildings but needing a higher rental rate to justify the cost,” he says. “With vacancy at 6.4 percent in 2014

— combined with no ready-to-go Davidson County sites and a true lack of small space available — we saw ProLogis build two new 150,000-square-foot buildings in La Vergne (in Rutherford County). Both achieved record rental rates for our suburban markets.

“Tenants have no choice but to pay more if they want new space,” he continues. “Currently, developers control the majority of what I would call true ‘A’ industrial sites market wide. Only two are in Davidson County.”

Not surprisingly, McGahren says ongoing industrial development will continue to be primarily focused on neighboring counties.

“It will be interesting to see where the next wave of development occurs after those sites are developed,” he says.

When McGahren attends meetings, panel discussions and/or after-work parties, he often hears, “What inning are we in with this market?”

“We have been rebounding now for four to five years,” he says regarding the Great Recession. “Most recoveries/ good markets have a seven- to 10-year life cycle. Factors for a possible slowdown include the U.S. presidential election, Brexit, possible interest rate increases, an employment slowdown and terrorism.”

With these potential concerns, McGahren says some decision makers for companies that lease industrial space are seeking to “tap the brakes” a bit.

“They are making sure their decisions for moving, expansion or growth are justified by customer demand or efficiency improvements to their operations,” he says. “Most of the investment capital still believes we have some runway left and are investing accordingly. That remains a good sign and is very positive for Nashville.”

McGahren says it’s a “great time” to own Nashville-area industrial property.

“Rental rates are up and rising to a degree, cash flow is great and building values are up,” he says. “If you’re a seller, you couldn’t ask for a better window of opportunity.

But a lot of owners are happy with the cash flow they are receiving and do not have another asset(s) to reinvest their proceeds in if they were to sell.”

In contrast, McGahren says it’s a challenging time for brokers focused on industrial space.

“It can become a game of musical chairs when you have multiple tenants looking at the same spaces,” he says.

“Someone is going to miss out. And if the [prospective] tenant is from out of town, they do not always believe the broker when they describe this crazy market and encourage their client to make quick decisions. Corporate America does not necessarily work that way.”

Colliers’ Smith says those folks who build and lease industrial space should prepare for a new reality. When he talks to colleagues within the industry, the responses are blunt.

“They find it is impossible to find infill sites at a reasonable price,” he says. “It is difficult to make a return on infill sites unless tenants can get comfortable with [potential] $7- to $8-per-square-foot rents.

“Users and developers will have to become more comfortable traveling to Mt. Juliet/Lebanon or La Vergne/ Smyrna to find industrial product.”

‘They find it is impossible to find infill sites at a reasonable price.’

Max Smith

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INDUSTRIAL

facility would not be easy. However, most observers contend two front-runners chug far ahead of the field.

Smyrna

A major advantage for Smyrna is that the region’s secondlargest yard — constructed to serve the Nissan plant — already exists. As with any of the location options, having freight — both from train to train and from train to truck — moved at a site located farther out of Nashville proper would ease congestion on the lines in the heart of the city.

However, there is a degree with which one problem is traded for another. Less rail traffic within Metro means necessarily that more semis (which would yield increased traffic) would be required to ship freight into Nashville itself.

In addition, the Nissan yard already is basically maxed out with significant rail traffic that, nonetheless, is far less than what Radnor experiences. So, lots more infrastructure would have to be built. In addition, the Nissan yard, like the Radnor Yard, is virtually landlocked, shoehorned between the factory and the largest parking lot for Nissan workers.

Murfreesboro

Runaway train

Plan to relocate Radnor Yard for mass transit may be derailed quickly

by J.R. LIND

CSX’s Radnor Yard

The Moving Forward report that came out of a yearlong study commissioned by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce was a bold statement on Middle Tennessee’s future transit options.

Released earlier this year, the report calls for adopting the most ambitious and expensive vision — a $5.4 billion decades-long plan — the Metropolitan Transit Authority and Regional Transit Authority have put forward in past studies.

The most eyebrow-raising of the proposals was a call to relocate the CSX-owned Radnor Yard — a massive industrial railway yard located south of downtown — and reinvent its site as a mass transit hub.

Sounds overly ambitious? Indeed, even the most ardent supporters of a bold transit vision admit, at least privately, that transforming the site for transit is unlikely, in part because the Tennessee Department of Transportation estimates doing so would carry a price tag of at least $767 million.

Furthermore, CSX is entrenched at the site. Built six decades ago by the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, Radnor sees freight trains from across the East and South loaded, unloaded, coupled and decoupled. At 517 acres, it is, not surprisingly, one of CSX’s largest rail yards.

Finding a suitable alternative location for a major CSX

Another site that has caught some looks is the intersection of State Route 840 and Interstate 24 outside Murfreesboro.

The south and east quadrants of the intersection are still relatively undeveloped. However, given the growth of the so-called Bucket City, it isn’t hard to imagine that some savvy developer is salivating at the prospect.

There are some rail connectivity issues, as the intersection is located more than a mile from the main rail line. But on a positive note, the proximity to 840 makes for easy connections to all three Midstate interstate highways. In contrast, and of a concern similar to that with Smyrna, having rail traffic at such a distance from Nashville would likely increase road traffic on an already highly congested corridor.

Interstate 65

While CSX controls the north-south line that runs along the Interstate 65 corridor (Nashvillians of a certain age will remember the old L&N Humming Bird passenger service that ran on the line to Birmingham and destinations beyond), there are numerous limitations to moving the yard.

Land values along that freeway are much higher than those near Interstate 24 and Williamson County comes with stringent planning strictures. It would be virtually impossible to go farther afield, say to Columbia, because there is no through-line into Maury County.

Interstate 24

Could CSX consider relocating beyond Murfreesboro?

There is sufficient land in Bedford and Coffee counties, but Manchester, for example, is located 65 miles outside of downtown Nashville. And a large-scale freight yard that far removed from the area’s urban epicenter would serve little logistical improvement purpose.

In short, envisioning CSX happily moving — much less pondering the thought of Metro spending millions on a major transit project — is difficult at best. This is one potential project that might already have run off the rails.

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$3.7

The collective permit value in Nashville reached a record of $3.7 billion in 2015-16, almost 30 percent higher than the previous year.

Numbers are in billions.

$1.4

The eye test is evidence enough that Nashville is in the midst of a construction boom. The iron skeletons of rising buildings dot the cityscape, and cranes poised to construct more are erected seemingly every day.

The collective permit value in Nashville reached a record of approximately $3.7 billion in the past fiscal year and required the issuance of 12,275 permits, according to data gathered by the Metro Department of Codes and Building Safety. Those figures mark an all-time high, with the dollar figure nearly 50 percent greater than the record mark of the year before.

“The value of those projects and the complexity, the size of them, is so much larger than we have seen historically,” says Terry Cobb, director of the codes department.

The department has seen a steady increase in permit requests following the Great Recession and has implemented several initiatives to accommodate those requests. For example, two years ago Codes opened a development services center that allows for those Metro departments and agencies with an interest in the permit process (Public Works, Water Services, Fire Marshal, Health Department, Historic Commission and Planning Commission) to be connected electronically via a common computer program and database.

The department also began reviewing certain projects while they are still in the design phase, making permit issuing more efficient when the time comes. In late May, Codes introduced a new computer system to replace the one designed a decade ago.

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by Peter Chawaga

$1.1

Metro Codes grapples with Nashville’s rapidly increasing construction rate

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Permitting the boom

With these changes, the codes department has managed to stay afloat during the rising flood of construction — but not without some difficulty.

“The process has been bogged down,” says Michael Hayes, president of C.B. Ragland Co., the local commercial real estate company currently undertaking the 222 2nd tower with Houston-based Hines. “The type of new construction is different than what the Metro Codes Department has previously had to review, with significantly more mid- and high-rise buildings, which just by their nature take longer to process than smaller-scale buildings.”

Cobb concedes that the waiting period for permits has increased during recent years but contends that his group does as well, if not better, than codes departments located in Nashville’s peer cities. He estimates that, locally, half of the building permits are issued the same day they are requested, 66 percent are issued in the same week and about 80 to 85 percent are issued within a three-week time period.

“The queue is a little longer today than it used to be,” Cobb says. “It’s not because of the sheer number of projects. It has to do with the complexity of the projects and the complexity of our regulations.”

To get a better handle on the city’s increasingly complex building regulations and future needs, the codes department has bolstered its staff by about 10 percent during the last few years. The approximately 100 employees also have more specific functions than in the past.

If the number of large-scale construction projects continues to increase, Codes will have to do its best to keep up.

“We’re continuing to monitor staffing levels,” Cobb says. “At the end of this calendar year, we will take a hard look at whether the market is continuing to accelerate at this pace and try to determine what we need in the future.”

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Construction on the 505 tower at Fifth and Church

DISTINCTIVE CONSTRUCTION

Nashville’s boom yields unusual building methods

by William Williams

Nashville is booming, as the city’s multiple cranes suggest.

In fact — and if the rate of construction of major projects continues unabated — the city could soon rank among the top 20 in the U.S. in terms of number of buildings approximately 100 feet tall or taller.

With all the high-rise activity, to be expected, come some distinctive and interesting construction methods.

For example, Giarratana Nashville is having Chicago-based construction manager Archer Western use a process for its 505 project long implemented in the construction industry in Europe and large U.S. cities. Known as the “self-climbing core formwork system,” it is the first time in the method has been deployed.

The company estimates the use of the system will shave nearly three months of construction time off the schedule for the 45-story skyscraper, underway at the

southeast corner of the intersection of Fifth Avenue North and Church Street. Expected to have about 550 condo and apartment units, 505 is scheduled for completion in late 2017.

Specifically, the self-climbing core formwork involves a moving platform that contains a form for the concrete core of the building, according to Brian Evans, Archer Western senior project manager.

The core — about 1,400 square feet — will eventually contain elevators, the trash room and chute, and circulation systems, Evans says.

“The method allows the four walls of the core to be poured one floor at a time, before the formwork is hydraulically raised to the next floor, at which point the process is repeated,” he says.

Conventional construction methods call for the formwork for the core walls to be built by hand, then disassembled and re-assembled on the next floor by hand after each pour, he says. That process typically takes about two days for each floor.

Evans says the self-climbing core formwork method saves time by maintaining the basic forms in place, combined with the ability to move vertically. The hydraulic self-climber takes less than 30 minutes to move itself to the next level, he notes.

A concrete placing boom was assembled on top of the COURTESY 505 NASHVILLE

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platform after the structure reached ground level, providing a lifting platform in lieu of a mast going through the floors that would need to be reshored all the way down, Evans explains. This eliminates penetrations and required bracing through the building, he says. With the core always three floors above the deck, a simpler concrete pour is offered.

When 505’s 45 above-ground floors are combined with the six underground floors, the amount of time saved could be as much as three months.

“I expect more projects in the South will begin using the core formwork system as project managers see it in action,” Evans says.

Evans says there are several factors to consider before a core formwork system makes sense for a project, including total building height, design, the availability of power to run the hydraulic lift and the mathematics of time saved versus the rental cost of the system.

Evans says Archer Western has several crews with experience using the self-climbing formwork. A four-person crew assembled the form in about two weeks for 505.

Once in place, Evans says, it usually takes a similarly sized crew to operate.

“It’s a safe system that gives the construction crew a platform to work from,” Evans says. “This demands much less man-handling of the forms because they are on rollers. So they can easily be rolled away from the finished concrete.

Developer Tony Giarratana says this is his second experience with the core formwork, the first being a steel structure office building in Denver in the 1980s.

The self-climbing core formwork is a rented piece of equipment, and one that is fairly expensive. Giarratana is confident the savings in construction time will more than offset the rental cost.

To eventually stand about 525 feet tall, 505 will be the tallest building in Tennessee based on occupied floors. Only the AT&T building is taller due to its iconic Batman-esque twin spires.

“Nashville is long overdue for taller buildings,” Giarratana says. “At 45 floors, 505 is a step in the right direction.”

Aertson Midtown is another project that has requires various distinctive building methods, in this case courtesy of Nashville-based Crain Construction.

Developed by Indiana-based Buckingham Companies and addressing the point at which 21st Avenue, Broadway and Division Street converge, Aertson offers a modified two-tower form rising 17 stories at its tallest point. It will feature a Kimpton Hotel, 350 apartments, a 630-space parking garage and street-level retail. The massive building covers two acres near Vanderbilt University.

Lizabeth Theiss, Crain vice president of business development, says Aertson Midtown is a “complicated structure” with 36 sloping columns, multiple transfer beams and a concrete framed trellis at the top of the building.

“Every floor had a different concrete pour plate because of the sloping columns and special structural issues,” Theiss says. “This required approximately 30,000 cubic yards of concrete for the structure, with 93 elevated slab concrete pours involving an average of 30 truckloads of concrete for each pour.”

Theiss said the tight urban site — multiple buildings, streets and people are within close proximity — created significant challenges.

“We implemented just-in-time delivery to carefully plan and coordinate materials,” she explains. “We also had to consider traffic and pedestrian flow around the site and keep existing businesses in the vicinity open.”

Theiss says special noise-reduction measures were implemented.

“We worked with our concrete contractor, Charter Construction Inc., to be the first in Nashville to implement several measures to reduce noise since we had to pour concrete at night so we wouldn’t tie up traffic in the area. We averaged two or three nighttime concrete pours each week, startcontinued on page 24

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© 2016 Google Fiber Inc. Service not available in all areas.

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CONSTRUCTION

ing around midnight and sometimes lasting until 6 a.m.

“We created an insulated mobile wall panel system, about 10 feet high, around the pump truck to contain the noise within the insulated area,” she adds. “We also fabricated insulated ‘skirts’ and put them around the blades of the concrete troweling machine. We also changed the mufflers on the gas-powered machines to reduce noise and switched the back-up alarms, setting them at the lowest level allowed by OSHA.” Similarly, Nashville-based C.B. Ragland Co. and Hines of Houston are enlisting construction manager JE Dunn Construction Co. to undertake their mixed-use SoBro tower 222 2nd with some interesting building methods.

Michael Hayes, Ragland president, says street and site configuration have been factors in the project, located at the address from which it takes its name.

“One of the initial challenges was to work with a site that is not a rectangle,” Hayes says. “We worked for well over two years to realign Molloy Street and to add an additional traffic lane to First Avenue South while widening the sidewalks on all sides of the project.

“We found surge groundwater at eight feet below grade, which was a surprise,” he adds. “We conducted over 40 soil borings on the site and found the water flowing on one of the last ones. Had we not taken the time to adequately probe the subsurface area, we could have run into a significant water issue after commencing construction.”

With multiple large-scale buildings nearby, Ragland, Hines and Dunn have built in contingencies to stay on schedule.

“One of the most challenging factors early in our process was responding to an ever-changing landscape around us,” he says. “Three of the four blocks south of Demonbreun from First to Fourth are currently under construction. The West Riverfront Park was under construction while we were in design. With the park, the city worked with multiple telecom providers to bury their fiber lines. It seemed like a weekly occurrence to see someone burying something new around our project site that, in turn ,would have an impact on our development. Above-grade power lines also were an issue where we had to install temporary power to serve another project so we could have a crane on our site.”

With the high-profile construction efforts come technology offerings Nashville would not have seen in prior years.

For example, the Nashville office of Turner Construction is now offering a service to allow clients to “virtually enter” a room or building.

The experience is meant to elevate the experiences that result when clients review blueprints or watch 3D videos, according to Russ Alford, general manager for the Turner’s Nashville-based Medical and Research Solutions entity.

With the virtual reality lab, clients can “virtually enter” a room or building, walk around, and pick things up and move them around, Alford says.

Turner Construction is billing itself as the first and only company in Nashville to offer a virtual service of this type.

Alford says the use of virtual reality in computer modeling has “transformed” early design meetings to allow users to “experience” the built environment before Turner constructs spaces.

“This has accelerated both the pace and quality of decisions by clients, reducing design times and eliminating changes in the built environment,” Alford says.

No doubt, “building big” in Nashville has become a major challenge.

Even rather basic construction efforts will often face special events and road closures.

“It seems like at least once a week, one of the streets around us is blocked,” Ragland’s Hayes says. “That said, we have an amazing project team in place and remain on schedule to deliver next summer.”

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Build it again, SAM

Masonry company Wasco puts new bricklaying robot to the test

by Geert De Lombaerde

Since its founding 50 years ago, local commercial masonry company Wasco has worked on Nissan Stadium, the Country Music Hall of Fame and Ascend Amphitheater, among others. This year, the company has broken some new ground of its own by being the first in the region to use the SAM100 bricklaying robot, most recently as part of its work on the new Welch College campus in Gallatin.

Wasco CEO Andy Sneed, son of company founder William A. Sneed, says having the SAM100 on a job is the equivalent of adding a mason to his team there, an asset that is growing in value as the regional shortage of skilled craftsmen worsens. Not that it’s a straight machine-for-man swap: Having the robot handle the repetitive task of actually laying the bricks frees up the masons to focus on quality control and attaching other

construction parts to the wall.

“It simply helps them do more with less crew, while potentially minimizing the physical stress of repetitive brick-lifting motions,” Sneed says. “We are hoping to develop SAM as a reliable tool for our craftsmen, assisting them in their craft. We do not ever expect the robot to replace the need for human artisans.”

Construction Robotics of Victor, New York, launched commercial production of the SAM100 last year, promising cost savings of up to 30 percent. The robot can lay about 230 bricks per hour compared to what Masonry Magazine says is a typical mason’s production of between 300 and 500 per day. Sneed says Wasco’s longstanding relationship with Construction Robotics led the New York company to reach out to his team about being a trial partner.

After unveiling SAM100 at Wasco’s 50th anniversary party, executives first tested the robot on jobs at a school site and on a retaining wall. At its peak, they say a team of a human masons and the SAM100 will be equivalent to about two and a half workers. Sneed says his team is working with Construction Robotics on both the accuracy and speed of SAM100 in various scenarios.

“It will be in a stage of being perfected for possibly years to come,” Sneed says. “It gets better day by day.”

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SAM100, the bricklaying robot Wasco has been testing, most recently in Gallatin

COURTESY WASCO

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Peace of Mind.

‘direct action to fill the bench’ Last decades’ construction bust pushed out many experienced professionals and has added an urgency to workforce development programs. One initiative taking a longer-term view is the ACE Mentor program, which looks to expose STEM-interested students to careers in architecture, construction and engineering. In July, Middle Tennessee State University hosted a group of 18 students for a week-long immersion, the only one of its kind in the national ACE Mentor network. The Post recently checked in with Tom Gormley, associate professor in MTSU’s Department of Engineering Technology, to talk about the program, which now touches 130 young people each year.

What prompted the start of the program in 2002 and how has it grown?

The national ACE Mentor program was started by Charley Thornton of Thornton Tomasetti in New York City about 25 years ago. Charley saw the need to bring more students into the architecture, engineering and construction world. The local program was given birth under the leadership of Joey Hatch of Skanska, myself when I was at HCA and Bob Sarratt of the Parent Company. Joey and Tom had been given assistance in their own careers by the late Joe Rodgers and they wanted to find a way to give back to the industry.

The program has succeeded because of the commitment of more than 30 ACE-industry companies in Middle Tennessee. We have also been helped through public-private partnerships with schools and entities like MTSU and Vanderbilt University who want to see greater and greater participation of young men and women training for and entering ACE jobs.

How has the program itself evolved? Are there new elements?

The Nashville program has grown from participation in one school in one school district in Nashville with three teams to 15 schools across three school districts and 10 teams.

Est. 1958 • rgfence.com The commercial fence ProfessionalsTm

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Are there certain skill sets the industry is particularly struggling to attract these days?

As the ACE industries workforce ages out and retires, coupled with those professionals that left the industry after the last economic downturn in the industry, we are looking to replenish the workforce with new diverse talent. This is more than a matter of replacing certain skill sets, but [instead] direct action to fill the bench that’s been emptied. The ACE Mentor Program assists young people in making that final decision about choosing a career within the ACE industry and which direction to pursue.

COURTESY MTSU

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Thinking about the future of housing

Competition reimagines the home for all generations

by Geert De Lombaerde

A recent survey of almost 5,000 homeowners by Freddie Mac and GfK showed that 63 percent of people aged 55 or older prefer to age in place rather than relocate to senior living facilities. Of those roughly 42 million people, 23 percent told survey organizers their homes would need major renovations to stay accessible as they aged.

That will create a huge demand — but for what exactly?

This fall, a Memphis family will receive the keys to a competition-winning home overhauled using the principles of universal design, which focuses on safety and ease of movement for people of all ages, particularly seniors. The home was chosen this summer as the winner of the “Re-defining Home: Home Today, Home Tomorrow” competition — sponsored by AARP, the AARP Foundation, Home Matters and the Wells Fargo Housing Foundation — that asked architecture firms to redesign a typical home to enable residents to live there through every stage of life.

The winning team of IBI Group – Gruzen Samton architects worked with a $75,000 budget that focused on

creating a number of common areas that “invites the outside in.” The goal of the New York-based IBI trio was to maintain clear connections to neighbors and the community, be it through the kitchen or a small community gathering space that will connect the house and the garden. Beyond that, the team’s ideas call for wider hallways and bigger bathrooms that will preserve freedom of movement for people as they age and may need walking aids or wheelchairs.

“When the design challenge partners looked to us for the remodel, they turned a spotlight on all the community development work going on in and around Memphis,” said Tim Bolding, executive director of United Housing Inc., a Memphis nonprofit that has helped more than 4,000 families own or save their homes. “With Memphis’ recent focus on proactive blight elimination, it’s important to remember that every new homeowner — in each life stage — is representative of one less blighted home in a neighborhood, which can then positively affect residents in neighborhoods throughout our city.”

The competition’s second-place concept remodeled the house along two axes, one consisting of a “flex wall” that incorporates storage spaces and the other being a path that runs from the street directly through the house to the back yard. As with the IBI design, the goal is to better connect the property’s public and private zones.

The third-place design used a steel-and-wood framework to create a “second skin” for much of the home, an approach that creates a prominent front porch to connect the structure and the street and allows for gardening opportunities. It also opts for knocking down some interior walls to create an open central space that’s easier to maneuver.

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IBI Group’s winning design in the “Re-defining Home: Home Today, Home Tomorrow” competition

For more info, go to: homemattersamerica.com

courtesy of IBI Group – Gruzen Samton: Gabriel Espinoza, Carmen Velez and Timothy Gargiulo

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new faces of development

BRITNIE TURNER

mcclain towery

At 18 and planning to be a missionary in Africa, Britnie Turner attended what she calls a leadership and survival school.

Little did she know at that time a real estate career awaited.

“A man spoke about how to use [real estate] cash flow to fund your missions instead of having to ask for donations,” recalls Turner, the founder and CEO of Nashvillebased Aerial Development Group. “I was so jazzed about this idea that I bought my first house a few weeks later.”

Fascinated by the thought of building a business that could aid her planned advocacy efforts, Turner decided in 2007 to learn as much about real estate as possible.

“I moved to Nashville in 2009, lived in my car on and off, and worked for free for nine months in exchange for learning the business,” she recalls.

At that point, she founded Aerial.

“Needless to say, it was more than a struggle to get it off the ground,” she says.

In those early days, Turner says she recognized the opportunity to not only positively impact Nashville’s neighborhoods in meaningful ways through development, but how to also “truly live my passion for making social impact both across the globe and in local communities where we build, and harnessing the power of capitalism to continue to make change.” > William Williams

McClain Towery’s first project was a small residential deal in Hillsboro Village and involved his long-time friend and business partner Elliott Kyle.

“We bought it off a bank’s balance sheet, which was unsettling given that it meant someone else lost the property,” he recalls. “Luckily, it worked out pretty well.”

Things have continued to work out well, as Towery, now in his mid-30s, is quickly bolstering his local reputation with quality small-scale projects.

“Most of what we currently have going on are adaptive reuse projects,” he says. “We’re repositioning older buildings with what we think are cool new tenants. We’re about to start building out a new speakeasy bar in East Nashville for Attaboy of New York. Bongo Java’s new concept (BOX) is now under way at our 10th Avenue project near 12South.

And we have plans in motion for one of our WedgewoodHouston properties.”

The president of Towery Development, which he founded in 2002, Towery cites as an influence veteran commercial real estate industry official Rob Lowe, vice chairman of the Nashville office of Cushman & Wakefield. He says his favorite aspect of development is construction, “even though it can be a messy process.”

As to his least favorite?

“It’s aggravating how long most projects take to open the doors,” he responds. > William Williams

Founder and CEO Aerial Development Group

courtesy britnie turner

President Towery Development

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new faces of development

ANDREW STEFFENS

Adam Leibowitz

Few out-of-town development companies are targeting Nashville with the same gusto as Alliance Residential Co. It is Andrew Steffens’ task to keep that energy focused.

Steffens serves as the Nashville region development director for the Phoenix-based luxury apartment company, which recently finished Broadstone Germantown and is now working on Broadstone 8 South. In addition, Alliance wants to develop in The Gulch a 14-story apartment building called 8th + Division.

“I get a lot of enjoyment out of delivering a community people really like and want to be a part of,” says Steffens, who credits Alliance Managing Director Todd Oglesby and local developers Todd Jackovich (Stonehenge) and Jeff Haynes (Boyle) for their positive influence.

“There are a bunch of new apartment buildings in Nashville, so understanding how to take a building one more step to create a fun and enjoyable apartment community has been satisfying,” he adds.

A avid duck hunter, Steffens says his father —who worked in the construction and development industries — was a key role model.

“Being around the industry as a young boy, I was always intrigued by building things,” he says. “As I looked to pursue a career in development, the luxury apartment industry seemed like the perfect platform to exercise my finance background while also being able to be creative.” > William Williams

The man behind projects in North Capitol, Salemtown and East Nashville says that while visiting New York City as a child, the older buildings caught his attention.

“I specifically remember seeing dilapidated buildings and wondering whether there was a way to reuse them,” he says.

That memory has influenced Leibowitz, whose current adaptive reuse project involves converting the former Holt Brothers Carpet & Flooring building on the east side to high-end office space. Hardaway Construction will be anchor tenant.

Also on tap for Leibowitz is Holiday Jones, a boutique hotel eyed for Main Street in East Nashville.

“Coming up with an idea, working through issues that will inevitably happen and seeing the finished product provides a great sense of accomplishment,” says Leibowitz, who is involved in pro-Israel advocacy work. “I am also fortunate to be surrounded by a great team of partners.”

Leibowitz says his father and late grandfather have been influential, as has been his mentor, local real estate pro Marty Heflin.

A Vanderbilt University grad, Leibowitz says the failed The Amp would have been spurred transit-oriented development.

“I feel encouraged that a regional mass transit system will eventually happen,” he says. “This will create great opportunities for development in pockets that otherwise wouldn’t be on the radar.” > William Williams

Development director Alliance Residential Co.

DANIEL MEIGS

Principal Double A Development

DANIEL MEIGS

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new faces of development

D.J. Wootson Principal Titus Young Real Estate

D.J. Wootson looks at his 1821 Jefferson mixed-use project, scheduled to open later this year, as his calling card. The fourstory, $4 million building is being backed by prominent names including John Ingram and Bob Bernstein and will be home to 18 market-rate apartments and several retail spaces, including stores for Smoothie King and Bernstein’s Bongo Java concept.

Just steps away and at the corner of Jefferson Street and D.B. Todd Boulevard — what Wootson calls North Nashville’s “Main and Main” — he has under contract the property now home to Paul’s Market. A redevelopment of that site, together with a number of apartment and single-family properties he owns in the area, is part of his vision to begin to fulfill the potential of the section of Jefferson that links Tennessee State University, Meharry Medical College and Fisk University. Today, that stretch is pockmarked by too many rundown properties and undeveloped plots, but Wootson sees a district with the chance to assume the same role Hillsboro Village or 12South play for their nearby respective university populations. To succeed, though, he says the area — Wootson has floated the moniker of University City — needs market-rate developments such as 1821 Jefferson as well as dining and business services options that don’t yet exist.

“Especially on this main artery,” Wootson says of Jeffer-

son. “There’s an economic engine here and there’s spending power. But the money can’t be spent around here. So it gets spent elsewhere.”

In addition to his sites on and near Jefferson and D.B. Todd, Wootson owns a prominent plot at 28th Avenue North and Alameda across from Hadley Park, on Clarksville Highway and is repurposing for Dollar Tree a building on the prominent corner at 39th and Clifton, across the street from the redeveloped Preston Taylor Homes and in the middle of a food desert.

Having grown up in a hardscrabble environment in Wilmington, Delaware, Wootson says his point of departure in developing real estate is different and he embraces the social aspect of development. Fully intending to leave a legacy beyond a handful of buildings, he is heavily involved with Mending Hearts, a nonprofit that helps women recover from alcohol and drug addiction and is based just a few block west of TSU’s campus.

Wootson sees the Jefferson Street corridor and the areas home to his other properties becoming a vital part of the chain of redeveloping neighborhoods close to Nashville’s core. Germantown, The Nations, Sylvan Heights, 12South and Wedgewood-Houston all are seeing an influx of residents, capital and commerce. North Nashville won’t — and given its value relative to Nashville’s hot spots, can’t — be left behind, says Wootson, who began buying properties in the area more than two years ago. With his sizable head start, he has the chance and the intention of becoming the closest thing it has to a master developer. > Geert De Lombaerde

ERIC ENGLAND

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nEw FAcES oF dEvElopmEnt

Looking to heaL

This summer, a group of planners with the U.S. Department of Transportation hosted a twoday design workshop (as part of their Every Place Counts Design Challenge) with members of the North Nashville community that produced some sketches of potential redevelopment visions. The program’s aim was to envision ways to undo some of the damage inflicted half a century ago by the construction of Interstate 40.

The consensus among the stakeholders at the gatherings was that the Jefferson Street corridor today is, while steeped in history, disconnected and underused but full of potential to become a vibrant and walkable district. Key to achieving that vibrancy will be to protect current residents as development fills in the gaps now dotting the thoroughfare and to offer multiple transit options connecting key points. Among the ideas floated to achieve those goals were the adoption of an inclusionary mixed-income housing ordinance and the creation of an umbrella organization to pull together small business, housing and workforce efforts.

The planners channeled many of the ideas and visions of attendees into a series of sketches that include both tried-and-tested concepts such as narrowing Jefferson and either on-street parking or a buffer zone as well as audacious concepts for capping parts of I-40 where it cuts under Jefferson at 12th Avenue, just north of Fisk University’s campus east of D.B. Todd Boulevard and around 28th Avenue near Hadley Park.

On a smaller scale, the USDOT team and session attendees also brought to life a vision to fill gaps in the Jefferson streetscape with residential and commercial buildings. With a nod to Jefferson’s musical heritage, a performance hall might anchor this area of redevelopment and be accompanied by live-work artist housing nearby or even adjacent.

For more info on the USDOT’s Every Place Count initiative, visit www.transportation.gov/ opportunity/challenge. > Geert De Lombaerde

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Recreating Clifton

Under-the-radar North Nashville street poised for new form, function

by William Williams

Most Nashvillians are unfamiliar with Clifton Avenue.

Old-timers and those who enjoy exploring the city’s less-traveled areas know the street as home to the legendary Swett’s restaurant, the venerable Kimbro Oil Co. and the now-closed, yet still cherished, Amun Ra Theatre.

The street also sports small homes, buildings, various warehouses and light industry.

Most importantly, however, Clifton is a key east-west street within the primarily African-American district called McKissack Park.

Still, the North Nashville street — specifically its span from 20th Avenue west to Interstate 40 — has remained under the radar to developers.

Until recently.

A handful of real estate pros now envision Clifton and its side streets as a possible mixed-use district. Located north of Midtown, that land mass is bordered by Dr. D.B. Todd Boulevard on the east, I-40 on the west, Charlotte Avenue on the south and Herman Street on the north.

Nashville-based developer John H. Eldridge III — a visionary of sorts for his work in Wedgewood-Houston and Edgehill/12th Avenue South — is ahead of the curve in this respect.

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Within the general McKissack Park area, Eldridge owns upwards of 50 properties that could, via their zoning, accommodate about 300 residential units.

“Over the next 12 to 48 months, my group has plans that would commit up to $70 million for active development in our target area,” he says.

Eldridge, founder of E3 Construction Services, began amassing the properties a few years ago, anticipating the McKissack Park streets, and particularly Clifton, would nicely lend themselves to positive change.

“I envision not just more housing but also more restaurants, a grocery store, retail spaces and businesses,” he says. “I see an area full of the people and building diversity that makes Nashville so wonderful, with families filling the sidewalks much like with some of the other successful areas in town.”

With his robust land holdings and equally bountiful optimism, Eldridge has a jumpstart on other developers eyeing the area. For example, he is overseeing the adaptive reuse of former apartment building Titans Terrace at 2507 Clifton Ave. The 16-unit building will offer onebedroom efficiency condos of about 650 square feet and $250,000 each.

In addition, Eldridge has a property, located on the southwest corner of the intersection of 27th and Clifton, under contract with real estate investor Max Khazanov.

(The two men previously have completed various real estate transactions.) He is planning a 15-unit townhome development that would be, if standing today, the most high-end multi-unit residential project Clifton has seen to date.

“Our intention is to bring the same quality of homes we are building in 12South and Wedgewood-Houston to

1. The Del 17-townhome project 2. Planned project

By John Eldridge and Max Khazanov 3. Planned project Details forthcoming 4. Planned project Details forthcoming 5. Titans Terrace 16-unit apartments, at 2507 Clifton Ave.

by John Eldridge 6. Family and Children’s Services 2400 Clifton Ave.

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civicdesigncenter.org Sept. 16 Downtown Gulch Five Points Charlotte Germantown

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Become a member today and take part in Nashvilleʼs design and action.

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the Charlotte Avenue corridor,” says Eldridge, who has enlisted Nashvillebased rootARCH to design the townhomes. Each residence will offer a rooftop deck and a garage and will span in size from 1,300 square feet to 1,750 square feet. Such residential infill (if eventually priced at even $200 per foot, the smallest unit would list at $260,000) would have been unthinkable for Clifton, with its many modest homes, even a mere 12 months ago.

Other residential infill projects are eyed for Clifton, including at the southeast corner of 26th Avenue (details have not been disclosed) and at the southeast corner of 27th (owned by a group of investors that includes Tony Harris of Brentwood-based Avenue Construction).

A few blocks to the west and at the southeast corner of 31st and Delaware avenues, Harris and the same group of investors want to undertake The Del, a 17-townhome project.

Eldridge — who advocates offering a diversity of housing prices and exterior designs, while adding building density in the process — says the majority of the Clifton-area properties he owns are either empty lots or parcels with condemned houses.

“I wanted to find an area that we didn’t have to focus solely on [demolition],” he says. “If a property has an existing home that can be renovated and placed into our rental portfolio, then we certainly take that re-use seriously. Many of those homes have been rehabilitated and are now servicing a need for Nashville’s workforce housing, including some of my employees and their families.”

The proximity to Charlotte Avenue, one of Midtown’s key east-west streets, is part of Clifton’s appeal. The street runs somewhat parallel to, and a few blocks north of, Charlotte.

Relatedly, the segment of Charlotte spanning 20th on the east to the 28th/31st Avenues Connector on the west has seen major infill during the past few years. For example, Atlanta-based The Worthing Companies recently completed 279-unit apartment building 2700 Charlotte Ave. Nearby is Cambridge Holdings’ oneC1TY site, which will eventually offer multiple buildings with a mixture of retail and office space. Also on the Charlotte stretch are Metro’s Lentz Public Health Center, apartment building Aspire Midtown and office buildings 2300 Charlotte and The Sheds on Charlotte.

No doubt, Clifton is benefiting from Charlotte’s success and can piggyback on its positive perception. In fact, Eldridge considers Clifton “a bit of a hybrid” street in an area that is neither fully Midtown nor fully North Nashville.

“The area is ready to be defined with its own identity and hopefully we can be a part in helping it find that,” he says. “This is one of the reasons I have targeted it.”

Eldridge is not alone in focusing on Clifton and McKissack Park. The aforementioned Tony Harris says Clifton has the potential to be a “pedestrian-friendly street with a compliment of commercial, residential and some mixed-use smaller developments.”

“Initially, we did not see much activity for other developments in McKissack Park [other than The Del], but that has quickly changed,” Harris says. “So we are still evaluating the best use for 2611 Clifton based on other developments being announced along the street. We can see retail with a housing component as a good option.”

Harris stresses the importance of respecting the area and its longtime residents.

“I’ve talked to one of the other developers and asked, ‘What do you plan to do with your property in McKissack Park?’ And he said, ‘Where’s McKissack Park?’” Harris says.

“So the people in this pocket will define whether the area remains McKissack Park or becomes part of Midtown or the Charlotte Avenue corridor,” he continues. “There is certainly some history — [particularly seen] if you search the name Moses McKissack or Captain Merritt Pilcher — that could be lost. So I would like to see something similar

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to how the Chestnut Hill area [in South Nashville] was preserved with some additional street signage and appeal.”

Clifton has landed two key newcomers during the past few years: The Next Door, a nonprofit catering to women in life transitions, operates from a newish building located at the southeast corner of the T-intersection of 22nd and Charlotte; and Blackstone Brewing Co., a craft beer company housed in a warehouse within the 2300 block of the street.

A third is on the way, with an adaptive reuse of a warehouse located near the Blackstone site and to accommodate Family & Children’s Services. The nonprofit recently acquired the property for $2.7 million and will retrofit the facility for its headquarters.

Eldridge says Blackstone, with its recently opened taproom, is capable of creating a community destination of sorts.

“Any time you have a business [with such cachet] that is willing to commit to a transitioning area, it is huge,” Eldridge says. “These areas need social destinations that will appeal not only to the locals but that have the ability to draw visitors. I saw this when Austin Ray opened his second ML Rose on Charlotte (located about 1.5 miles to the west of Clifton).

That kind of a risk can really make a difference if successful. ML Rose stays packed. I personally know a group that drives down from Clarksville once a week just because that is their spot. Blackstone has the potential to be that kind of new destination on Clifton.”

Ron Mitchell, property standards chief with the Metro Codes Department, says Eldridge has gained the respect of Metro and the private sector, which should yield a “win-win for all” regarding the future of McKissack Park.

“The quality of work that can be expected is of particular interest , and the balancing act will be how affordable these new units will be,” Mitchell says. “Anytime you have that many properties under the development purview of someone who genuinely cares about the community, it can be of great benefit to all concerned.”

Eldridge says a combination of Metro officials, other developers/investors and banks will be needed if Clifton and its side streets are to reach full potential.

“I’ve invested so heavily in this area because I have so much faith in it,” he says. “We hope to sow the seeds and help it grow.”

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‘I’ve Invested so heavIly In thIs area because I have so much faIth In It.’ John H. Eldridge III

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Rendering of potential form and function of 12th Avenue South at Wedgewood Avenue

Split personality Mid-section of 12th Avenue evolves in quirky manner

by Linda Bryant

Many major Nashville streets offer multiple personalities of sorts.

But there is something different — even oddly charming, in fact — about 12th Avenue, which has emerged in a high-profile manner during the city’s post-2000 boom.

Everybody knows The Gulch on the street’s north point and the 12South commercial district on its south.

In contrast, the roughly 1.5-mile mid-section of 12th spanning the inner-interstate loop to the northern border of 12South remains a bit patchy, with some empty lots and bland buildings interacting with pockets of nice landscaping and attractive structures. Public housing is a major component, too. With that random form comes quirkiness — but also opportunity.

Many developers and real estate agents are keenly aware of 12th’s uptick. They expect residential and commercial projects along the aforementioned stretch to unfold significantly during the next two to five years. For example, Mainland Cos. is undertaking the 79-unit Acklen on 12th apartment building at the intersection from which its name derives.

“Right now, parts of the street feel a little desolate,” says Village Real Estate Services Realtor David Dorris. “But it’s going to become an extension of The Gulch.”

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Dorris should know. One of Nashville’s most active agents brokering urban properties, he is handling sales for Archer at 12th, 49 single-family row homes located about five blocks south of the 12th and Division Street intersection in The Gulch. The Evergreen Real Estate project (phase one was expected to have been completed by press time) sits only three blocks south of The Gulch.

The three-story rowhomes at Archer at 12th are priced at $549,000 to $649,000 — unthinkable dollar figures for the street a mere three years ago — and offer rooftop terraces with expansive views of both downtown Nashville and E.S. Rose Park. Sixteen of the 31 units under construction have sold without being advertised.

The park will be a “huge asset” not only to Archer at 12th but to future developments, Dorris says.

One could argue that the Archer at 12th prices are excessive given the project’s proximity to modestly priced homes and the Edgehill Homes public housing community.

Hunter Connelly doesn’t think so.

“We believe a high-quality residential development in this community can really thrive,” says Connelly, Evergreen principal and co-founder with Aaron White. “I’d hope that [the street and its side streets] stay diverse and include older homes and new construction.”

A five-minute drive along the approximately 1.5-mile stretch of 12th from The Gulch to Ashwood Avenue (at which point 12South starts) reveals a hodgepodge of buildings, few of them architecturally significant.

The Beaman Automotive Collision Center and United Methodist Communications properties anchor the corner of 12th and Hawkins Street. From there and headed south

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are modest mini-ranch homes, nondescript commercial buildings, CarterLawrence Elementary School, a library, three small apartment structures, some modernist buildings home to churches, the Midtown Hills Metro Police Precinct, Belmont University student housing and a fire station.

Importantly, the I.W. Gernert Homes mid-rise and Edgehill Homes — one of the city’s oldest and largest subsidized housing communities — sit in the middle of the stretch. Their residents, despite modest incomes, are close-knit, have an active neighborhood organization and will certainly want a voice in what type projects reinvent the area, especially regarding retail.

On this theme, the Metro Council has approved a $20 million, 138-unit workforce housing project on city-owned land located at the northeast corner of the intersection of 12th and Wedgewood avenues. The apartments will be rented only to people who satisfy certain annual income restrictions.

The combination of the new residential projects and the aging low-income housing gives this stretch of 12th a certain quirky and distinctive flavor. But a key element is lacking.

“The street would benefit from some mixed-use projects,” says Mark Deutschmann, president of Core Development and founder and principal of Village Real Estate Services. “I believe that neighborhood commercial zoning would be needed to extend the [12South] retail district [north] towards The Gulch. Otherwise you have dead zones, which does not benefit retail. To create an extended walkable district, it would help to have some [mixed-use building] continuity along the street.”

Deutschmann is widely seen as a linchpin in developing 12South, having once owned 11 commercial buildings in the now-bustling district. He sees the under-developed segment of 12th Avenue changing, but he’s not sure what direction that will take.

“Five years forward, I would imagine that The Gulch will extend [south] towards the Beaman lot, which should be developed with mixed-use highdensity buildings,” he says. “What happens depends upon how the city chooses to rezone.”

John H. Eldridge III, owner of E3 Construction Services, has also invested in the area. He is developing The Row at 12th S., a 17-unit townhome project located at 1420 12th Ave. S. and catty-corner from the police precinct.

“We don’t need or want [12th’s mid-section] to become an extension of The Gulch or 12South. It needs to find its own identity,” Eldridge says. “It’s likely to see a blend of commercial and residential [projects]. The corridor is [suitable] for mixed-use buildings.”

At $250 to $275 a square foot, The Row at 12th S. isn’t exactly affordable housing. But like Connelly and Deutschmann, Eldridge believes one of the strengths of the street is that it has the opportunity to offer residential price tag options.

“I don’t really see it as a $100-a-plate dinner kind of place,” Eldridge says.

Eldridge praises Mayor Megan Barry for the aforementioned workforce housing project.

“Mayor Barry has made a smart selection,” Eldridge says. “There’s certainly a big need for it.”

Eldridge predicts more infill for 12th’s underdeveloped side streets, especially South Street, Southside Place and Wade Avenue. These pockets are already seeing smaller residential projects.

“What you really need is walkable downtown access … extending from Wedgewood Avenue to The Gulch,” Eldridge says. “Residents will want interaction. They’ll want to get out and about.”

Village Real Estate’s Dorris says that as residential projects reach a critical mass, retail development will follow.

“In many ways, I think the redevelopment [of 12th] could happen fairly quickly,” he says. “It’s a continuous [stretch]. Compared to a place like East Nashville, which probably has 20 separate neighborhoods, [12th is] all in one place. Once you look at the street, you can start to envision a transformation.”

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Shifting Sidco A stretch of Sidco as seen from the top of Edgenet’s new offices

South Nashville street sees industrial buildings transition to creative spaces

by Linda Bryant

It’s a common narrative for a growing business. Start your company’s operations in an affordable area, even if it’s a bit sketchy. When you’ve grown beyond the startup phase and are stable, relocate to classier digs that suggest you’re moving up in the world.

Reverse that business blueprint and you’ve assumed the mindset of Steve Proctor.

In 2015, the Edgenet CEO moved the software-asa-service company from the buttoned-up and businesslike Maryland Farms in Brentwood to a 10,000-squarefoot former industrial space located on Sidco Drive in South Nashville.

“The move made all kinds of sense to me,” Proctor says. “Maryland Farms is the second-largest business park in the Southeast, and it’s a nice place. If you want to buy a Land Rover, you can do it right there in Maryland Farms. “[In contrast], Sidco is a little grittier and, therefore, more authentic,” Proctor adds. “Somehow, it fits our identity as a company more closely.”

Edgenet’s new home, Proctor points out, is no downgrade. Instead, it’s more like an image change and a statement to employees, particularly millennials.

Indeed, the Edgenet headquarters space has been designed with creative elements such as a meditation area, a yoga room, a floating staircase and a soon-to-becompleted rooftop deck at which a weekly songwriters’ night will be held.

“We want to be close to talent,” Proctor says. “A lot of our young employees live in the Berry Hill, Woodbine or Melrose areas. It’s very convenient for them. Even if you live in East Nashville or Germantown, commuting here is a good compromise. A lot of people, especially young people, just don’t want to commute to Brentwood or Cool Springs.”

Edgenet is not alone in its attraction to Sidco.

In recent years, a hodgepodge of businesses have taken space within the street’s warehouses and light industrial facilities, including walk-in furniture and design companies such as Merridian, Nadeau and Peacock Alley; Black Abbey Brewery, a micro-brewery with a taproom located in the former Southern Book Binding building; Wholly Chow restaurant; and C3 Consulting, a management consulting firm.

Underway is a conversion of a warehouse, to be called the Oak Barrel Building and to offer office and restaurant spaces.

C3 Consulting was an “early adopter” of the Sidco Drive scene, says CEO Beth Chase. The company moved from Maryland Farms to the Oaks Business Center on Sidco in 2011 and is completing a $2.2 million renovation in a nearby building. The new home will offer about double the office space C3 currently occupies and will continue the “chic industrial” workplace design the company created when it relocated to Sidco.

“We’re growing and did need to expand our space,” Chase says. “But we didn’t want to move out of the area.

Its development has been so interesting, and I believe it will continue to surprise us.”

Named for an acronym for Southern Industrial Development Co., Sidco Drive and its surrounding streets long were known for their light industrial vibe. These days, people struggle with an apt descriptor. It’s been called Nashville’s “Design District” by some, but that moniker doesn’t factor in the rise of companies such as Edgenet and C3.

“I would describe the neighborhood now as eclectic,” says Thomas Gibson, president of development company Oman-Gibson Associates, which operates from nearby Foster Creighton Drive. “There are a number of [distinctive] small businesses — medical sector tenants, home decor businesses and creative-class users.”

Proctor believes Sidco’s newer arrivals share two important characteristics: innovation and creativity.

“A lot of people want to crown the street as a tech hub, but it’s bigger than that,” he says. “It does have an industrial feel, but it’s also creative. A lot [of the comERIC ENGLAND

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panies] are just plain smart, too. I’d bet you that the number of people listening to NPR is very high here.

“C3 is a smart person’s company,” Proctor adds.

“Wholly Chow is just a smart restaurant. They have the most [innovative] menu. They saw the potential of the street.”

Gibson, who has watched Sidco Drive’s slow transformation for 30 years, thinks the street has yet to peak.

“When I moved to Nashville in 1986, Sidco was a desirable area for industrial tenants due to its centrality and access,” he says “There were pivotal events that became game changers from an historical perspective: the completion of the Armory Drive interchange and Vanderbilt University Medical Center relocating non-acute care functions to One Hundred Oaks. The neighborhood was always solid. But currently, demand exceeds supply. It is continuing to evolve.”

Robby Davis, vice president of the Nashville office of Cushman & Wakefield, agrees that VUMC’s leasing of 436,000 square feet of office space near Sidco started a domino effect of new businesses migrating to the street and the general area and converting previously industrial spaces to office or retail.

“I definitely think the conversion trend will continue,” he says. “It’s happening all over the country. Old warehouses and other industrial buildings in close proximity to the urban core are being converted to creative office space. In fact, there are currently two or three warehouses under contract on Sidco [with conversions

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planned]. Creative space in Nashville is hard to come by, as most of the buildings considered to be creative office are fully leased.”

Commercial broker Dwaine Anderson of The Anderson Co. believes warehouse conversions will continue throughout the market.

“Companies want easy access for their employees, and they want parking,” Anderson says. “Parking is the driving space for office space in Nashville, and Sidco has more of it.

“People who’ve been drawn to West End Avenue or 21st Avenue are now feeling drawn to Sidco Drive,” he adds.

As noted, the headache-free access to the interstate via Armory Drive is “phenomenal,” Proctor says.

“In Maryland Farms, if I got caught in traffic at the wrong time of day, I was late to meetings all the time. Now I can drive home in 12 minutes.”

As to Sidco’s near future, David W. Creed, partner and co-managing director with Stan Snipes of the Nashville office of Sperry Van Ness, foresees Sidco “being almost exclusively office and retail in five years with very little industrial uses remaining.”

Creed, Snipes and some unidentified investors plan to close in October on the acquisition of a Sidco warehouse and convert it.

“We expect to add around 150 to 200 people to Sidco with the Oak Barrel Building conversion,” Creed says, “which will help more restaurants and bars find the area attractive.”

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View of Midtown’s Hayes, Patterson and Church streets

Understated trio Midtown’s Hayes, Patterson and Church streets will see future change — but how much?

by Bill Lewis

People living on the coasts might consider the interior of the country to be “flyover territory” that they have little reason to visit.

Likewise, patrons, guests and residents of the restaurants, bars, apartments and hotels located along West End Avenue, Church Street and Charlotte Avenue in Midtown could be forgiven if they feel the same way about the side streets running parallel to those high-profile thoroughfares.

Hayes, State and Patterson streets have not landed many of Midtown’s large-scale developments like the Hutton Hotel at 1808 West End Ave. or Aspire Midtown at 2400 Charlotte Ave. Instead, those secondary streets — particularly their segments within four blocks between 17th and 21st avenues — have remained home to mostly small, owner-occupied businesses and medical offices in single-story or low-rise structures.

This understated physical nature yields both a reality and potential.

“It is easy to overlook the three streets even though they are very important to Midtown and are ripe for change,” says Stan Snipes, partner and managing director of commercial real estate company SVN | Nashville. “I’ve seen the streets change a lot in the past 18 years that I’ve been working the Midtown area. And I’ve always felt that they would be a logical location for infill development given their close proximity to the major Midtown corridors.”

Hayes runs between West End and Church Street, with State and Patterson situated between Church and Charlotte. Because of their locations, they serve as the backdoor for businesses with addresses on the aforementioned main streets.

Guests at the Hutton Hotel, for example, no doubt are

familiar with Hayes, but only because the hotel’s garage entrance is accessed via that street. Similarly, the adjacent parking lot for the Renasant Bank building at 1820 West End dominates the southeast side of Hayes Street’s intersection with 19th Avenue.

Perhaps unfortunately, design elements that enhance the streetscape of Midtown’s key streets can be detrimental to its side streets. The U.S. Post Office on Church, for example, was designed primarily with a New Urbanism approach. The building is positioned with no setback from the Church sidewalk. As a result, parking is to the side and behind the building, on State, creating a gap-toothed effect on State Street.

Developers have their eye on Hayes, State and Patterson streets, but the challenge and expense of assembling small, independently owned parcels could dampen their enthusiasm and slow the pace of change as Midtown evolves around them in the coming years.

“Smaller parcels make assemblage on these streets more difficult and expensive. Over time, this could/should change, but I wouldn’t think you’ll see much in this cycle,” says Henry Menge, managing director of XMi Commercial Real Estate. The company has several listings in the area.

“Larger parcels, like those owned by Corner Realty on State Street, are difficult to develop and somewhat expensive relative to development parcels that are better situated geographically,” he says.

Even with those challenges in mind, their location makes the three streets attractive to investors, says Charlotte Ford, senior vice president of Colliers International | Nashville. And high-profile development near the trio, in theory, increases the value of their parcels and buildings.

“Based upon the location — well situated between Charlotte Avenue and West End with close proximity to Vanderbilt, Saint Thomas and interstate access — this area is constantly being picked over for development opportunities,” she says.

The three are not without quirks. For example, Patterson and State both dead-end into Saint Thomas Midtown Hospital, which partially dominates the landscape.

At Hayes and 20th, Healthcare Realty Trust is building a ERIC ENGLAND

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907-space parking garage for Midtown Medical Plaza I and II. The garage is designed to include an enclosed pedestrian skywalk linking it to the third floor of the medical plaza building and to the hospital.

Saint Thomas’ presence at the west end of Hayes, State and Patterson does not isolate those streets, says Ford.

Indeed, the hospital’s presence has not impeded development on its west side. Developer Giarratana Nashville, for example, recently opened the Edge Midtown apartments at 2200 State St. Southern Land Co. quickly leased Elliston 23 when that high-end apartment and retail building opened in 2013 at 2300 Elliston Place.

“I do not think [Saint Thomas] isolates these streets at all,” Ford says. “Being located close to Saint Thomas is a positive for multiple uses. Some factors that may diminish interest from investors may be over-pricing and zoning restrictions.

“In 10 to 20 years, Midtown will look drastically different,” she adds. “It is an ideal urban infill area that benefits from being Nashville’s medical district while also being close to Vanderbilt, The Gulch and downtown.”

Over the years, Hayes, Patterson and State have developed their own personalities, and they will continue to evolve independently, says Menge.

Because Hayes is bracketed by West End and Church Street, commercial development on those streets could limit Hayes to being their “service access,” he says.

“Small restaurants and doctors’ offices will probably remain, but I would think their existence is threatened by larger development on either Church or West End using Hayes as a point of access for service and/or parking, more than anything else. Time will tell,” says Menge.

There are signs that Hayes could be more. The $16.6 million sale of the street’s GuestHouse Inn & Suites earlier this year is an encouraging sign of developer interest, he says.

Other noteworthy businesses addressing Hayes in some manner include Tennessee Donor Services, Hope Clinic for Women, Las Palmas Mexican Restaurant and the Residence Inn Nashville Vanderbilt/Midtown.

On the north side of Church Street, State and Patter-

son have their own development potential. Menge foresees limited conflict with commercial development along Charlotte Avenue, which is not as well developed, or attractive for infill, as West End. “You also have a wider range of use on those streets — medical, residential, general office and even industrial,” he says.

Uses on Patterson include the entrance to Alive Hospice, American Heart Association, a Saint Thomas Midtown garage and low-rise apartment buildings. The street dead-ends into the hospital campus before picking up again on the hospital’s west side and running past Centennial Medical Center to Centennial Park.

State Street may offer an early example of the type of changes on the way to this part of Midtown — and of the years-long time frame that could be necessary for those changes to occur.

The street is home to Olympus Midtown, a 170-unit apartment building at 1700 State St. that was developed

by Franklin-based Bristol Development Group in 2010.

The building, originally called Bell Midtown, was acquired five years later by Fort Worth, Texas-based Olympus Property for $27.4 million.

The Gardner School, a private, academically focused preschool, opened in 2011 at 1811 State St. Others with a presence on the street include Tennessee Maternal Fetal Medicine, whose address is 300 220th Ave. N., and State House Condominiums at 1808 State Street.

Change is coming. The question is, how long will it take?

“Cost is the major driver today,” Menge says. “Land values have spiked, as have construction costs. At some point, tenants-users will refuse to pay — or be unable to pay — the increased lease rates for all asset classes.”

“That time is coming and will spur a ‘flight to quality’ where main arteries such as West End, Church Street and Charlotte Avenue will be more attractive than secondary streets,” Menge adds. “However, given the increased density, population growth and attractiveness of urban locations, these areas should weather a downturn better than in the past.”

‘It is easy to overlook the three streets even though they are very important to Midtown and are ripe for change.’

Stan Snipes

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‘As a city, we have to have some backbone’ Mark Deutschmann on rebuilding Nashville’s corridors, his greenway vision and having more fun

Since he started working in real estate nearly three decades ago, Mark Deutschmann has broken new neighborhood ground, built Village Real Estate into an organization with more than 300 agents, launched Core Development and played a key role in initiatives that are changing the look, feel and use of our city. Deutschmann sat down recently with Post Editor Geert De Lombaerde to talk about his career, Nashville’s development and what’s next on both fronts. Here are some excerpts from that conversation.

I thought we could start with Wedgewood-Houston and then work our way back. Take us back to the beginning of when you had the idea to get to work there.

When did the light bulb come on to make you think there was something there to explore?

I was finishing up with the last sales at Werthan Lofts.

That had turned into the 10-year project. We took it off in chunks and the last phase of 98 units, we were in the process of selling it out. We were looking for the next big thing and my CFO actually is an artist on the side.

He builds sculptures and he had a place down in Wedgewood-Houston. There was already a nice artistic and maker community so there was sort of a seed of some goodness. Couple that with some very underutilized industrial property and we felt like it was a neighborhood that could be embraced.

Did it remind you of your work in 12South or of Werthan? Was it something where you said, “I’ve seen this before, and I think I know how this is going to work?”

There’s always some of that. You definitely learn from your experiences. I sort of started looking at my work in terms of the one-mile radius. What’s happening in a onemile radius? If I start to get involved in this, what are the assets available? Who’s here already? What can we build upon? What are some major things that we can do to move things along? What are the profit interests that are

there? What are the greenways, the natural resources?

And so this is when you can size it up and go about one mile to the Music City Center and you have access to the park [Fort Negley] because there’s going to be something happening there. You have artists, makers, a community that they want to develop so they’re welcoming in this way.

And I guess at that moment in time, the land was very readily available, looking at price. So it was something which would allow us to do what we’d like to do — not the ones and twos and single builds or the 20-story high rises. We can do something that’s sort of small and nimble and, hopefully, help create a neighborhood.

You’ve long been active in neighborhoods close to Nashville’s core. How did you come to it?

I have Village Real Estate, started that in 1996. But even previous to that, I had sold real estate. I had worked with a company called Renaissance, a real estate company located on Woodland Street. And they divvied up the city by geographic zones. And I had purchased a house over off 12th South, on Caruthers Avenue, and I wanted that zone. Somebody had that zone but there was available the area between Belmont and West End. So I took that and my first thing that I got involved with was Hillsboro Village, which was then still somewhat vacant and had faltered. I started thinking in terms of, “I sell real estate within a one-mile radius of Hillsboro Village.” When people asked me what I did, that’s what I told them. I started thinking, “If I can help energize a commercial district, it’s going to be a little jewel. And people will want to move back to the houses, and it will help my sales career.” I helped organize the first home tour with Jane Cleveland of Vanderbilt University. We got together and had a home tour and Halloween party — that’s way back in the late ‘80s, early ‘90s.

Then, since I had moved to 12South, I asked for and received that as part of my sales territory. I started studying that and, by the mid ‘90s, I realized that energizing a commercial district was going to be critical to the continued renovation of houses. So I started a partnership with Joel Solomon and we bought up 11 properties on 12th Avenue South for between $40,000 and $150,000, which seemed like a great deal at the time. But people thought we were sort of crazy, too.

We weren’t trying to keep the buildings. We were trying to attract merchants. We could buy buildings for $80,000 and sell them for $80,001 just so somebody was going to use it.

continued on page 44

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In a lot of ways, though, it’s become the model. When you look at the districts that are trying to get re-energized now, people kind of look at 12South and say, “Okay, we’re going to do that.”

Yeah, it was great because it was a skinnier street. So you could do traffic [control] measures. People were concerned about safety, bad sidewalks and lighting, so we slowed the traffic down so people would stop. We did one section of the street just to showcase what we could do. Later on, we got the street finished and put in place lighting standards and the whole thing to make it what it is now. It seems like an instant success 20 years later.

‘I really think it’s easier for people to digest development of the corridors.

It’s easier than having something pop up next door in the back yard.’

You worked with Bill Purcell on the 12South improvements and you’ve had the chance to work along the way with everybody from Phil Bredesen to Megan Barry today. There has been a real continuity in terms of public investment in neighborhoods. How much has that played a role in what you have been able to do?

There are probably different stages of my career with each of them. Bredesen put together the system for greenways.

And now, how many years later, I’m the president of Greenways for Nashville. We have laid down 215 miles of paved premium park trails and we’re about to have a trailoriented-development discussion with the Urban Land Institute. You have the riverfront parks in place.

Purcell did a lot of work with sidewalks and improvements so that the neighborhood commercial districts could improve, so they could come back and see more retrofits of housing. And then, Dean came in and set the course for four major park systems. I’ve been able to help out with that. We also did all the riverfront parks during his term, which arguably is one of the best things that’s ever happened for us — and also for our Music City Center guests coming in and our tours. People see the city through a different light with all that done.

And now you have Megan Barry. She’s just laid down some money for The Fairgrounds and she’s doubling down on being the greenest city in the Southeast.

And it all plays a key role in the development of our economy.

Well, going back to greenways: How important is walkability becoming? How much more is a house or development valued if it’s next to something? And that could be a neighborhood commercial district or greenways and parks. All those things become more important in people’s housing choices. So we’ve laid down enough of it, and it keeps coming.

Lay out, if you would, the vision for completing a circle of greenways. You’re building on what’s already there on the north side.

There are two pieces of it. One, you have an interstate that got laid in starting in the ‘70s. There was supposed to have been a greenway as part of that system. It got value engineered out or possibly some people decided that having a greenway in their backyard wasn’t something that was going to be attractive. Now everybody’s come together and realized that you have a lot of TDOT easements and TDOT favors getting those to Metro and letting us use them for a greenway system and even some parks.

We have an interstate that connects Nolensville Road to Franklin Road to Belmont to 21st and West End. Why not use it to connect people to corridors and connect people to work and connect the parks that exist from Sevier Park to Centennial Park? And then if you look at it as a piece of a bigger loop, you’ve already got the 28th-31st connector, you can connect to Hadley Park and then back to the Ted Rhodes trailhead. Then you can get back downtown, come through the city and go through Rolling Mill Hill, where we already have the greenway. From there, you can link up with Brown’s Creek, take Brown’s Creek back to 440, and you can get all the way around the city.

This project should create opportunity for lots of the populations that should be benefitting from the economic lift that’s happening right now. Chestnut Hill, that whole area between basically Franklin Road through to Nolensville is underserved as far as greenways and access to park systems. It’s the same thing if you go north up towards TSU; you have opportunity to create more connections for those communities. I think that’s an important piece of this big loop. We’re not very good yet with our feet and our bikes in the city. But we can learn.

And with the easements already there, there’s potential to build clusters of communities that link to existing amenities and existing communities. That might be the fastest way to get to an affordable housing solution.

Well, NashvilleNext is promoting the identification of corridors, which makes a lot of sense. You also have a pushback starting in Green Hills and East Nashville about development in those neighborhoods. Well, then you have to allow development of the corridors and you should aggressively pursue it.

You can look at a corridor and say this is an opportunity to create the housing next to the transportation, and also you can add density and put TIF districts along the corridors. Then you can pretty much count on some affordable housing when the developers get in to make their developments.

If you do that coupled with a trail, you have double.

You have corridor transportation and then you have another viable asset nearby. And if you upzone, it’s a great opportunity to create and to protect the wetlands and have tech corridors, to create soccer fields and different kinds of things for the residents with the big park system.

It’s just a great opportunity.

Where do you think the pulse of the city is these days in terms of that push for redevelopment? Many people say, “Yes, we want to invest in this corridor and that neighborhood.” But there also is the opposite thought that says, “I don’t recognize my city anymore.” What’s your feel for where that pendulum is?

There are always going to be people who say, “Slow down, we don’t want to change.” But I don’t know that we can.

We could control it. We can shut everything down and put a moratorium on building and just not receive anybody else. But I don’t think we’re doing that.

And did I not see a $6 billion transit announcement the other day? That’s what we’re thinking about doing. We have to create bigger solutions for what’s happening becontinued on page 46

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fore it gets ahead of us. I really think it’s easier for people to digest development of the corridors. It’s easier than having something pop up next door in the back yard.

There’s a place where, as a city, we have to have some backbone. You can’t just block the development on corridors just because neighbors didn’t want it. That is the place where you have to say “yes” and say the NashvilleNext process determined that’s where we’re going to put it and that’s the right place to put it.

It’s called transit-oriented development. It’s called trailoriented development. It’s called walkability. And it’s going to be the more efficient way for humans to live.

On the flip side, I’ve been working through the Village Fund and Hands On Nashville, putting a lot of money into their home energy savings program. We’ve retrofitted maybe 200 houses in the Wedgewood-Houston neighborhood for energy savings, to make sure that the roofs weren’t leaking, that the plumbing was okay. That was so people could stay in their houses, allowing the housing that exists right now to remain and making it maybe a little more valuable so that they don’t just go down.

Right, to keep a healthy mix.

That’s going to be one of our best housing solutions. Keep what you’ve already got if you can. If you can allow seniors to age in place and stay connected to their communities, you can create multigenerational housing opportunities so that maybe three generations are living in that house and people can come back. As we have the affordable housing conversation, you can look at doing that all around the city.

It sort of slows the gentrification process and allows us to continue to have a better community. And the city could — when you think of the Barnes Fund and stuff like that — put money there. It’s going to be a lot cheaper to do that. You can come in for $1,200 and reduce the energy flow in a house 25 percent. You can come in with another chunk of money and you can fix things and just keeps it all in place.

That does bring up the bigger issue of affordability. Advocates for existing neighborhoods say that every time a new development comes in — whether it’s 20 homes or 200 apartment units — there’s going to be some displacement. It’s almost inevitable. What can the development community do differently to be more mindful of that dynamic?

Again, I think corridor development’s a good thing. The Urban Land Institute just did a healthy corridor study and we used Charlotte as an example. There’s lots happening on Charlotte, but if you drive up and down it, it’s still pretty ugly and most of our corridors are pretty ugly.

Poor zoning practices, poor codes, not enough density, ad signage everywhere, too difficult to cross, dangerous, no sidewalks, no pedestrians, no biking.

We abandoned our cities, went to the suburbs and created ugly corridors to get us there. Now we need to recreate our corridors with walkability and bikeability access in mind and have them be continuous. You have to have neighborhood commercial at the base so you don’t create a gap. Create something so that it’s interesting for people to get from point A to B and don’t allow developers to come in and create dead zones with big walls.

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I go to Vancouver all the time; my friend’s the mayor of the city. It’s his third term and they’re having all the issues that we have, and more. Their affordable housing crises is serious, but when they think of transportation, they think of corridors. They think of transportation and zoning in the same breath. You can’t have transportation without the zoning. Cambie Street there goes out towards the airport from downtown. They basically rezoned the whole of Cambie Street because they were going to put in a major transportation system. They upzoned, created the heavy density on the road and buffers and density just outside it and then back into the neighborhoods. It was not necessarily popular, but now you’re watching everything happen, and it’s going up and intensifying and there are criteria for affordable housing within the whole thing. It took some political will to get that done but it’s the way they created walkability — and all the things we need as a city — with transportation. is there enough collective political will here in town to make real progress on transit?

I suppose we have the regional transit group that’s working together and hopefully everybody’s on board. But I don’t really know the answer to that question. This mayor is strong and can align with all the people that need to align because it’s her number one issue, really.

Are you having fun these days versus trying to make money? Is that a fair characterization of you in your career now?

It’s gotten really fun now. It gets more fun all the time.

I already have sort of a network of all the different kinds of pieces in place. For instance, we just bought two properties right at the Fairgrounds. Who’s the councilperson?

Colby Sledge. OK, I’ve worked with Colby in the past. The Civic Design Center has done the study, the Urban Land Institute is interested in helping us think through the development, Greenways For Nashville has the best interest in getting this section of greenway done.

You’re making it sound really easy.

Well, it is easier because you put in all the time to get involved in all these organizations. I have the Village Fund, which has gotten more robust, so I can come in and seed nonprofits I’d like to see do the other work that I can’t do.

So that’s another piece of it. Five percent of the company and of Core goes into the Village Fund and just keeps popping out a little here and a little there. You can just keep feeding these organizations that are doing that important work. You need to enrich the arts, environmental issues, housing, affordable housing, senior housing and all the things that you would think needed taken care of to have a good city.

So yeah, you have more fun. And also my wife, Sherry, is doing her thing with LetterLogic. Since we’ve been together, we both have grown up, grown up our organizations and grown up our impact in community. She’s really into fair wages and putting her employees first. She’s a sought-after speaker and just dynamic in that way. And we do like to just talk about those things. We come in and we get excited about what we did today with our businesses.

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Werthan’s ‘fairly reluctant’ developer

A decade ago, few projects opened Nashvillians’ eyes to the concept of urban loft living the way Werthan Lofts did. Here, Mark Deutschmann runs through the process that led him from marketing Row 8.9n across from the Farmers Market to redeveloping the massive former factory.

In the early 2000s, we had started thinking about our multi-residential sales strategy at Village. We didn’t really have any multifamily residential in the city. We had a zoning code downtown that really didn’t allow for the creation of all that.

The first project that we got to list after we had that strategy was 8.9. We didn’t have that many agents back then but we sold so many of them in-house and people were attracted to it.

Then couple that with the beginnings of the charrettes for the Plan of Nashville. They were holding charrettes around the city and talking about what each neighborhood might become. I went to one on Eighth Avenue and all the

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neighbors had their maps out. It was an interesting mix; you had neighbors from Hope Gardens and Buena Vista and Germantown.

They were circling the assets and at one of the tables, someone said, “Artist block.” And I thought, “Okay, we just sold 8.9, so maybe there really is time to get some true lofts in Nashville. Everybody has been asking about it for 15 years, but nobody built anything.”

Then you had people from Jefferson Street saying, “We don’t want to be known as the crime district. We’re interested in some mixed-income housing. We want some investment in our neighborhood.” And Werthan was just sitting there as a big, vacant 400,000-square-foot building. Even then, everybody thought it should be lofts. It’s now 342 residential lofts and it’s a cool place.

I was fairly reluctant. I was a reluctant developer because I had my sales thing going and I didn’t know anything about the building trades. But I felt like somebody had to do it and it was a weird combination of relationships with politicians and relationships with MDHA and the Metro Council. And it was like, “Who is going to do this?”

I just had to do it. The first phase was a 23-unit phase.

The second phase was about 25 units, the third phase 36 units. The fourth phase was 120 units and we were fortunate enough to get it closed in March of 2008. We finished the project and we got about 78 closed before the recession really hit. > Geert De Lombaerde

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DESIGN

Civic duty

Gary Gaston moves design center forward in step with changing Nashville Gary Gaston is executive director of the Nashville Civic Design Center, an independent nonprofit that works with both the public and private sectors regarding the city’s built form and function.

With the center having released Shaping the Healthy Community: The Nashville Plan earlier this year, Post Managing Editor William Williams caught up with Gaston to gauge his thoughts on various topics NCDC turned 15 in 2015. What does that signify?

It is a milestone, considering the lifecycle of nonprofits, and especially some design centers that are no longer in operation or have been absorbed by a local municipality.

The Plan of Nashville set the tone for many of our accomplishments over the past 15 years; the Ten Principles outlined in The Plan guide our work and projects every day.

It was certainly our biggest endeavor in the early years, and was successful from both a process and a product standpoint.

The Plan of Nashville signified a transformative shift in the city’s planning ideology to a citizen engagement and participatorybased model, which has greatly benefited the city. The Plan’s focus on redeveloping the Cumberland riverfront has had the most imDANIEL MEIGS

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pact as a project. Imagine our riverfront 10 years ago and compare today.

One of the proposed outcomes when The Plan was released was to create an educational initiative to teach high school students about urban design and civic engagement. That didn’t happen at the time. Now, thanks to a grant from the James Stephen Turner Family Foundation, I’m thrilled we are moving forward to develop this curriculum.

Relatedly, what will be some of the major NCDC initiatives for the next 15 years?

We are already engaged in critical community issues outlined in Shaping the Healthy Community: The Nashville Plan.

In addition to promoting pedestrian walkability, mass transit, housing affordability, and better infrastructure, our big focus is on public space improvements. Our TURBO (tactical urbanism organizers) group is making great strides in this area.

And the next big idea is creating new park spaces over the interstate, a concept we heard from citizens that participated in The Plan of Nashville and an idea explored further in Shaping.

Major segments of Nashville lacks building density, mass transit and consistently attractive urban streetscapes. Thoughts?

Planning and design is a slow but steady process. Efforts over the past 15 years have focused on building infrastructure to resolve the issues you raise. Our city leadership has made this its priority over the past couple mayoral administrations, with Mayor [Megan] Barry strongly continuing that legacy. The ambitious vision for mass transit and affordable housing is inspiring to me.

And our Shaping book will serve as NCDC’s guiding plan moving forward over the next decade, through its focus on improving the built environment and public health across Davidson County.

Many mid-sized cities don’t have a design center. Why does Nashville need one?

Look around us. Nashville is the result now of the planning and design that started 15 to 20 years ago. We aren’t considered the “It City” just because we randomly stumbled into that title. Design innovation is a critical part of the success.

Still, government-related moves can baffle. Why, for example, did Metro approve the nasty stucco exterior design for the Hyatt Place hotel in SoBro? Why did the Tennessee Department of Transportation, after doing a strong job overall with the bridge work on the west side of the inner-interstate loop last year, add cheap chainlink fencing? Why is there no left turn lane for motorists heading west on Korean Veterans Boulevard? Cost considerations are a factor, true. But …?

Of course finances drive many projects. Our goal is to present an ideal vision, and we realize that the reality will

hopefully settle into a realistic medium — significantly better than if the vision had never existed. I would also say that our doors are open to anyone who wants to come in and discuss how to improve the design and livability of a project, and the opportunities and challenges those imply.

Hypothetically, let’s say Gary Gaston lives in Buffalo and is considering moving to either Austin or Nashville. Your choice?

I would choose Nashville because of its central geographic location; its rolling green hills, lakes and rivers; its friendly, diverse and welcoming people; its innovative, entrepreneurial spirit and robust economy; and, even though there is tremendous growth, its comfortable feel.

And ultimately I like hot chicken better than brisket.

I’m due for another visit to Austin soon. But, hypothetically, I would choose to live there because the community has a head start on Nashville regarding mass transit.

What is the NCDC’s arrangement today with both the University of Tennessee and Vanderbilt University? And how has that relationship changed?

The UTK College of Architecture and Design and Vanderbilt have been critical partners since NCDC’s founding.

I serve as a faculty member of UTK CAD, and have close partnerships with UT professor TK Davis.

During the fall, spring and summer semesters, we focus his student work here in Nashville. It is invaluable as a laboratory for testing innovative design ideas on real-life sites and programs. Sometimes they come to fruition several years later. First Tennessee Park is a prime example.

Hopefully, we will see a riverfront boathouse and the realization of the Neuhoff vision in coming years.

Our partnership with Vanderbilt has yielded our main source of interns throughout the years. We are working with VU Peabody College faculty on our education curriculum, which is very exciting considering Peabody’s high ranking nationally.

Many of our employees have strong connections to both institutions.

What will Metro’s role be, related to the center, the next 15 years?

[NCDC’s nonprofit status] is critical to our success. NCDC did receive Metro funding at our formation in 2000 with the [Bill] Purcell administration, continuing in Karl Dean’s later years, and in the current budget year.

We meet with Mayor Barry and key Metro officials occasionally to talk about our programs and projects and various challenges the city faces and how we can assist. We are fortunate that our close partnerships with Metro, UT CAD and Vanderbilt [differentiate us] from other design centers nationwide because we can remain independent to work with public- and private-sector entities.

The reputation and recognition of the organization is expanding through increased partnerships and collaborations.

And in that way, we can continue to play our part in making Nashville an even better city.

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The Sky is the Limit

High-rise development professional Tony Giarratana sees Nashville as primed for tall buildings Tony Giarratana oversees Giarratana Nashville, a boutique development company known most commonly for its mixeduse high-rise buildings, including The Cumberland, Encore and Viridian. His downtown-based company has two major skyscraper projects — The SoBro and 505 — underway.

One of the elder statesmen of the local development community, Giarratana recently sat down with Post Managing Editor William Williams to discuss the city’s fast-changing manmade landscape.

What is the single-most exciting thing about Nashville’s current urban building boom?

We had few downtown residential options in the early 1990s.

There are currently about 8,100 residents living downtown and that number is expected to rise to 12,000 upon completion of buildings under construction. This expanding population will allow downtown Nashville to once again support retail — such as the recently announced Whole Foods on Broadway (to be undertaken by Austin-based Endeavor Real Estate Group) — making downtown Nashville an even more exciting place to live, work and play.

Compared to when Giarratana Nashville developed Viridian and Encore in the mid-2000s, how much more difficult (or less difficult) is it now to undertake the development of large-scale buildings in Nashville?

Developing large-scale buildings is less difficult today. There were no “sale comps” before Viridian and Encore to confirm that high-rise condos would be successful, which made entitlements challenging and financing hard to secure. Nashville’s political leadership and the general community now understand the contribution downtown residential makes to a healthy urban core. The Metro Planning and Codes departments are also better equipped to guide and review new developments.

What individual work task keeps you the most busy?

Schedule and budget are naturally priorities for our entire team. But I also get to spend time working on the sale, leasing and marketing of our developments. This is certainly true with 505 (pictured), which we will be unveiling in a particularly exciting and unique way in early September.

Once finished, your 345-foot-tall The SoBro will be the third-tallest Nashville building to offer curvature with its exterior form, trailing only the 400-foot-tall Nashville courtesy GIARRATANA nashville

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City Center and, on a very modest “curvature scale,” the 385-foot-tall Renaissance Nashville Hotel.

I’ve noticed during my recent travels to various U.S. cities that buildings with curves are becoming more commonplace. Two recent additions locally — Adelicia and Thompson Nashville Hotel — are very tastefully done.

What is your take on the use of curves in the exterior designs of tall buildings?

The SoBro’s serpentine shape was influenced by its irregular site. In addition to being architecturally appealing, the curves enhance The SoBro’s dramatic river and skyline views and create unique unit layouts.

Wind tunnel testing is being used to design dramatic curved façades on tall buildings to help reduce wind loading. The 121-story Shanghai Tower is a spectacular example of this. While anything can be overdone, curved facades will continue to be used in the design and engineering of tall buildings.

‘I never tire of looking at the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building and Rockefeller Center.’

Tony Giarratana

Giarratana has developed The Cumberland, Viridian and Encore, each more than 250 feet tall. It has two more — SoBro and 505 — under construction that will be about 345 feet tall and 525 feet tall, respectively. In addition, you recently completed The Dallas, Edge Midtown and 1818 Church and have done other local developments of major note (Belle Meade Town Center, for example). In short, no other Nashville-based development company has done this level of large-scale mixed-use (residential/ commercial) urban development. Your thoughts?

You are very kind, but I just love tall buildings. The company initially was drawn to complex urban projects because no one else was doing them here, particularly vertically integrated mixed-use buildings. They are challenging, but we’ve learned a lot — sometimes the hard way — and they have become our preferred building type. We would certainly like to develop more.

You are a fan of Chicago skyscrapers. Why? “Chicago School” architects have designed a wide variety of outstanding 19th- and 20th-century buildings that remain significant today, ranging from neo-gothic to contemporary. Chicago understands the importance of great architecture and, with many of the world’s leading design and engineering firms based there, it will continue to be an important center for cutting-edge design and technology.

What is your favorite city, national or international, for tall buildings?

New York City. I never tire of looking at the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building and Rockefeller Center. I recently toured CIM’s 432 Park, which, at 1,396 feet, is the second-tallest in New York City, the third-tallest in the U.S. and the tallest residential building in the world. It’s stunning and we are using the Italian-made Aran cabinets we saw there in select 505 units.

During the past few years, you have partnered on various projects with Chicago-based entities. How did those relationships evolve?

My connection to the city began in 1981 when I joined Chicago-based Urban Investment and Development in Denver.

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It expanded in 1987 when I met Bill Wardrop, then managing director of LaSalle Partners – the predecessor company to Jones Lang LaSalle. Bill and I developed The Cumberland together, with Bill arranging equity from a leading Chicago family. We have since worked on numerous parking, office and multifamily ventures. In fact, Bill is a partner with me in The SoBro. In addition to Bill and JLL, I have had the pleasure of partnering with some of Chicago’s most respected families and many of Chicago’s top design, development, engineering and construction firms On the Chicago theme, what do your friends and contacts in that city say about Nashville’s emerging built fabric — both the positives and the challenges/shortcomings?

What’s not to like? Nashville’s hot. The buildings being developed today are better designed and of higher quality than earlier-generation buildings. But my out-of-town partners are often puzzled by Nashville’s apparent aversion to density and tall buildings. Recent approval of tall buildings in SoBro and The Gulch may be signaling that things are changing, but small-scale projects continue to be advocated for development on prime sites that deserve far more.

Is there a local tall building — either under construction or recently completed — that you did not develop and that you find noteworthy and/or stellar?

I’ve long felt the L&C Tower was the most significant building developed in downtown Nashville. Twice as tall as any existing building when built in 1957, it has a visually pleasing aspect ratio. Moreover, it signaled that Nashville was a leader within the emerging Southeast.

Of recent buildings that we didn’t develop, I am particularly impressed by Music City Center. While enormous and monumental, TVS (the architect) did an amazing job maintaining a human scale.

Giarratana Nashville is home to a small, close-knit team.

What can you say about the model, the philosophy and your colleagues?

Giarratana LLC is a small private development company by choice. We are selective of the projects we work on, and our core team thrives on wearing multiple hats to get them done. It’s a tough business and things can get tense, but we share a mutual respect and contribute our collective skills to develop the best possible buildings. Our small size allows us to be nimble but, together with “best in class” partners, we can tackle even the largest projects.”

You referenced this earlier. Nashville can’t seem to break the 650-foot-tall building barrier. Will we see construction start by, say, 2020 on a local building — not yet announced, of course — of at least 700 feet? Or is Nashville simply not the type city suitable for such height?

It took us nearly seven years to secure Federal Aviation Administration approval for a building over 400 feet on the former Cain-Sloan site. Now that aircraft no longer fly over downtown, FAA approval should be easier to secure going forward. Nashville is long overdue for taller buildings. At 45 floors, 505 is a step in the right direction. We would love to be the company that builds taller, but we will applaud another company that does.

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A Rockin’ Grill

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From Nashville to ashlaNd City Could county’s northwest quadrant use rail to spur growth, improve connectivity?

by J.R. LIND

601 12TH AVENUE S THE GULCH 615.248.2888

The 25-mile stretch of highway between Ashland City and Nashville is one of the last truly bucolic routes connecting the state’s capital to its smaller sister cities.

Indeed, until the aforementioned Ashland City Highway butts heads with Clarksville Highway in North Nashville, the meandering road is light on traffic; its commute, relatively stress free.

With its rural vibe, this segment of Davidson County — located north of the river and west of downtown — has been able to fight off unwanted growth, thus keeping traffic levels down. But as the suburbs and outlying areas on all other sides of the county choke with suburban sprawl, it is only a matter of time before people start looking down State Route 12.

According to Metropolitan Planning Organization studies, in the next quarter-century, commutes from the northwest could climb to an average of two hours.

Ashland City, Cheatham County’s seat, is grow-

ing quickly. Between 1990 and 2010, the population shot up 178 percent, according to the U.S. Bureau of the Census. That said, it is still one of Nashville’s smallest suburbs, with roughly 5,000 residents.

More growth is coming and civic leaders know it, having adopted long-range land-use plans and, importantly, commissioning several transit studies.

The Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce Moving Forward report included a recommendation born of that study: a 45-mile commuter rail line using old Tennessee Central rights-of-way now controlled by the Nashville & Western Railroad.

The commuter train would run from Clarksville in Montgomery County — commutes from the Queen City to Nashville along Interstate 24 are already lengthy — and then into Ashland City and, from there, to various stops in North Nashville, ending at either the Nashville Farmers’ Market on Rosa Parks Boulevard or in The Gulch.

Of all the spokes on the Nashville wheel, the one within the county’s northwest quadrant would allow commuter rail that could offer the most manageable options with the fewest challenges.

Because the track is controlled by the short-line Nashville & Western, passenger rail would not have to compete with the heavy freight traffic handled by rail giant CSX (as it would if it ran south, southeast and northeast of town). Nashville & Western is, in fact, owned by the Nashville & Eastern railroad. Of note, Nashville & Eastern rails are used for the Music City Star commuter line that serves Mt. Juliet and

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In fact, the stretch of line between Ashland City and Clarksville, now part of the rails-to-trails program, is abandoned, having been turned into a popular riverside greenway.

The Northwest Corridor Study spearheaded by WSP | Parsons Brinckerhoff in conjunction with the Regional Transit Authority found that ensuring the greenway would remain ranks among the tougher challenges of getting the rail line in place. And if that is a daunting task, what about finding the $525 million to fund the project?

Cost, as always, is a sticking point, particularly given the early struggles of the Music City Star.

Though its ridership steadily has increased over its lifespan, it still has yet to hit its target of 1,500 daily average riders. The northwest line, according to the study, could draw as many as 3,000 a day, with nine or 10 daily trips between Clarksville and Nashville.

Footing the bill would almost certainly be a multilevel partnership between the federal, state and various local governments along the line (outside of Metro, Ashland City and Clarksville are the only incorporated cities on the proposed line, so Cheatham and Montgomery counties would also need to be involved). But according to the Parsons Brinckerhoff study, rail — pricey though it may be — would nonetheless be the most cost-effective choice. True, a bus rapid transit service would cost “only” $300 million.

However, the commute would be three times as long

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and would draw only 1,000 daily riders.

As to rail, such a project could spark a wave of smart development. Transit-oriented development is one of the more popular trends in contemporary place-making circles, and Middle Tennessee got its first taste at the terminus of the Music City Star in Lebanon with Hamilton Springs.

The first phase of that two-decades-old project opened with a luxury apartment development three years ago. Ultimately, as with all TODs, it will be a mixed-use development with single-family homes as well as apartments, along with retail, all designed to encourage transit use and draw residents inclined to use transit, which typically means the young, essential to the future of exurbs like Lebanon and Ashland City, which are increasingly faced with a grayer population.

In a way, The Gulch is already a TOD, just without the “T.” Certainly a project in Ashland City is not going to match the scale or scope of the highrise-oriented Gulch. But imagine a smaller-scale development aimed at young families drawn to the convenience and amenities of a city, but also looking to minimize vehicle usage while enjoying a pastoral atmosphere unavailable in a city.

The Parsons Brinckerhoff study said the northwest is a prime corridor for TODs because of the availability of land and the need to have more stops.

If those TODs pay off and if the northwest train hits the rider numbers predicted, that $525 million tag won’t seem so high.

Likewise, Ashland City won’t seem so far away.

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The transit-oriented Paseo Verde project in Philadelphia

Development driven by transit Nashville could look to Philly project for cues regarding TOD

by Bill Lewis

As the Metro Council considers how to address the growing shortfall of workforce housing, a successful project in Philadelphia might show the way forward.

And that is good news to Nashville’s teachers, firefighters, police officers, nurses and restaurant and hotel employees.

The project, Paseo Verde, also serves as an example of how Nashville might create economic opportunity and address its worsening traffic congestion by encouraging mixed-income development beyond the urban core and along the city’s main corridors where mass transit is available.

Located near Temple University on a 1.9-acre former brownfield site in the economically struggling Philly neighborhood of Lower North Philadelphia, Paseo Verde is a transit-oriented mixed-income housing development with 120 affordable and workforce rental units serviced by the busiest regional rail stop outside the center of the city.

A similar development in Nashville would be “good for the economy, good for economic diversity and good for the environment,” says Floyd Shechter, president of locally based commercial real estate firm SmartSpace.

Shechter suggests Donelson Plaza for what would be Nashville’s first suburban mixed-income, transit-oriented development. Of note, an unidentified company with a Nashville presence is acquiring the mid-century-developed shopping center. Though the company has not disclosed its plans to redevelop the property, Shechter offers some suggestions.

“It’s an opportunity for all Nashvillians to live side by side, encourage development along the corridors and encourage mass transit. It checks all the boxes,” he says.

Shechter says Donelson Plaza has something no other property can match: a location along the route of the Music City Star, the commuter train that travels between Lebanon and downtown. The shopping center is also on a Metropolitan Transit Authority bus route.

Donelson Plaza is being considered as a possible site for a new public library branch. The city’s budget includes $6 million for that project, says Metro Councilman Jeff Syracuse, in whose District 15 Donelson sits.

If the shopping center’s new owners choose to pursue Shechter’s idea, they will have Syracuse’s backing.

“I would absolutely support a development like Paseo Verde in Donelson, transforming a post-World War II shopping center into a transit-oriented, walkable town center,” says Syracuse. “Development around the plaza — especially transit-oriented — would be a sustainable, solid investment.”

Paseo Verde became the first project in the country to achieve U.S. Green Building Council LEED (leadership in energy and environmental design) platinum status related to its “neighborhood development” standards.

The 206,000-square-foot building was constructed with energy-efficient materials and features a green roof, solar jeffrey totaro

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panels and locally sourced materials.

“People have the perception that affordable housing is [of poor quality],” says Syracuse, adding that Paseo Verde proves that argument faulty.

The 120-unit building features one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments as well as ground-floor retail and community service space.

Parking for residents is limited to 67 spaces to encourage their use of public transportation.

Hunter Gee, principal of Nashville-based architecture, urban planning and design firm Smith Gee Studio, toured Paseo Verde after learning about the development during an Urban Land Institute webinar.

“Contrary to stereotypes, low-income families took much better care of their units and the facilities than the market-rate residents [many of whom are college students],” he says.

Paseo Verde took years to launch and complete. Developer Jonathan Rose Companies partnered with Asociación Puertorriqueños en Marcha (APM), a Philadelphia-based nonprofit that had planned the project for a decade. (Rose is expected to visit Nashville this fall to address a ULI meeting.)

Clearly, any comparison between Lower North Philadelphia and Donelson must be done with care, as the two are quite dissimilar. And if somebody chooses to pursue in Nashville a development much like Paseo Verde, it’s not clear that Donelson Plaza would be the place. Donelson Plaza may be located along MTA and Nashville Star routes, but its surroundings are marked by sprawl. Paseo Verde, on the other hand, is located in a buildingand people-dense area on a route that is part of a comprehensive regional mass transit system.

Similarly, Paseo Verde provided stimulus for a struggling neighborhood, while Donelson hardly needs such help. In fact, home sales in what some call Hip Donelson are booming as young families move to the neighborhood.

But the idea of pursuing such a development outside of the urban core, where Nashville has traditionally placed housing for lower-income residents, is sound, says Syracuse.

“You don’t want to concentrate poverty,” Syracuse says, adding that placing mixed-income housing along transit lines makes sense.

“Not everyone has a car,” he says.

Shechter agrees but notes that assembling financing from multiple sources — including federal funding, grants and tax credits — is a complex task that can require several years. In addition, the property must be properly zoned.

Gee believes the Metropolitan Development and Housing Agency will play a role in any plan for addressing Nashville’s need for affordable housing.

The agency’s renovation plans for the Cayce Place public housing development in East Nashville could serve as a template. The effort involves combining low-income, workforce and market-rate housing.

“They own hundreds of acres and have financing ability,” says Gee. The need for workforce housing is undeniable, says Shechter. And the numbers back him up.

The average monthly apartment rent in Nashville was $1,375 in June, according to Rent Jungle, a website that tracks markets nationally. To afford that while paying no more than 30 percent of their income for rent, a family would need an annual income of almost $50,000.

In Davidson County, the median income for a family of four is $47,000, but many people make far less, says Shechter.

“There are thousands of hotel rooms downtown. Bars and restaurants all over town. How many people does it take to run them? Where are you going to find a [reasonably priced] apartment? You have go to Lebanon or Mt. Juliet and drive [to and from work],” he says.

“We’re talking about housing for teachers and police officers,” says Shechter. “If you don’t make it a priority, it will never happen.”

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The extension of Legends Drive will present new opportunities in Cumberland Center.

Setting the stage

Lebanon’s ECD plan eyes balanced growth

by Geert De Lombaerde

Last year, more than 73,000 cars traveled Interstate 40 between Lebanon and Nashville, an increase of 25 percent from a decade earlier. With Wilson County projected to absorb a solid share of the region’s population growth between now and 2040, that number — made up primarily of commuters driving to and from Nashville — will most likely continue to grow. But city leaders are very much focused on growing their local economy and giving residents more reasons to work and spend their money close to home.

Long a prime destination for distribution and logistics facilities, Lebanon has scored some nice manufacturing wins recently, with Maplehurst Bakeries and Wonder Porcelain committing to bring a combined 520 jobs to town in coming years and retail technology company Optoro planning to hire 300 people for a new facility.

Those successes and others are helping generate new rooftops. The city has 8,000 housing units approved in the pipeline, split relatively evenly between singlefamily homes and apartments. The additions will swell the city’s population well beyond 40,000 — from right 58 BOOM

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at 20,000 in 2000 and almost 33,000 during a recent special census — and spur demand for retail and commercial services.

City officials are targeting two axes — just two miles apart and both being developed by local firms — southwest and south of downtown, at the Hartmann Drive and Cumberland Street/Highway 231 exits. At the first, SouthStar is building out Lebanon Market Place, a retail center anchored by The Home Depot and Chili’s locations. At the second, a three-quarter-mile eastward extension of Legends Drive — running parallel to Interstate 40 and started this summer with a price tag of $4.6 million — will open up the remaining parts of Cumberland Center, a 165-acre mixed-use project where the first phase includes a Logan’s Roadhouse and Boot Barn.

Plans by developer Vastland Realty call for a wideranging mix of retail and restaurants (111 acres), apartments (15 acres), hotels and convention space (almost 15 acres) office buildings (eight acres) and more. The project is equipped to accommodate a possible extension of the Music City Star commuter rail line as well as a potential municipal center of some sort.

Sarah Haston, the city’s economic development director, isn’t afraid to look to elements of Franklin’s growth for inspiration and parallels. In the Legends Drive extension, she sees elements of Cool Springs.

And with downtown Lebanon gathering momentum — among its amenities is The Mill at Lebanon, the adaptive reuse of former industrial space very much akin to The Factory at Franklin — the core is playing its part in the city’s growth.

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Personal Commitment Q&A with Broker Sue Earnest, CCIM

Q: You came into industrial real estate services naturally, from the steel and barge industry. Do you still love it?

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Sue Earnest, CCIM Principal Avison Young

A: I get a kick from lifting people up, making them happier. Being genuinely interested in what they do. Commercial real estate is like a series of stories that I can jump into - an opportunity to shine a light.

To work together with Sue, give her a call at

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tiF

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A new-look TIF Subsidy primed for future redevelopment districts in city’s outlying areas

Maintenance

by Linda Bryant

Exterior Protective Coatings

Over the past decade, tax increment financing has played a substantial role in the transformation of Nashville’s urban core, helping the city parlay the growth to garner a national spotlight.

But use of the popular public financing tool is poised to pivot from the urban core and into areas some folks contend are neglected and underutilized.

Under former Mayor Karl Dean, TIF fueled highprofile signature projects en masse in districts closely tethered to downtown — the Gulch, Rolling Mill Hill, Rutledge Hill, the East Bank and SoBro. But soon after Mayor Megan Barry took office in October 2015, it became clear that continued TIF use would face a new level of scrutiny and transparency and perhaps be considered for areas of town that haven’t yet felt the economic blessings of Nashville’s “It City” status.

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Overseen by the Metro Development and Housing Agency, TIF has been deployed in 11 redevelopment districts that needed to “reverse disinvestment and blight and promote redevelopment that is sustainable from economic, environmental, aesthetic, public safety, and historic preservationist perspectives.”

Now, the Barry administration indicates it will view TIF through three lenses: its ability to create or stabilize jobs and spark economic renewal; the feasibility of economic and/or residential development actually taking hold in a designated district; and the likelihood of it eventually generating tax revenues for the city’s coffers.

The bottom line for developers interested in using TIF involves two questions: Are there current redevelopment districts prepped to pop or future ones on the horizon?

Many locals feel the answer to both questions is “yes.”

Bob Mendes, Metro councilman-at-large, says he has heard through “rumor and scuttlebutt” that both Donelson Pike and Nolensville Pike (near Thompson Lane) are being batted around in some circles as possible redevelopment districts.

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TIF

“One can make a really good argument for both of these areas,” Mendes says, adding that he’s not involved in actively pushing either area for redevelopment district designation.

“Gentrification has spread in both areas, and there’s already marketplace activity,” he adds.

Mendes, who recently co-sponsored a Metro Council bill that requires greater transparency and annual reporting from MDHA on all TIF projects, thinks creating a Nolensville Road redevelopment district is particularly promising.

“If we actually thought hard about Nolensville, and figured out a way to get retail projects a block or two off of Nolensville in either direction, especially in the part that runs from Thompson Lane and north to I-440, we could still let traffic flow through and also develop a walkable community,” Mendes says. “I think it would blow up.”

Mendes also offers a wild card.

“It’s involves a longer timeline, but the southern and western parts of Madison are ripe,” he says.

Jeff Syracuse, a Metro Council representative whose District 15 includes Donelson, is bullish on that first-ring suburb landing redevelopment district status. The most promising prospect is the Donelson segment located near the train station on Lebanon Pike, Syracuse says, though he adds there is no “formal discussion” underway about the possibility.

“Donelson is already set up in some ways that encourage growth,” Syracuse says. “The area around the train station has had an urban design overlay since 2009. Having design guidelines and a vision in place is such a big plus.

“More and more people are actively interested in Donelson,” he adds. “We are fourth in terms of tax revenue for Davidson County. We bring in 42 percent of the city’s hotel tax money.”

Syracuse believes Donelson’s place in the spotlight is imminent and is quick to point out that the area’s 36,000 residents would flock to — and even work for — new retail businesses or private- sector companies lured to Donelson with TIF incentives.

“Our residents take pride in Donelson,” Syracuse continues. “There’s an influx of new families. Growth here has been steady. We already have a lot of [commercial and corporate] interest. A redevelopment district and tax increment financing can only accelerate the growth.

“I understand why downtown originally got the TIF attention, but now the growth is headed out the pikes,” Syracuse continues. “It’s time to give them the attention they need.”

Despite the chatter about creating redevelopment districts, Joe Cain, MDHA director of urban development, says there are no plans on the front burner. But he’s quick to note a handful of already existing, and long-dormant, districts are showing promising activity.

“The Jefferson Street, Skyline and Main Street redevelopment districts currently have the most potential for growth,” Cain says. “They are starting to get traction.”

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Case in point: Recent efforts from developer D.J. Wootson are giving a jumpstart to the Jefferson Street district, which was established in 2005 for portions of the historic North Nashville neighborhood.

Wootson and his team of investors are spearheading several projects, including 1821 Jefferson, a mixed-use building with 18 apartments and retail space; The Heritage at Jefferson, which includes 14 three-story townhomes with one-car garages; and the completed 1826 Jefferson Apartments.

Mendes says it’s not unusual for a redevelopment district to underperform or sit relatively dormant for years.

“You need to wait for anchor developments to get started,” he says. “”But when there’s not a lot going on, you might have a district that’s in a [general] area the market finds completely undesirable. At some point, it’s time to say it’s just not going to work.”

Cain agrees, but adds: “Redevelopment districts aren’t going to become hot spots overnight. It can take 15 years before you have interest, before a project comes along that’s going to spark additional develop and, hopefully, a domino effect.”

Developer and real estate agent Matt Burnett is hoping that his 1st North, a nine-unit townhome project located on Dickerson Pike, sparks commercial and residential activity in the Skyline Redevelopment District.

Though Skyline, which covers portions of Dickerson Pike, has been in place for nine years, minimal new development has come to the urban strip, which for years suffered from a seedy reputation.

“This is my first TIF project,” says Burnett, owner of Burnett Real Estate Group. “I think this area is long overdue for development. There’s a lot of buzz now.

Land costs are less expensive here, so we’re able to offer a [quality] product at a [reasonable] price.”

With spa-like bathrooms, significant storage space and rooftop terraces offering sweeping views of the downtown skyline, 1st North residences are priced at $300,000, arguably significantly less than a comparable residence in a trendier neighborhood.

“I expect within five years, because of the redevelopment district and TIF, you’ll see more walkability here,” Burnett says.” You’ll see coffee shops, restaurants and more homes and condos. I know many people have been waiting for it. It’s going to happen.”

Cain is also keen on the Bordeaux Redevelopment District, which the Metro Council approved in 2015.

Located about six miles northwest of the downtown core, the newish district spans 530 acres and was created to jumpstart growth in what was a onceflourishing section of North Nashville.

“The Bordeaux neighborhood worked hard to come up with a plan,” Cain says. “We’re close to having design guidelines finished for the community.

“There’s really a lot of potential,” he adds. “You’re not going to see a 30-story building, but you could see a corporate headquarters with a campus-style design.

We hope to see low-density residential that allows for mixed use.”

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PARKING

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Parking evolving Two Nashville designers discuss the future of structures, requirements

The future of parking garages and lots will be part minimalist, part high-tech and part “The Jetsons.” In some cases, we’ll see no parking where parking was required before. In others, parking structures will be reduced in scale or converted to new uses. Down the road, parking facilities will be designed for self-driving vehicles and features all sorts of tech-driven bells and whistles.

Post correspondent Linda Bryant chatted recently with kennon|calhoun WORKSHOP architect John E. Calhoun Jr. and Kim Hartley Hawkins, founding principal of Hawkins Partners, to get their take on the subject. Both firms are Nashville-based.

Let’s start with you, John. Are clients asking for scaled-back parking structures or even no parking due to practical restraints and/or in order to stimulate interest in public transportation or ridesharing?

JC: The [proposed] 12-story 121-room Stanza Hotel site at Fourth and Ash in SoBro has no room on the site for parking. So the owner and developer, Mark Cleveland, has come up with some creative ways to provide transportation to and from the building.

Parking a car is difficult and expensive in Nashville and nobody really wants to drive to and from the action. Mark has a solution: to partner with Uber, Lyft, Music City Trolley Hop and Circuit Bus, JoyRide and/

or Pedicab. He has also been in talks with a driverless car company to utilize his building as a hub for the first of its kind in Nashville. The idea is that people will fly to the city to experience this, or they can drive here, park down the street and a driverless car will follow them and bring them back into the hotel. A second driverless car may be deployed to shuttle guests to popular tourist destinations.

What are some trends likely to drive your future designs?

JC: There is technology (such as Bosch’s Mobility Solutions) that provides the end user and parking industry with a unique database of real-time parking occupancy in parking lots and parking garages and on-street parking. With this software and wireless capability, the information can be accessed from smartphones, the Internet and integrated dynamic signage. These types of software and connectivity can provide benefits such as better traffic flow, reduced pollution and reduced stress for drivers. Not only will this type of thing benefit the end user and the parking and traffic professionals, but local municipalities understand the importance of providing and improving parking facilities and conditions.

Kim, there’s mounting evidence that the way we design and use parking spaces will change a lot in the future. What are you seeing at Hawkins Partners?

KHH: How we think about parking is going to change very quickly. A lot of it is because of the advent of services such as rideshare and bikeshare. Autonomous vehicles are going to have a big impact. And at some point, the need to rely on mass transit is going to catch

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PArKING

FEATURES

Bosch’s special occupancy sensors recognize which parking spaces in an urban area or parking structure are free and reports their exact locations.

up to us in Nashville. All these factors are working together to produce what I see as a huge sea change coming our way.

We are starting to see the need for [a different way of looking at] parking related to restaurants, bars and entertainment venues. These places have some of the highest parking requirements per square foot in the city. When you start seeing a significant number of people using rideshare or bike share to get around, it reduces the demand for parking in those locations.

ect is located in a walkable, compact district.

What’s an example of reduced demand for parking in Nashville?

KHH: H.G. Hill Realty Co.’s 2100 Acklen Flats project in Hillsboro Village, which has 42 residential units plus retail and restaurant space. Acklen Flats opened a little over a year ago and, at that time, the neighborhood was very worried there weren’t going to be enough parking spaces. They asked if the development could provide 30 more spaces than the required parking spaces by code, which Hill Realty did at significant cost because it’s structured parking.

Now every apartment is leased and every retailer is doing very well. But if you look at the parking garage, there are spaces available everywhere. I believe that’s indicative of what we’re going to see more and more.

This has huge implications.

Since we can’t do away with parking altogether, how will a new parking structure be different than what we’re used to now?

KHH: We’ll need to start designing our parking structures so that portions of them really can be changed out over time. These are spaces that could potentially be changed to small residential housing units, retail or offices. It can happen. For example, you might take a parking space that’s 9 feet by 18 feet. You use two or three of those parking spaces, you’ve just created a space that’s about 45 feet by 60 feet. You end up having a great area to develop something, especially when the parking structure is facing the street. We are working with the Nashville Downtown Partnership on a concept, called Living Alley, that will potentially bring an option like this to downtown Nashville. These are the kinds of things that are coming. It’s going to be critical to get policies in place.

What other trends related to parking are you seeing?

KHH: We’re starting to hear more about the idea of decoupling housing from the parking. Just think about it for a minute. You can do a lot more, especially with affordability [when there’s less parking for a project than typical]. Micro housing is an example. Small units that might be 400 to 600 square feet. If you are providing this kind of product but have to provide a parking space for it, that adds another 400 square feet, and you are basically doubling the cost of the project. If you don’t have to do that, it can make a big difference. Of course, this kind of scenario only really works if a proj-

Has any of this changed the way you’re approaching clients?

KHH: Just in the past six months, we’ve begun to ask a new question when we’re developing our plans: “Where are the rideshare opportunities here?” We are strongly encouraging clients now to take all the incentives they can [to reduce or to be creative with parking requirements.]

Do you really think Nashville can become less dependent on cars? Where does mass transit fit in?

KHH: I was at a meeting with a client a couple of months ago and found out he doesn’t own a car and every trip he takes is done with Uber. I’m sure he’s not the only one. I’m 55 and I still think about driving my car to a restaurant. But my kids, who are 24 and 27, would not dream of taking their own car if they are going to a concert, dinner or out partying. It’s a generational change and it’s happening quickly.

courtesy bosch

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8/23/16 8/23/16 12:54 3:33 PM

Technology is overhauling how and where health care is being delivered — and Middle Tennessee companies are at the center of many of the changes.

We’ll spotlight local innovators and big thinkers as they provide a glimpse into the sector’s future.

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HISTORY

FEATURES

WHEN NEW MEETS OLD Nashville’s growth yields historic change

Most Nashvillians are too young to recall the days when Music City offered a truly urban form and function. Prior to World War II, districts such as Germantown, Midtown and SoBro bustled with pedestrians conducting their daily business, often via on electric trolleys. Then along came cars, forever altering Nashville. The following photos highlight those changes.

Church Street at Sixth looking west circa 1959

Cain Sloan and the Tennessee Theater anchored the south side of the block. Today, skyscraper 505 rises, soon to loom large over McKendree United Methodist Church.

photos by eric england and daniel meigs, historic photos provided by the Nashville Public Library, Special Collections NASHVILLEPOST.COM

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Church Street at Sixth looking west circa 1950s

Nashville-based department store Harveys was once a downtown staple before closing in 1988. Restaurant Tazza and pipe shop Blend Bar stand in its place today.

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Public Square Park looking south circa 1986

Only 13 years have passed since motorists parked fronting, suburban style, Nashville’s courthouse — unthinkable today. Live on the Green and public art are now staples of the grounds.

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Broadway-West End split looking west circa 1940

A statue (below the electronic billboard) is long gone.

But remaining is, arguably, the city’s preeminent vehicular intersection. SkyHouse Nashville towers on the left.

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Fifth Avenue looking south circa 1940s

Fifth was the city’s epicenter for lunch counter desegregation in the 1960s. Note the eye-catching Walgreen Drugs sign, since replaced though the business remains.

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Hillsboro Village at Wedgewood looking south circa 1950

The Rexall sign marks the current Provence Breads & CafĂŠ space. A modernist structure replaced the far-right building before being generically re-skinned in the late 1990s.

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ARE YOU LOOKING FOR A LEADERSHIP OPPORTUNITY IN NASHVILLE? DO YOU WANT TO BE A MAN & WOMAN OF THE YEAR CANDIDATE? DO YOU KNOW SOMEONE WHO DOES?

The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society is recruiting for its 2017 Man & Woman of the Year campaign. If you are interested in an opportunity to impact our mission to cure blood cancer and improve the quality of life for patients and their families–either as a candidate or Leadership Team member– please contact Oliver Wade at oliver.wade@lls.org or 615-331-2980.

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thanks to our corporate sponsors gala sponsor

developing leaders

Bradley

platinum sponsor

golf sponsor

Tressler & Associates

BL Harbert International

gold sponsor

Crain Construction, Inc. • Dekalb • Empower Electric Gresham Smith & Partners • Highwoods Properties Pinnacle Financial Partners • Spectrum Properties | Emery

Avenue Bank • Duke Realty Corporation • H.G. Hill Realty Company, LLC JE Dunn • Office Furniture + Related Services • Suntrust Bank The Bank of Nashville • T.W. Frierson Contractor, Inc. • Waller Whisenant, Stewart, Watrous & Associates

silver sponsor

Alex S. Palmer & Co. • Avison Young • Baker Donelson • Bass Berry & Sims PLC • Bell & Associates Construction • Boyle Investment Company Brasfield & Gorrie • CBRE • Chas. Hawkins Co., Inc. • Colliers International • Cushman & Wakefield • Dickinson Wright, PLLC DWC Construction Company, Inc. • Eakin Partners, LLC. • First Tennessee Bank • GBT Realty • Holladay Properties • Jones, Lang, LaSalle • Lines, Inc. MarketStreet Enterprises • Mayer Electric Supply • NAI Nashville • OakPoint Real Estate • Panattoni Development Company, Inc. • ProLogis Ragan-Smith Associates, Inc. • Regions • Shaw Contract Group • Sherrard, Roe, Voight, Harbison • Skanska • SP+ • Technical Innovation The Parkes Companies • TMPartners, PLLC • Turner • US Bank • Wachter, Inc. • Wells Fargo

Bronze level

Green & Little • Feltus Hawkins Design • Flow Construction Company, Inc. • Newbanks | Nashville Ortale, Kelley, Herbert & Crawford • S&ME • Synergy Business Environment • TTL

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FEATURES

TALLY

Data Bank

projects’ PRICE TAG PER DISTRICT

The Post has crunched some numbers related to large-scale construction projects within urban Nashville. The developments we considered are underway, recently completed and/or expected to happen. For the exerecise, we used for geographic boundaries the parts of the city located within Interstate 400 and MetroCenter, East Nashville and Green Hills.

To qualify, a residential development offers at least 10 units. Most solely commercial buildings were included. By “recently completed,” the Post considered a time span of about the past 18 months. For those projects we “expect to happen,” we consider developers with experience.

Though not a precise exercise, the numbers (all are approximate) are revealing nonetheless.

most active Private-sector entities Projects

Giarratana Nashville............................................4 Vanderbilt University..........................................4 Architecture firm Projects

Hastings Architecture Associates...............10 Gresham Smith & Partners..............................8 Smith Gee Studio..................................................8 DAAD.........................................................................6 EOA............................................................................6 ESa.............................................................................6 Construction management firm Projects

R.C. Mathews.........................................................9 JE Dunn.....................................................................7 Skanska....................................................................6 Brasfield & Gorrie.................................................5 Cambridge Swinerton.........................................5

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Total number of projects

1. SoBro: $1.61 billion 2. Midtown: $1.44 billion 3. Central Business District: $1.15 billion 4. The Gulch: $780 million 5. West Nashville/Charlotte Corridor: $729 million 6. North Capitol/Germantown: $680 million 7. Hillsboro Village/Vanderbilt U.: $273 million 8. Green Hills: $225 million 9. Five Points/East Nashville: $195 million 10. Eighth Avenue/12South: $115 million

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Number of architecture firms

6

58

Number of construction management firms

34

Number of cities represented related to development entities

9 3 4

2

5

1 10

7

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INFRASTRUCTURE

FEATURES

Perimeter Security.

Peace of Mind.

Tesla’s Model S

Self-Driven future

Is a driverless vehicle culture on Nashville’s horizon?

by PETER ChAwAgA

In May, a man riding in a self-driving Tesla Model S was killed when the vehicle’s autopilot system failed to detect the white paneling of a tractortrailer turning against the brightly lit Florida sky and crashed into it.

When news of the accident made national headlines the next month, it was a reminder of the progress still needed before autonomous cars are ready for wide use — despite advances in their sophisticated systems involving software, sensors, cameras and radar.

And until the technology has been refined to render their usage a reality, the legislation and infrastructure changes to accommodate it can’t move forward.

“The technology is so fluid at the moment that it’s pretty hard for us to determine exactly what our position is and what we need to do to prepare,” says John Schroer, commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Transportation. “We need to get the technology right first before we legislate.”

In Nashville the prospect of computer-piloted transportation that eliminates red lights, speed limits and parking will be entertained no matter how far off self-driving technology remains.

But says Sean Braisted, press secretary for Mayor Megan Barry, more research is needed on how such technology will fit the city’s transit infrastructure.

In an effort to expedite the introduction of self-driving cars and facilitate pilot testing, a state bill amending the Tennessee Code to expand the definition of a driver and outline autonomous vehicle technology was approved in April, the first such measure taken in the United States.

“We define autonomous technology very liberally so we believe currently there are no barriers to autonomous technology vehicle use in Tennessee,” says state Sen. Mark Green (R-Clarksville), who introduced the bill.

How quickly and effectively testing is done will be up to the car and technology companies. The results of that testing will inform future legislation, which will most likely come from federal and state agencies.

If and when driverless technology arrives, Nashville and other cities will need to adapt their infrastructure. While the current state of autonomous technology suggests that self-driving cars will be able to function on roads as they exist now, making the most of their capabilities could mean extensive changes.

“Driverless cars are much more efficient when they’re not comingling with [people-driven] cars,” says Schroer. “That may mean that we have to have separate lanes that are narrowed and the speed limits could be faster.”

But like legislation, any infrastructure changes will have to wait until self-driving technology solidifies.

“I want to make sure that whatever we do that we have the ability to keep up with technology,” Schroer says. “We can’t make these huge, giant capital investments that can’t change as the technology changes.”

CoURTESy TESlA

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Est. 1958 • rgfence.com The commercial fence ProfessionalsTm

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FEATURES

INFRASTRUCTURE

An outsider’s take

Placemaking expert Gabe Klein offer ways to improve Nashville

by NANCY FLOYD

Gabe Klein is an entrepreneur, an author, a former commissioner of the Chicago Department of Transportation and a one-time executive with Boston-based Zipcar.

With a career history involving both the public and private sectors, Klein frequently speaks about issues involving the man-made environment, with a particular focus on transit and technology. Relatedly, he penned Start-Up City: Inspiring Private and Public Entrepreneurship, Getting Projects Done.

In June, Klein was a guest speaker during a meeting of the Nashville chapter of Urban Land Institute, touching on 30-plus themes and topics from Gear Up 2020: Rapid Goal Setting for a 21st Century Nashville.

Here, the Post sums up 10 of his ideas and calls to action.

Overhaul public parking

The parking rates for Metro public garages and meters are considerably lower than parking lots targeting consumer business, resulting in less revenue for the city. Limited meter hours (8 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday to Saturday) and infrequent ticketing enforcement contribute to a low parking turnover rate for area businesses, an influx in unnecessary trips and, by extension, higher congestion and lower air quality. Increased parking fees, extended meter hours, enforced ticketing of illegally parked vehicles and better curbside management would generate more money for the Nashville Downtown Partnership to be used toward bikeshare or new projects. The public parking overhaul efforts should be overseen by the mayor’s office and managed by [a Metro entity] with the goal of a cursory review to be conducted this fall and new rates and technologies to be implemented in early 2017.

Increase active transportation options

Nashvillians, particularly those who are financially disadvantaged, spend an exorbitant amount of money on transportation. Although biking and walking are growing in popularity, they’re not primary methods of transport, and individuals are unhealthier as a result. By prioritizing pedestrians and cyclists, particularly in new construction areas, the city will see growth in commuting by biking or walking, resulting in healthier and more active lifestyles.

The Metro Public Works Department would be tasked with implementing an active transportation action plan that would include revising construction codes to require

sidewalks in front of all new buildings, constructing and protecting a network of bike lanes and sidewalks throughout the city, converting parking space into public space and adhering to guidelines established by the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO).

The Metro Health and Planning departments, along with local schools and businesses, will need to work together to create the right messaging around these initiatives and encourage the city to get more active.

Add B-Cycle stations

With 31 stations throughout the city, Nashville’s B-Cycle has proven to be a successful bikeshare program for tourists to get around town. In order to boost the popularity of cycling among residents, the B-Cycle program would need to grow significantly. By increasing the number of stations to 125 and locating them throughout surrounding neighborhoods, the B-Cycles can become a viable mode of transportation for locals, and a profitable one at that.

New stations should be strategically placed near colleges, hospitals, major job centers, existing bike trails, transit connections and popular neighborhoods. In order to be successful, this growth would need to occur in tandem with new and improved bike lanes in and around Nashville. To make the bikesharing program accessible to all communities, a bike share equity program should be implemented to offer cheap or free membership to low-income individuals.

Eliminate road fatalities by 2025

In Davidson County, an auto accident takes place every 26 minutes and the number of pedestrian and cyclist deaths are at their highest in 20 years. A Vision Zero plan should be established as a goal to eliminate traffic fatalities completely by 2025. In order for the city to accomplish this goal, the DOT and the mayor’s office should look to the Five E’s of the National Center for Safe Routes to School as a guideline: 1) engineering strategies to redesign Nashville’s streets to ensure safety for children, the elderly and the disabled; 2) enforcement of laws to deter distracted, drunk and reckless driving; 3) encouragement of walking and cycling in the community; 4) educating citizens about safety measures and the impact of injuries and death on communities; 5) evaluation of the program’s progress, success and areas of improvement. Additional initiatives would include lowering the speed limit to 25 mph on all neighborhood streets and assessing and protecting all current bike lanes.

Offer dedicated funding for parks

Park budgets have been slashed in recent years, preventing thousands of acres of new land from being developed due to lack of funding. Citizens are also interested in greater amenities and programming within the parks, something that is currently unavailable. By building some public-private partnerships, including sponsorships, programming or community collaboration, the parks systems MICHAEL W. BUNCH

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INFRASTRUCTURE

can raise more money for maintenance and improvement and local businesses and nonprofits can benefit, as well.

The idea is that local businesses would offer specific programming — such as Chicago’s Lollapalooza, for example — that would entice citizens to the park while also raising money that can be poured back into the green space. Allowing short-term leases of land-banked acres to farmers or nonprofits is a way to generate income on land that is waiting for improvements. A change in zoning codes to allow non-commercial community gardening, with possible monitoring by a local nonprofit such as Nashville Food Project or Hands On Nashville, gives Nashvillians greater access to local food.

Consider burying power lines

The arguments against above-ground power lines are numerous: they’re unattractive, power can be knocked out because of storm damage, they often limit enhancements to the street and they hinder street design. However, the cost and efforts to bury lines are extremely high, particularly in neighborhoods with rapid development like Germantown, East Nashville, Midtown, SoBro and Wedgewood-Houston. Since burying power lines will be costly and it’s unclear who would pay for it, an exhaustive analysis needs to be completed to determine the expense, how neighborhoods would be prioritized, who would potentially cover the cost (NES, Metro, developers) and what the possible return on investment would be. The Department of Economic and Community Development, along with the Metro Development and Housing Agency, NES and local developers, should take the lead on examining possible funding and plausibility for the project to determine whether it is justified.

Establish a street light master plan

There is currently no standard for street lighting. It is typically determined by developers and designers who choose the details, style and spacing based on their personal preferences and their project budgets.

There’s little to no direction given and the process to obtain a permit is a confusing one involving NES, TDOT and Public Works, with uncertainty about the authority of each agency. Establishing a master plan would guarantee consistency and clarity for developers and owners. The plan, developed by Public Works and NES by the summer of 2018, should clearly outline the design, style and technical standards for specific street classifications, neighborhoods and/or districts.

Convert parking structures to affordable housing/open spaces

There are tens of millions of dollars worth of property in and around Nashville currently being used for parking.

It’s an unwise use of the space given the low need and cost of parking across the city. Over the next decade, the need for parking will decrease even more with the rise in popularity of ridesharing, the advent of autonomous cars and a decreased interest in owning vehicles by the next generation. Land and structures that are currently being used as parking lots or garages could be converted to more usable space, such as affordable housing, schools, recreational facilities and the like. The first step in this process would be for the Metro Planning Department to do a complete inventory of all publicly and privately owned parking facilities throughout greater Nashville and their current values.

By coupling that with data on the areas of projected growth in Nashville, Metro can work together with private developers to determine the best use of these properties to meet the future needs of the city.

Institute an urban forestry program

Based on aerial imagery from 2010, 47.3 percent of Davidson County is tree-covered with 15.3 percent of public spaces and streets being tree-lined. However, there seems to be a lot of confusion about who manages the city’s trees, particularly in public spaces. The jurisdiction currently falls under Public Works, which has an inventory of 2,000 trees downtown. To streamline the management of urban trees, the mayor’s office first needs to do an assessment of the various groups that manage trees and landscaping in public places and determine if it makes sense to consolidate these responsibilities into an urban forestry division. A tree master plan should be created that recognizes the importance of urban trees, sets standards for trees and landscaping along streets, and combines the efforts of Metro, nonprofits and developers for tree planting and maintenance.

Create a streets corridor program

The need for street improvements exists throughout the city, but it’s a costly and time-intensive process that can best be accomplished through private funding. Metro Planning and the DOT must work together to create a master plan for corridor improvements, which would include a list of potential candidates and opportunities for private partnership.

If Metro can determine what services are needed and desired along streets, they can identify opportunities for businesses to partner with the city and pay for these improvements while also getting something for themselves, such as new bus shelters that serve as prime spaces to advertise their business. By putting together a complete list of assets that can be offered, along with determining tax dollars that can be used toward the improvements, Metro can open up the projects for various companies to bid on.

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READING CORNER

READING CORNER

Reforming the arterials

An excerpt — penned by former Metro Planning chief Rick Bernhardt — from The Plan of Nashville, which was published in 2005 and has informed many a conversation, policy and project since The arterial gets its name by way of analogy to the artery in human anatomy, which carries blood from the heart through the body. Historically, arterials have functioned as the main channels in a branching system of roads and streets, carrying traffic to and from the heart of the city.

Over the past 50 years, Nashville’s arterials have passed through three stages: from multimodal mixed-use corridors, to high-speed single-mode commercial arteries, to roads characterized by excess vehicle capacity and decayed and underutilized low-density commercial buildings. Today Nashville is suffering from a clogging of its arteries. We have tried to make these roads carry heavy traffic, yet zoned them almost entirely commercial. These goals work in opposition to each other.

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Fast flow of traffic happens when cars stop infrequently. Commercial areas, however, require frequent cuts in the curves of these roads for cars to access parking lots. Cars slowing and stopping to turn all along the block reduce mobility to a crawl. Lots of curb cuts also endanger pedestrians by interrupting the sidewalk and forcing walkers in cars into conflict — guess who wins?

The congestion created by cars slowing to turn at each retail outlet undermines efficient mass transit. Commuters in cars, frustrated by the stop-and-start rhythm of the arterials, take to the interstates, contributing to these highways’ increasing dysfunctionality. Commercial properties suffer from the loss of traffic. Our arterials have thus become a non-sustainable — functionally and economically — segment of the infrastructure of transportation.

Places and markets change. The belief that the commercial-only arterial is best must be rethought in favor of concentrated commercial nodes linked by higher-density mixed-use corridors. There is much more property along our arterials zoned for commercial use than can be economically sustained and the amount of existing arterial commercial development — in the form of the big box and the strip mall — cannot be supported under today’s economic realities.

According to Kennedy Lawson Smith, the director of the National Trust’s Main Street program, the amount of retail space per capita has outgrown the nation’s needs.

In 1960, the United States had four square feet of retail per person; in 1990, 18 square feet; by 1998, the figure had grown two 38 square feet. Yet Smith says that our existing buying power can support only 16 square feet of retail per capita. At the same time, there is not enough residentially zoned property in proximity to mass transit to provide the ridership to make transit viable.

An important challenge of the Plan of Nashville is to recapture Nashville’s historic pikes-turned-arterials as the means to link and enhance all elements of the city.

To reestablish our traditional pikes as great corridors, we must do nothing more — or less — then apply the lessons of urban avenues and boulevards: • Use a participatory process to develop a public consensus as to the redevelopment potential of individual corridors.

• Identify important commercial nodes. At these nodes, create places where people feel comfortable by slowing traffic and providing interesting uses and convenient access.

• Intensify the development that flanks our corridors with increased residential and office activity connected with appropriate pedestrian linkages and mass transit service.

• Develop a plan that, in addition to recommending land uses, provides clear visual examples of how to enhance the physical environment through properly placed and scaled buildings, properly located parking, efficient access and easy wayfinding.

• Develop strategies for the arterial street system that provide for motor vehicles, pedestrians, bicyclists and mass transit with equal attention. Buildings placed next to the sidewalk, with direct pedestrian

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access from the primary street, encourage walking. Parking located to the rear shields the undesirable appearance of parking lots while leaving the street available for more interesting building frontage.

The network functions best with a few vehiclular access points or curb cuts — except from alleys or lanes to parking in the rear — and short blocks (600 feet maximum, preferably 400 feet) with properly signaled intersections.

• Finally, make it easy for builders and developers to do the right thing.

All too often, developers support the vision of the community discussed above and would develop in ways that are pedestrian-friendly and supportive of transit use. But time is money. Unless the development review system is redesigned to speed up the process of obtaining permits for project such as the community envisions, developers are forced to revert to previous building patterns because they cannot wait for more flexibility.

Great streets — such as King Street in Charleston, Mulberry Street in Boston, Washington Avenue in Miami, St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans and even Second Avenue in downtown Nashville — are great places. Nashville currently has few great streets, and none of them are our major arterials. But all have the potential to become pleasant to drive on and, more importantly, reward pedestrian traffic, if we take the steps outlined above.

Nashville’s urban form was at one time seamlessly integrated with its pikes and avenues. They provided the means of commerce, communication and community structure. The city’s major streets were the conduit for walkers, streetcars and automobiles and reflected the diverse urban experience. Our objective is to recapture that balance.

StrategieS for arterial reformation

Eyeing Gallatin Pike between Ordway Place and Greenwood Avenue Left: Existing street with curb cuts indicated by red lines. Most of the sidewalk is eroded by curb cuts, which is dangerous for pedestrians. Traffic is slowed by countless turning opportunities.

Center: By eliminating curb cuts along Gallatin and providing parking access from the side streets, the number of turning opportunities is reduced from 41 to 12; sidewalks can be repaired, making the street safer for pedestrians and increasing traffic flow.

Right: Gallatin Pike redeveloped with buildings (illustrated in gray) constructed up to right of way, which provides definition and scale to the pedestrian area is already enhanced by the elimination of curb cuts.

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‘Walkable urban development has returned’

An excerpt from Foot Traffic Ahead, a new report from George Washington University detailing ‘a definite, but gradual shift’ in how our cities use real estate This study has examined the current state of walkable urbanism, trends pointing to future walkable urbanism, social equity correlations with walkable urbanism, and correlations between walkable urbanism and education as well as GDP per capita.

Overall, the research has shown market share growth in walkable urbanism for income products in all 30 of the largest 30 U.S. metros, as well as positive impacts on social equity, the education of the workforce, and GDP per capita.

In addition, there are substantial rental premiums on a persquare-foot basis.

There is also a need to more deeply understand the role of walkable urbanism in addressing social equity challenges. The counterintuitive conclusion of this research is that

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increased walkable urban development in the 30 largest metros also increases social equity by the measures we employed, though the obvious multi-family rental premiums demonstrated in this study have to be addressed through conscious attainable housing programs.

Drivable suburban development has characterized U.S. metropolitan growth since 1946 — a structural shift from the walkable urban pattern that dominated development prior to the 1930s (during the years surrounding and just following the Great Depression, buildings permits were down by 60 percent (1930 and 1945) from what they had been in the 1920s). The data presented in this report suggests another structural shift is now taking place; walkable urban development has returned, occurring in some metros more quickly and in some more slowly. Our analysis shows that walkable urbanism has gained market share in the office, retail and multi-family rental product types over drivable suburban, possibly for the first time in 60 to 70 years.

The U.S. metropolitan landscape will likely continue to trend towards walkable urbanism, with real estate indicators positively trending towards this pattern of urban development. Previous WalkUP Wake-Up Call reports have demonstrated this phenomenon for the metropolitan areas of Atlanta, Boston, Washington, D.C., and Detroit. Bolstered with the new data in this study, we suggest that the U.S. is undergoing a significant shift in growth patterns.

A paradigm-shifting share of office and multi-family rental absorption in this real estate cycle (2010 through 2015) has taken place in walkable urban places, or WalkUPs. WalkUPs continue to outpace drivable suburban locations by measures of absorption and are experiencing strong rental premiums. This is despite the fact that WalkUPs occupy a small portion of a metro’s land mass — generally somewhere between 0.5 to 1.2 percent.

We present these results with a few caveats. First, this analysis is limited to rental office, retail and multifamily space as reported by CoStar. An analysis of for-sale housing is needed to further confirm the results of our analysis.

Secondly, owner-user space is not included in the data set of our analysis, although our hypothesis is that its inclusion would probably further underscore a trend towards a preference for WalkUPs. Core Values, a survey conducted in 2015 by GW, Smart Growth America and Cushman & Wakefield, sought the motivations behind the relocations of 500 corporate offices to walkable urban locations. The top two reasons cited were to recruit talented millennials and to brand the company as a 21st-century, knowledgebased business.

Recent major corporate relocations include: • General Electric’s announced move to the Boston downtown adjacent Seaport District • Marriott’s announced plans to move to a walkable urban, transit-served location in metro Washington, D.C. • Capital One Bank’s new headquarters adjacent to the Tysons heavy rail station These illustrate that large corporations, which own a large portion of owner-occupied space, have a preference for walkable urban locations.

Finally, this analysis does not mean that sprawl will vanish from the American metropolitan landscape, especially

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since most buildings have a 40-year plus life before they are either rehabilitated or torn down. Instead, this report suggests a change in trends that will take decades to play out; in a good year, only 2 percent is added to the current real estate inventory. And this inventory is the result of more than 60 years of drivable suburban development.

The current real estate cycle, which started in 2010, serves as a watershed moment that marks a definite, but gradual, shift to walkable urban development. Every region in the U.S. still continues some level of suburban development, particularly on the metropolitan periphery where land prices are lowest. Construction of fringe metro drivable suburban, for-sale housing in particular has not ceased, though it is getting harder for conventional builders to make their financial models work. Drivable suburban, forsale housing was the most negatively affected real estate product during the 2007-09 housing and real estate crisis, and most of the remaining “under-water” housing inventory is in fringe drivable suburban locations.

It should also be noted that metro Dallas and Houston are still pushing their drivable suburban boundaries — further to the north in Dallas and both northwest and west in Houston — though, even in these two metros, walkable urban development is gaining market share over drivable suburban competition.

While some metro areas rank highly in walkable urbanism, and will continue to benefit from continued WalkUP development, the overall national trend largely depends on what happens in the middle- and lower-ranked metro areas.

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Will these metros continue to build predominantly drivable suburban, or will they follow the path of the highly ranked walkable urban metros? To what extent will these metros move toward urbanizing their suburban areas?

Based on Development Momentum rankings, this analysis predicts the following low-to-middle ranked metros will accelerate their evolution in a walkable urban manner: Detroit, Phoenix, Los Angeles, St. Louis, Miami, Atlanta and Cleveland.

With their histories of drivable suburban development, and reliance on automobiles and trucks, metros with low walkable urbanism generally resist walkable urban development. These metros, however, display indications of movement towards walkable urbanism based on the data in this analysis and because of local support for walkable urbanism, including developers, neighborhood activists and elected leaders. Nonetheless, dominant infrastructure, zoning and land-use subsidies for many metros will continue to favor drivable suburban development in lower-ranked metros. It is possible for them to catch on to what we see as a national trend towards walkable urbanism, and to do so requires the advocacy, place management, policy tools and transportation infrastructure necessary to support the future form of American urban development.

To access Foot Traffic Ahead in full, go to smartgrowthamerica.org

At 13, Attorney General Herbert Slatery was making jump shots and playing sports with his friends.

Unfortunately, 13 is the average age of entry into human trafficking right here in our own state. But you can do something. Go to Whatis13.com to hear from Herbert Slatery on how you can help.

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BIG QUESTION

THE BIG QUESTION

What else can we do better?

More than a decade after the publication of The Plan of Nashville, the city can point to lots of success stories driven by smart choices and new thinking. But permit us here to leave you with a few thoughts on where our collective spirit and endeavor can again be put to good use.

Make the case for transit — cube by cube

The Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce is — and should be — a vocal supporter of the recently unveiled $6 billion plan for a transit system that will adequately serve the region’s population by 2040. But we’re pretty sure that support won’t have hit the radar screens of many downtown, Midtown and airport-area commuters who would need to use new transit options to make them viable. They need to hear the case for better transit made by their colleagues, bosses and their bosses’ bosses. And since we all know behaviors take a long time to change, they need to hear it starting now.

So, Nashville CEOs, let’s have less grousing about the cost of parking and more investing — verbally and financially — in getting your people to their desks using alternative transportation modes. There’s a good chance they’ll arrive more rested and refreshed and not be tempted to look for jobs closer to home.

Keep an eye on districts beyond the core

We’ve become accustomed to spending public money on prominent projects close to the heart of Nashville. We’ve also

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been regularly and richly rewarded — in visitor spending and party barge sightings, among other things — for making those investments. But let’s not lose sight of infrastructure needs in districts that don’t touch Lower Broad, First Tennessee Park or The Gulch. They, too, need complete streets, recreation sites and transit options. As our story in this issue discusses, blanketing some of these areas with TIF districts would send a message that their improvement is as much as priority as is landing the next big convention.

And those millennials whose energy and spending we’ve warmly welcomed? Many of them will soon start families and want to trade their apartments for cozy starter homes. It behooves Metro to make sure they’ll be able to get there comfortably and traverse their new neighborhoods safely. If the city does not, we all know there are tempting choices beyond Davidson’s borders.

Give Terry Cobb and his team all they need

Yes, developers around town will complain about the Metro Department of Codes. It’s kind of a thing they do, right? But you won’t hear them talk about jobs not being done well.

They know Director Terry Cobb and his team do good work but are quite simply short of the resources they need to adequately service our boom.

Nashville is still hot and developers are more willing to put up with a small delay here and there. But those hiccups will cost the city once we’re again competing without the “It City” tag. More developers will then either cut back on the scope and amenities of their projects or bail out of them altogether.

If that happens often enough, the debate about what we can do better could shift to needing to safeguard our gains rather than building on them.

8/23/16 6:30 PM

Tickets on Sale for the 2016 Induction Ceremony!

With a mission to honor men and women who have made significant and lasting contributions to the health care industry, The Tennessee Health Care Hall of Fame seeks to recognize and honor the pioneers and current leaders that have formed Tennessee’s health and health care community and encourage future generations of health care professionals. Don’t miss the induction of the second class, featuring these health care legends:

Jack O. Bovender, Jr.

Henry W. Foster, Jr., M.D., FACOG

Stanley Cohen, Ph.D.

Retired Chairman and CEO, Hospital Corporation of America

Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry, Vanderbilt University

Professor Emeritus and Former Dean, Meharry Medical College

Frank S. Groner, LL.D.

Paul E. Stanton, M.D.

President Emeritus, Baptist Memorial Hospital

President Emeriti, East Tennessee State University

Clinical Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Vanderbilt University

Colleen Conway Welch, Ph.D., CNM, FAAN, FACNM

Professor Emeriti of Surgery, East Tennessee State University

Dean Emerita, Vanderbilt University School of Nursing

BELMONT UNIVERSITY  CURB EVENT CENTER  OCTOBER 10, 2016 10:30–11:30 a.m. Registration  11:30 a.m.–1 p.m. Lunch & Ceremony

Individual Tickets available at tnhealthcarehall.com The Tennessee Health Care Hall of Fame has been created by Belmont University and The McWhorter Society and is supported

by Founding Partner, The Nashville Health Care Council.

GRAND SPONSORS

PRESENTING SPONSORS

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