Bull Street Common

[mr. chips]

It is interesting to compare growth in Columbia and Greenville. When I came to this state in 1981 I had to go to Greenville quite often - and hated going. Besides Furman and proximity to the mountains, I couldn't see anything attractive about the city. I was much happier living and working in Columbia. I figured that Columbia would become the next "in" place in the state, what with the university, and state government, and the fort. But over the decades Greenville grew and changed tremendously, and now it is a fabulous place to visit. Columbia has grown also, but not qualitatively as well. Grenville has a feeling of success and momentum.

It is interesting to note the differences even in "energy" between the Urban Planet forums for Columbia and Greenville. The Greenville Forum has 1,086 topics going, while Columbia has only 487. The Greenville Forum has 58,419 replies, while the Columbia Forum has only 24,373 replies.

Why did Greenville grow into such a nice place? Great leadership, the advantage of being on a major highway between two major cities, etc. And Columbia, by comparison, has had poor leadership, and is a very divided city - people from Lexington don't even like to associate themselves with Columbia, even though Columbia is the core of this region. Also divided school districts, as compared to Greenville and Charleston, which allows them to do some great things - such as their Fine Arts Center for the whole county. Columbia seems to be moving away from its core - witness Sandhills and growth in the suburbs. If Columbia is ever to get its act together as a great city, it needs to change this culture of division - it needs to unify governments, and people need to recognize that their future is tied to the success or failure of the City of Columbia.

[johnpro318]

It is interesting to compare growth in Columbia and Greenville. When I came to this state in 1981 I had to go to Greenville quite often - and hated going. Besides Furman and proximity to the mountains, I couldn't see anything attractive about the city. I was much happier living and working in Columbia. I figured that Columbia would become the next "in" place in the state, what with the university, and state government, and the fort. But over the decades Greenville grew and changed tremendously, and now it is a fabulous place to visit. Columbia has grown also, but not qualitatively as well. Grenville has a feeling of success and momentum.

It is interesting to note the differences even in "energy" between the Urban Planet forums for Columbia and Greenville. The Greenville Forum has 1,086 topics going, while Columbia has only 487. The Greenville Forum has 58,419 replies, while the Columbia Forum has only 24,373 replies.

Why did Greenville grow into such a nice place? Great leadership, the advantage of being on a major highway between two major cities, etc. And Columbia, by comparison, has had poor leadership, and is a very divided city - people from Lexington don't even like to associate themselves with Columbia, even though Columbia is the core of this region. Also divided school districts, as compared to Greenville and Charleston, which allows them to do some great things - such as their Fine Arts Center for the whole county. Columbia seems to be moving away from its core - witness Sandhills and growth in the suburbs. If Columbia is ever to get its act together as a great city, it needs to change this culture of division - it needs to unify governments, and people need to recognize that their future is tied to the success or failure of the City of Columbia.

I agree completely. I think Greenville is a beautiful city and I'm liking what they are doing. I go to Clemson and have friends and family there so I visit the area often. I'll probably end up living there. I think Columbia needs to form an identity and have neighboring cities and areas want to associate with us rather than close themselves off. Every surrounding small city and town seems to want to close themselves off from their surroundings in the Midlands when we are all working together to help form a stronger, more viable metropolitan area. Columbia needs to have something that makes neighboring areas want to say they are part of Columbia, even when technically they aren't. This is already partially seen with West Vista in West Columbia trying to ride the wave of Vista's success.

I think Bull Street is definitely a catalyst that will help connect Five Points and the hospital area around Palmetto Health. It's also only two or three blocks from Main Street so that would help with that connection and then if Assembly Street is redeveloped, then the connection to Vista could more easily be made. Projects like this will only encourage infill in between our "districts".

[clt29301]

Downtown development is one of the hardest things to accomplish, especially in a city like Cola. While most cities have only one entity in the city government to work with, Cola has the city government, state government and a major national university. While they are assets and would be welcome in any community, they also present challenges in getting different groups with different agendas to work together. That being said, I see a lot of progress in downtown Columbia. Having different districts within the city is a huge asset as each serves a different demographic. But, there is a definite need to connect the areas so they are not only separate districts but can leverage each other to make the city better. Reducing the lanes on Assembly and providing more places for people to cross would go a long way to connecting the Vista and Main, I think this is in the planning stages.. I am not sure Five Points will every be connected. The Bull St project is one that has the potential to change that far corner of downtown and the blocks back towards Main. It provides an opportunity for companies that want to be closer in to town the ability to be in Columbia but with great access to the interstates and an international airport. Costs should be a little lower as wells since there is not a huge reason to build expensive highrises. It could be an urban version of Ballantyne Corporate Park here is Charlotte with a lot of 5-7 story buildings mixed with the occasional 10 story building.

The one thing that you said which also needs work and has not been mentioned is the identity issue. I am not sure why Lexington does not want an association with Columbia, could be politics, but, as downtown shows some success stories, that should wane. The problem is that it will take a lot of time for that to change, there are still counties in the Charlotte metro which do not associate with downtown Charlotte. And, to be fair, the upstate counties are not close. People in Anderson & Spartanburg do not claim to live in Greenville and residents of Greenville do not tell others that they are from the upstate, they live in Greenville. Because the upstate is a very large low density land area, it is not well connected. The two largest counties, Greenville & Spartanburg share an airport but, that is about it. There is even a discrepancy about BMW, Greenville calls it the Greer or Greenville plant, Spartanburg calls it the Spartanburg Plant, BMW calls it the Spartanburg Plant.

As for the Greenville-Columbia comparisons, after reading posts here and on other forums, the types of comparison which would be helpful are not present. Constructive comparison would be helpful to understanding how each city has accomplished different goals. Both cities could learn how to institute more transit in the car dependent cities. However, from what I read, some are more interested in negative comments, down to talking about cracked sidewalks. But, I agree, Greenville has a nice downtown and is vocal about it, hence the topic count on UP that even exceeds Atlanta. But, the growth and prosperity differences between the cities is largely about perception. The growth, income and education levels of each city are even at best, in some cases better in Columbia.

Edited December 26, 2010 by clt29301

[GvilleSC]

Nothing in this thread has been about comparing Columbia and Greenville. It's been discussing the importance of connections in downtown Columbia, the challenges that are present, and the impact of the Bull Street project. The ONLY Greenville connections are the developer himself, and my interest in the topic. Well, I say that, but it's now only a previous interest. Since my posts can only be read with negative twists and not viewed objectively as either constructive criticism or genuine curiosity, it's not even worth discussing with you all.

It's as if someone is always out to get you judging by the way some of you post. Defense mode goes into full force when Greenville forumers post ANYTHING. I guess when you're so happy with the way things are, there's no point to look at things from a different point of view, or to question how things are done or have been done in the past..? Carry on, folks.

Edited December 27, 2010 by GvilleSC

[krazeeboi]

There's a major wording problem or comprehension issue going on here...

EXACTLY! It's a very accessible location. That's NEVER been disputed. It's the whole point of my posts that this accessibility should be played up and increased. Thus, I think investing in those walking, and biking routes is important. Never have I suggested that it needs to be RIGHT on top of everything, but I do think the connections need to exist. (btw, the word connection doesn't indicate a distance, but rather a means-- is that where some misunderstanding is?)

And, yes, I do believe that these connections to the larger picture are critical early on for this development. Retail won't be able to be support for years-- simply put, the population won't be there. And, until then it's going to be a car-dependent development. So, YEA, I think good, solid, SAFE walking and biking connections to entertainment districts (DESPITE the distance or route) needs to be in place.

Well there are already sidewalks in the adjacent neighborhoods and there will be sidewalks in this development (it is TND after all). And Columbia is a bronze-level Bicycle Friendly Community, being the first among the "Big Three" in the state to achieve the designation, so there's already momentum for that citywide and not just in conjunction with one project. So connections already exist and the city is currently investing in more connections all across the city. Andres Duany specifically recommended such in conjunction with the development of the campus. Even without designated bike lanes, it's already relatively easy to bike through the Robert Mills historic neighborhood to Main Street, thanks to the wide residential streets and the relative sleepiness of that neighborhood.

This is what I've been saying the entire time. Is it any more clear now?

Even though I don't think it was intentional on your part, it seemed as though the focus of your argument morphed with each post. Initially, you implied that the Bull Street development would compete with Main Street, the Vista, and Five Points and that it would be harder for Columbia to attract certain amenities with one more commercial/entertainment district in the picture. When I pointed out that this is a TND project and not an effort to establish another commercial/entertainment district and that the most important thing is that the project be seamlessly connected to other surrounding neighborhoods, you seemed to imply that it needed to also be adjacent to a commercial district to be successful. I then mentioned the fact that there are other successful in-town neighborhoods as well as greenfield and infill TND projects in other cities that do just fine without being adjacent to a commercial district, and that's when you started talking about sidewalks and bike routes. So it was a bit hard to follow you all the way through, but now that I know where you're coming from, I can say that I don't believe connectivity will be a problem at all. As you stated, it will be years before there's a critical mass in this development in terms of population, so that gives the city more than enough time to enhance the "connective tissue" that already exists and plan for new ones.

[krazeeboi]

My original post speaking about having the City having its resources spread far and wide has more to do with the Columbia trying to tackle so much all at once. Instead of really excelling in one area or FINISHING one project before another one starts, the City of Columbia has been dabbling in a project here and there for years. It's like there's an ADD problem within the Mayor's office.

Firstly, let me say that I don't think the Bull Street campus is a fitting example of what you're talking about. The fact is that this property was previously "undevelopable" because it belonged to the state mental health department. So when the department offered to put the property on the market, the city actually learned from the CCI debacle and decided to NOT try and develop the property themselves. Instead they had weeklong charrette to get community input and hired New Urbanist expert Andres Duany to come up with a master plan for the property. In this case, the city did the right thing. Are you suggesting that the city should have had no hand whatsoever in the planning or marketing of this property? Should they have bought it themselves and sat on the land until other projects were done first, then developed it themselves? What other options existed here? Also, you yourself even said that we're talking about years down the road until this project will have a critical population mass. All the city has done to this point is help guide the planning and marketing of the property; actual involvement (in terms of infrastructure improvements) will come years down the road also while this campus is filling out.

Secondly, sizable cities should be able to handle more than one thing at a time; that in itself isn't a problem (like Greenville wanting to overhaul both E. North and Stone Ave. around the same time). It's all in how you go about it. Sometimes the city has gotten in over its head, like with the CCI tract, but thankfully they tend to learn from those mistakes (like with the Bull Street campus). And since cities are always a work in progress, you can't focus 100% on one area of the city all the time and throw all the resources there while the rest of the city languishes.

Thirdly, I think some perspective is needed here, particularly since comparisons to Greenville are being made. In Columbia, the declines of the commercial/entertainment districts happened in cycles. The Vista languished until its revival in the 90's. In the period preceding its revival, Main Street was still relatively stable and active and it wasn't until the Vista's revival was starting to get in full swing that department stores on Main started to close and the decline began occurring. Five Points, on the other hand, never really experienced a decline in terms of activity but as time went on, the district became in need to a little TLC. So the Vista began to get the bulk of the investment first. When merchants along Main and in Five Points began asking, "What about us?" in the late 90's, the city made it clear that the Vista was the priority. However, it was realized that those other two areas couldn't be completely neglected for long and also needed shots in the arm to prevent (further) decline. So streetscapings were planned for Main St. and Five Points, as well as Lady Street. There were some hiccups in terms of getting them completed on time, which is normal, but they were completed and nicely done, IMO (and now that the Vista and Main in particular have been revitalized or are showing early signs of revitalization, attention is shifting to having them connected). Greenville's situation was different in that both Main and the West End were in a state of decline at the same time so there was no need to try and completely revive one district, prevent further decline in another, and sustain yet another. There were no disgruntled merchants in neglected districts screaming, "Hey, what about us? Why are they getting all of the investment?" I think that's a pretty important distinction to make. As it's always said, we're talking about two different cities here that were/are in two different situations.

So, I said that, and then Krazee tried to tell me that this exists because of Columbia being planned and having such a large grid. Sorry, but how your streets were laid out hundreds of years ago has NOTHING to do with how the City manages those streets today, and disperses its resources among them.

I mentioned Columbia being a planned city, but I said absolutely nothing about a large grid being an issue (although the wide streets, which were planned that way, are). I said the issue was that there are large tracts of land in downtown Columbia that are for institutional uses which are pretty spaced out. When the state decides to dump them, the city has to make decisions regarding these tracts and all of this is happening while the city is focusing on and investing in the existing districts within the city. This is something that the city of Greenville, to my knowledge, has not had to deal with. The difficulty of moving ahead with projects on such large tracts of land in general, even for a city that's recognized for having superior planning and urban development standards, can be demonstrated by the very sluggish movement of the Magnolia and Noisette developments in Charleston.

[krazeeboi]

And Columbia, by comparison, has had poor leadership, and is a very divided city - people from Lexington don't even like to associate themselves with Columbia, even though Columbia is the core of this region. Also divided school districts, as compared to Greenville and Charleston, which allows them to do some great things - such as their Fine Arts Center for the whole county. Columbia seems to be moving away from its core - witness Sandhills and growth in the suburbs. If Columbia is ever to get its act together as a great city, it needs to change this culture of division - it needs to unify governments, and people need to recognize that their future is tied to the success or failure of the City of Columbia.

Firstly, if suburban growth is evidence of a city moving away from its core, then I'd say that every city in America has been doing that for the past 60 years. Lord knows Greenville and Charleston have their fair share of suburban growth. Greenville probably has more of it than Columbia, since they strategically plan to place certain developments along I-85--about as far from the core as one can get--for the purpose of visibility. And Greenville's version of the Village at Sandhill, the Shops at Greenridge, predates it.

Sure Columbia has a bit of balkanization going on--every metro of a certain size does--but I don't think it's more than in any other metro of comparable size. As a matter of fact, I'd say that Charleston has just as much, if not more, than Columbia has. While (downtown) Charleston is the showpiece of the region, North Charleston is really where all of the action is happening. Heck, it's almost as big as Charleston itself and is growing faster. It's where the majority of the job growth is happening in the region and is home of the primary suburban retail scene. Some people are upset with Mayor Riley for his aggressive annexation tactics; James Island even incorporated in order to hinder that effort. While there is probably a bit of envy on the part of Charleston for all of the jobs and retail North Charleston gets, there's also quite a bit of disdain as the high crime in North Charleston doesn't paint the prettiest picture for the entire region, especially when it comes to crime rankings. You even have cities fighting other cities over annexation of new residential developments down there and even forming alliances to block one of them from doing so.

I'm not trying to bash any city here, and I'm certainly not denying that division exists within metro Columbia. Just look at Lexington's refusal to participate in solving regional problems that exist like transit and homelessness and these annexation jumps across county lines. I'm just pointing out that it's certainly not unique to Columbia nor among the worst I've seen. Thankfully, certain issues now exist that more or less force leaders of the region to bind together for common purposes with Mayor Benjamin leading the way with those efforts. Hopefully they'll pay off over the long run.

[CorgiMatt]

Nothing in this thread has been about comparing Columbia and Greenville. It's been discussing the importance of connections in downtown Columbia, the challenges that are present, and the impact of the Bull Street project. The ONLY Greenville connections are the developer himself, and my interest in the topic. Well, I say that, but it's now only a previous interest. Since my posts can only be read with negative twists and not viewed objectively as either constructive criticism or genuine curiosity, it's not even worth discussing with you all.

It's as if someone is always out to get you judging by the way some of you post. Defense mode goes into full force when Greenville forumers post ANYTHING. I guess when you're so happy with the way things are, there's no point to look at things from a different point of view, or to question how things are done or have been done in the past..? Carry on, folks.

It might be different if any of the Greenville posters ever said anything good about Columbia in the Columbia threads. Mr. Hughes picked a great city in which to do his development. He has a positive outlook on the outcome. It should be a great thing for the state's capital city. All SC residents should share his enthusiasm.

Edited December 27, 2010 by CorgiMatt

[krazeeboi]

Since my posts can only be read with negative twists and not viewed objectively as either constructive criticism or genuine curiosity, it's not even worth discussing with you all.

I don't think it would be perceived that way if the majority of the posts weren't in the way of what you consider to be constructive criticism, especially if they aren't balanced out with any positives. At a certain point, it comes across as looking down your nose at the place even if you don't mean it like that--particularly when all of the criticism is more or less about the same thing. I don't think anyone would exactly view that positively, no matter which city he/she were a resident of. Now I'm not saying not to speak your mind or share your thoughts whether they be constructive criticism or otherwise, but just understand that if people detect what they perceive to be a negative theme in your postings, you just may not get the responses you were hoping to get.

[gman430]

It might be different if any of the Greenville posters ever said anything good about Columbia in the Columbia threads. Mr. Hughes picked a great city in which to do his development. He has a positive outlook on the outcome. It should be a great thing for the state's capital city. All SC residents should share his enthusiasm.

I share Mr. Hughes enthusiasm. I like how Columbia is reviving their Main Street and adding retailers like Mast General Store which should help connect the dots in the downtown area and increase walkability. I also like how the Bull Street property project is moving forward which should help add connectivity and continue revitilization of that area. Maybe in a few short years, that Bull Street property area will turn out to be a world class mixed use development that everyone from the state will want to visit. I certainly hope so at least.

Edited December 27, 2010 by citylife

[Spartan]

What do you all mean by "connections?" This term has been thrown around a lot, and I'm not sure we're all on the same page. The Bull Street Campus has more connectivity than most new urban style developments of its size due to the fact that it will be an extension of Columbia's robust grid of streets- all of which include sidewalks, and relatively few carry so much traffic that you can't walk or bike on them easily.

The funny thing is that when others say bad things of Greenville, they are branded and asked not to post anylonger, that happens on this site as well as others.

By whom? Nobody has the authority to make that request except moderators.

It is interesting to note the differences even in "energy" between the Urban Planet forums for Columbia and Greenville. The Greenville Forum has 1,086 topics going, while Columbia has only 487. The Greenville Forum has 58,419 replies, while the Columbia Forum has only 24,373 replies.

Those stats are not a relevant comparison. Greenville is consistently one of the most active subforums on UrbanPlanet, along with Grand Rapids, MI and Providence, RI, among others. It's not an accurate comparison of economic activity at all.

[GvilleSC]

What do you all mean by "connections?" This term has been thrown around a lot, and I'm not sure we're all on the same page. The Bull Street Campus has more connectivity than most new urban style developments of its size due to the fact that it will be an extension of Columbia's robust grid of streets- all of which include sidewalks, and relatively few carry so much traffic that you can't walk or bike on them easily.

Some take it to mean simply standard sidewalks. I'm looking for truly pedestrian-friendly/encouraging streetscaping. I think some REALLY celebrated routes to Main Street and Five Points would be an asset. Celebrated in ways that encourage future redevelopment and promote retail to be later constructed and further enhance the route. This includes branding, way-finding for PEDESTRIANS, and appropriately scaled lighting. Anyone COULD walk anywhere. It's a matter of making people want to walk somewhere.

DISCLAIMER: this is MY opinion, and what'd I would want to see if I were to experience it on a daily basis.

Edited December 27, 2010 by GvilleSC

[mr. chips]

Those stats are not a relevant comparison. Greenville is consistently one of the most active subforums on UrbanPlanet, along with Grand Rapids, MI and Providence, RI, among others. It's not an accurate comparison of economic activity at all.

I didn't mean economic activity - I meant the fact that so many people in Greenville are so interested in posting and reading these comments is further indication of the pride and participation of those citizens in their community - i.e. the "energy" is reflected in the number of reader comments. I read recently that Providence, RI is going through similar changes - new riverwalk downtown, artsy place, good restaurants. Don't know about Grand Rapids, but I imagine that there is something similar going on there. My question is - why those places and why not Columbia as much?

Edited December 27, 2010 by mr.chips

[CorgiMatt]

I for one all but stopped posting on UP because I found myself constantly defending Columbia against bashers from Greenville and getting in trouble for some heated comments. Posting something positive about Columbia is almost always met with negative comments from the bashers. The State Hospital development will be quite a feather in this city's cap. The tying together of all the existing districts that draw people is in the conversation among our leaders, and the new mayor is showing strong leadership. We've got it covered. There's a lot of territory to cover with the psychological tie-ins, but hey, that's a big-boned city for you. As downtown Greenville branches out from its spine, Columbia will be connecting the thigh bones to the ankle bones and the neck bones to the butt bones, etc., etc. Different cities, different set of circumstances.

[krazeeboi]

I didn't mean economic activity - I meant the fact that so many people in Greenville are so interested in posting and reading these comments is further indication of the pride and participation of those citizens in their community - i.e. the "energy" is reflected in the number of reader comments. I read recently that Providence, RI is going through similar changes - new riverwalk downtown, artsy place, good restaurants. Don't know about Grand Rapids, but I imagine that there is something similar going on there. My question is - why those places and why not Columbia as much?

The short answer is that Greenville has promoted the city and engaged its citizenry more than Columbia. Greenville has been in the process of reinventing itself for some time now, while Columbia is only recently awakening from its complacency. For too long, local leadership was content with letting USC, state government, and Ft. Jackson run the show because those are relatively stable pillars of the local economy; no one really saw a need to rock the boat. Other cities, on the other hand, saw the bases of their local economies decline as manufacturing jobs were eliminated altogether or shipped overseas, so there was an impetus for reinvention, economic and otherwise. Columbia now knows those stable pillars won't be enough to make the city truly competitive in a 21st century global economy, but the shift in the approach is still in its infancy.

[krazeeboi]

I must have missed something...what's so funny? That analogy seems more or less accurate for downtown Greenville given this map you posted about two years ago:

The "spine" is Main Street as it runs through the West End and up North Main, and from there the "branching out" occurs. Or am I missing something?

[GvilleSC]

I really don't think the Bull St Project thread is the place to discuss this. However, since you beg the question...

Corgi says that when Columbia connects its bones, Greenville will branch out from its spine. What defines spine? The ides of a "spine" is emphasized at this scale because of how much it includes. Zoom in and the spine idea loses a lot of its credibility in many ways. Since Greenville focuses so much attention to pedestrian detail and experience how can you really understand the layout of downtown without considering the human scale and ground-level experience? Here's a zoom:

Where's the spine in this last map? It's lost. The purple are streets that have received pedestrian-focused streetscaping. The orange block is the new visitor's center and cultural attraction/bike and kayak rental, which begins construction this coming year. And the yellow still represents storefronts (excluding office building entries).

But, yea, I guess since the City has been extremely successful in making connections, the idea of branching out gets lost in order to not cut out any thriving areas of the past 25 years of development.

If things don't have to be intimately connected, try mapping Greenville's Pendleton Street Arts District and Heritage Green with the West End and City Center. Sidewalks can get you there, but the experience isn't up to snuff with what we expect for a pedestrian corridor.

Edited December 29, 2010 by GvilleSC

[krazeeboi]

I'm sure that Corgi can explain himself, but to me, "spine" refers to the orientation of the bulk of development, which is largely (not exclusively, but largely) linear along Main Street. However, the zoomed area shows the branching out that has occurred, but overall, the development in downtown still takes a largely linear orientation. There's nothing wrong with that; as a matter of fact, it's been quite advantageous for Greenville. It's the same for Atlanta with the Peachtree corridor which connects its various cores (downtown, Midtown, Buckhead).

To tie this back to Columbia, having an expansive downtown with large tracts and entertainment districts spatially separated, along with wide streets, presents its own set of challenges that have to be overcome. Time will tell how that happens, but for now, the Bull Street campus being adjacent to traditional neighborhoods helps to reinforce the connectivity to the CBD.

[CorgiMatt]

I thought he was laughing about my analogy, not because he disagreed with me. The map Krazeeboi posted unmistakably shows the downtown Greenville spine and the branching out I referred to. The closer map doesn't, of course, because it shows a much smaller area. A map of Columbia on the same scale as the one Krazeeboi posted would show how differently the whole of downtown Columbia is laid out. The State Hospital site is not situated along or near a spine of rehabilitative development, but rather represents a big chunk of real estate that in and of itself is comparable in size to any central business district in SC.

[krazeeboi]

A state circuit judge on Wednesday approved the sale of the Bull Street campus. The sale now must be approved by the State Budget and Control Board, which is expected to decide at its meeting next week. A contingency in the agreement is that developer Bob Hughes can back out if he can’t reach a zoning agreement with the city satisfactory to him within six months. As part of the agreement, he put down $1.5 million in earnest money.

[CorgiMatt]

The S.C. Budget and Control Board unanimously approved the sale of the site this morning.

http://www.thestate.com/2011/06/14/1858527/board-approves-sale-of-bull-street.html

[krazeeboi]

I wonder what timeline Hughes has in mind for this development given the state of the economy.

[johnpro318]

I wonder what timeline Hughes has in mind for this development given the state of the economy.

I'm hoping a lot of apartments to bring huge numbers of people within walking distance of main street. We need to add as many people to the critical mass of downtown as we can and I hope they use quality materials that won't fall apart after 4 or 5 years.

[krazeeboi]

I have no doubt that Hughes will produce a high quality product. I also won't be surprised if the first phase consists mostly or exclusive of apartments which can potentially be converted to condos when the economy improves.

[growingup15]

I Heard this project is going to Feature Many Apartments,Condos and Rowhouses. also talks of adding a few mid rise business apartment/Mixed. and a school and a park. the Mental center i heard is going to be turned into a high price condo.

That's what i heard.