Agenda Packets - 2015/10/05 - Laserfiche WebLink

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5.16 The one exception might be single-level townhomes, which strongly appeal to an older buyer. Given the demographics of Mounds View and the lengthy period of the housing bust, there likely is pent-up demand from older Mounds View households to downsize and simplify their living situation. The challenge with single-level townhomes is that they take significantly more land per unit than other housing types, which decreases the amount of land available for other complementary uses, such as retail and restaurant s, within the Crossroad Pointe site. As for more dense forms of for-sale housing, such as condominiums or two- and three-story townhomes, there are other market challenges that would need to be overcome. First of all, there is a nearby townhome development with two-story product that has been very slow to absorb. Therefore, until the market demonstrates the viability of that product type, it would be recommended to consider other for-sale types. Second, the Crossroad Pointe site is not well positioned for condominium product because it does not have the open space and neighborhood amenity to draw buyers. Suburban condo product almost invariably needs a lake, a view, or some other selling feature to draw buyers. 5.4.4 Senior Housing Market Mounds View is an aging community with demographics very favorable for senior housing. However, the planned assisted living/memory care building adjacent to the property will likely absorb much of the existing pent up demand for those levels of care. Therefore, it would be recommended to wait and see how this property performs before considering similar uses on Crossroad Pointe site. With that being said, there probably is an opportunity to complement the development next door to the site with a concept targeted to more independen t seniors. However, in order to take any advantage of such a synergy, it would require a partnership of some sort with the developer/owner of the assisted living/memory care project. 5.5 RETAIL The small size of the Crossroad Pointe site and its proximity to Rosedale, and to a lesser extent Northtown, limits its potential to support any large-scale retail development. The size of the site also likely limits its size to support community scale retail (i.e., a Target or Wal-mart anchored development). Furthermore, the pending TCAAP development calls for some community-scale retail uses, which will likely out-compete the Crossroad Pointe site. Therefore, neighborhood- scale retail is the most likely option for the site. Nonetheless, placemaking will still be importa nt to attract retailers and customers as the retail market is increasingly becoming dominated by experiential retail in which the shopping experience becomes more important than convenience. Currently, the County Road 10 corridor between I-35W and Hwy 65 has a little over 80 retail properties, most of which are smaller, older and have low rents ($7.72 is the current average per square foot). Vacancy is 6.5%, which is above the metro-wide rate of 5.1%. Although there is some opportunity to introduce new retail space that would be a clear improvement over many of the existing options, one would need to attract chain retailers to the corridor in order to