In two weeks, the Davenport city council will take a largely symbolic vote on the mixed-use development with the romantic-sounding name Prairie Heights, on the land formerly known as 53rd and Eastern. That will be one of the earliest - and easiest - steps in what's expected to be an arduous process for the city council. Zoning and financing will be tricky issues to negotiate, to say nothing of convincing the public that this is a smart use of taxpayer money. But the first real challenge to getting this bold proposal through will be getting developers who own property in the project area to agree to the plan.

More than the name has changed for the property at 53rd Street and Eastern Avenue. What was once planned as a golf course and high-end residential development has been envisioned as a "new urbanist" haven in Davenport. The 630 acres, of which the city owns 220 acres, would feature more than 1,000 dwellings (with prices ranging from $150,000 to $525,000), a 126-acre park, greenspace corridors, and (along 53rd Street) commercial development.

Prairie Heights is about more than the allocation of space, though. It is first and foremost meant to show the Quad Cities a new way of doing development.

The "new urbanist" model focuses on creating old-style neighborhoods in which people build relationships with their neighbors rather than constructing privacy fences. Lots are smaller and houses are closer to the street. People will walk to the park and stores rather than drive, and architecture is meant to create a sense of place. (Prairie Heights is envisioned with three distinctive types of architecture.) New-urbanist developments are typically mixed-use and diverse, with housing for a variety of income levels.

This, to most people, sounds innovative and wise. And when the city council votes July 2 on the plan, you might not hear much complaining or controversy. But the vote on whether to adopt the plan will mean little. As Alderman Wayne Hean said, "We adopt a lot of plans," but few become reality.

As City Administrator Craig Malin is quick to point out, what is being discussed now is the vision: the general breakdown of residential, commercial, and greenspace, and the "new urbanism" principles. In other words, the city council will be voting on a broad outline next month, with the details to be filled in at a future date.

Malin estimated that implementing the vision - deciding how to institute architectural and other guidelines and how to pay for infrastructure, for example - could take six months or more. The city plans to build infrastructure in 2004, with the first Prairie Heights residents moving in the year after that.

Malin is clearly frustrated when people start asking implementation questions - how this or that might work. But his approach doesn't recognize that some questions should be worked out beforehand. Most importantly: Will the owners and developers of the land not owned by the City of Davenport go along with the proposal? The answer could make or break the development.

One key property owner said he's unwilling to fully endorse the project until he knows more about the implementation process. "I don't understand the concept of putting the plan in place, and the details later, and the financing later," said Steve Schalk, a local attorney and a principal in Eastern Avenue Farms.

"Where's the Endorsement?"

The first thing that's important to remember about Prairie Heights is that it's not just a city project. Davenport owns 220 acres of the land in the project area, with most of the rest of the land owned by Eastern Avenue Commercial Developers (led by Rob Fick, president of Mel Foster Company) and Schalk's Eastern Avenue Farms. Those two entities own roughly 350 acres.

The city, in theory, could do the "new urbanism" thing on its land and let those owners do what they want with theirs. But the project can't be broken apart so easily. The public park takes up more than half the city's portion of the property, and Malin has said it's an all-or-nothing situation.

"I don't think I want it to go forward without those property owners signing onto the plan," added Alderman Bob McGivern. He said he will likely support the Prairie Heights plan on July 2 but said he wouldn't be concerned if developers haven't yet agreed to the plan.

Alderman Wayne Hean is more concerned about the property owners. The city can't make developers do what they don't want to do. "If the developers aren't doing the same thing, we don't have a plan," Hean said. "Some sort of communication from them by July 2 would be nice. ... Where's the endorsement?"

A public show of support from the other property owners could also serve as a validation of the city's methodology and projections. Conversely, their questions or concerns might bring things to the city's attention that nobody had thought of. "They might say, 'We don't think we're going to make money,'" Hean said. "Do all the models make sense to the business community developing the land adjacent?"

Hean added that if the other land owners commit to the project, "that would facilitate things through [the] zoning" because there would already be agreement among the parties about basic project features; the city wouldn't be imposing on the other property owners.

But so far, there has been no public endorsement of the project from any of the other landowners in the project area. And that vote of confidence is unlikely to come. "I'd have to see more detail of what they'd attempt to impose on us," Schalk said, before he'd be willing to lend his support. He said he wants to know what architectural guidelines, lot sizes, and lot configurations will be put in place.

Those are exactly the kinds of details that Malin envisions working out after the July 2 vote.

Malin has stressed that the other property owners have had input into the plan and that discussions with them are ongoing. But public statements from those property owners have seemed lukewarm toward the project.

"I think there are a lot of pluses to it," said Schalk. One of the attractive things to him is that the city is not asking too much of developers, instead requesting that the private landowners "pick up the flavor of what they're trying to do on the city land." Schalk added that in the interest of getting the streets built and a park established in northeastern Davenport, "I'm willing to take some additional risk or examine those concepts." Greenspace set-asides in the Prairie Heights plan would restrict the amount of residential area, he said, but the higher density of housing makes up for that.

Schalk also said he's interested in making some minor revisions to the plan in the areas of the timing of road construction, the location and size of commercial areas, and the density of housing. He said he's discussed those issues with Malin, and he doesn't expect any of them to be deal-breakers.

Malin said the only objection he has heard from property owners has come from Eastern Avenue Commercial Developers' Fick. Malin said Fick is concerned that the housing in Prairie Heights is not dense enough. Fick told the River Cities' Reader, "We're kind of withholding judgment at this point."

Clayton Lloyd, Davenport's director of community and economic development, said the city has had discussions with all the property owners in the project area. "We've had some expressions of support and some expressions of concerns," he said. "No one has said, 'I object.'" Lloyd said there have been questions raised about the flexibility of the configuration in the plan, particularly of greenspace corridors, as well as the issue of private land that's publicly accessible.

Lloyd said those concerns are being addressed. "It is a plan," he said. "It is not zoning. It is not a prohibition."

Other Issues

Although Malin doesn't want to talk details, developers clearly do. And so do some members of the city council

Hean said there are other things he wants before the July 2 vote.

First, he is requesting a revised fiscal-impact analysis that projects costs over time (rather than using current costs and current dollars for future expenses). "In three years, what is going to be the cost of police service, the cost of plowing the streets?" he said.

The existing fiscal analysis suggests the city will net $551,000 a year from the project, basically by subtracting infrastructure and ongoing costs ($2.6 million a year) from increased property-tax revenues. (The analysis also says the city will get a one-time $2.43-million benefit, mostly from the sale of the property.) Hean wants to make sure the analysis' methodology is sound.

Both Malin and McGivern, though, stressed that the fiscal analysis was conservative, for instance projecting police-protection costs based on the numbers of calls for fully developed areas.

Hean also said he wants a to-do list of things that need to change, such as zoning, in that area before Prairie Heights can be developed.

That sentiment was echoed by McGivern. "We need to grasp the realities of how this going to be financed and implemented," he said. "I'm eager to really get into the implementation side of it."

One major question of implementation will be how to ensure that the execution matches the plan.

Traditionally, the city would use the Planned Unit Development or Planned Development District process to essentially impose a plan on the land. In this scenario, the street and lot layout, architectural restrictions, and other details would be established by the city council. This would afford the city more control over the project, but the top-down approach could chafe the owners of the other land. This approach would also suggest that Prairie Heights is a one-time project.

Hean said that he prefers this approach, but mostly because he's more familiar and comfortable with it.

The alternative would be to create a new zoning classification, something along the lines of a "traditional neighborhood" designation. Malin said he supports this route, and McGivern said it is attractive because it "would clarify the purpose of the concept" by codifying the tenets of "new urbanism." This approach would mean the city would have a template with which to work for similar developments in the future, and it would also give developers more flexibility. This approach has the disadvantage of giving the city less control over the land it doesn't own.

Documents related to the Prairie Heights proposal - including the plan itself, the market study, and the fiscal analysis - can be downloaded at (http://www.cityofdavenportiowa.com/latest.htm).

Background on new urbanism can be found at (http://www.newurbanism.org).


Sidebar: Why All Quad Citians Should Care

Although the Prairie Heights development would appear to be something only of concern to Davenport residents, the project is worth the attention of the entire Quad Cities area.

Most importantly, if Prairie Heights happens, and if it succeeds, it could be a model for sustainable new development for the rest of the community, an antidote to cookie-cutter subdivisions and rampant sprawl. It could show developers that traditional, more compact neighborhoods can be profitable, and that there is a market for them.

It could also prove to be an example of a public-private partnership in which city government can leverage its resources and power to create something that might not exist without its intervention. The City of Davenport is clearly in an unusual situation by owning the land, but all cities have tools - such as zoning power and economic incentives - that could be used for the greater public good.

Other communities might also learn from how Davenport took a contentious issue - plans for a golf course and residential area at 53rd and Eastern - and used public input to try to build consensus on a bold new concept. No matter what happens with Prairie Heights, the process is sound and worth mimicking.

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