Vision for Sinclair site is mixed use with a lot of housing, discussion of New Bohemia reveals

This week the City Council got behind the renovation of Third Street SE between Eighth and 14

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avenues SE, the heart of the New Bohemia area and the center of a hoped-for arts and cultural district.

The entire street will be torn up, transformed from a 48-foot-wide street to a 43-foot one, with wider sidewalks and other amenities.

In agreeing to the street renovation, city staff and the City Council set aside their reservations of 18 months ago about converting what is an arterial street and sole access into the former Sinclair redevelopment site into a less-wide avenue in an arts district.

 In the discussion this week, John Bender, president of the engineering firm, Ament Inc., noted that 4,000 vehicles a day use this stretch of Third Street SE, and by 2040, as many as 13,500 could be using the street.

Any time traffic counts exceed 10,000 vehicles a day, thoughts turn from two-lane streets to four-lane ones, Bender noted. But the thought is that a two-lane street will continue to work even with the projected traffic counts.

In passing, Bender noted that the current city thinking on the 30-acre Sinclair meatpacking site is that it will be developed mostly as a residential site. He referred to comments made by Sam Shea, the city's long-range planning coordinator.

On Thursday, Shea said the idea is that the Sinclair site will likely be a mixed-use development of residential with some commercial and maybe even some retail. It would be a place where people live, work and play, he said.

Shea said projected traffic counts in 2040, if they came to pass, likely would make a two-lane Third Street SE in New Bohemia a "pretty busy street" at times. An arts district might not mind some traffic, he added.

At the same time, he noted that the future could bring other traffic changes, including another access into the Sinclair site.

But that is in the future.

Giant debate looms before the construction crews hit Third Street SE in New Bohemia, which is a piece of the Oak Hill Neighborhood.

Firstly, there is a dispute over design. New Bohemia advocates favor a modern street design, while some of the property owners favor of historic look like that in Czech Village across the Cedar River.

The city intends to bring on a facilitator to find some common ground.

Additionally, property owners now apparently will be required to contribute to the cost of the project, which was put at $3.4 million a few years ago.

The earlier Third Street SE plan, which was part of the failed Cedar Bend/Vision Iowa project, had the city paying for the cost. The argument had been that the historical and arts and cultural center would become a regional tourist draw.

That notion, though, was before the city lost its state Vision Iowa money for the project, before the city changed its form of government, before it hired a city manager and before it elected its current City Council.

This council this week said it wanted to see property owners along the street contribute to an investment that surely will make their properties more valuable.

Council member Tom Podzimek said he, too, would love to see government spending out on his street, Maplewood Drive NE, if he didn't have to contribute.