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Developers, public discuss future of city-owned property
By Bill Conrad, bconrad@acnpapers.com
PLANO -- The city of Plano is seeking public input concerning what kind of development should take place on a piece of city-owned property in east Plano.
The city purchased a 4.6-acre plat of land at the northwest corner of K Avenue and Park Boulevard about a decade ago, said Phyllis Jarrell, the city's planning director. Jarrell said the city hoped the property would help spur development in the area, which sits adjacent to the Parker Road DART station.
"The city has chosen a development partner, Prescott Realty Group, and over the next 120 days we will be looking at what types of uses and development plans may be put together for the property, as well as negotiating a development agreement with Prescott Realty Group," she said during a public meeting about the property Tuesday night.
The area is dominated by automotive businesses, as well as surface parking for the DART station. One of the more prominent businesses in the area is the Plano Super Bowl, which could tie in nicely with the new development. Allan Zreet of Jacobs Engineering, an engineering firm working with Prescott, said the bowling alley could serve as part of a larger entertainment district.
The developers said one of the goals of the development would be to draw more riders to the DART rail station. The more people who are in the area, the greater the chance future developers will come in and pump money into the area. An entertainment district, or something such as a hospital or university, will almost certainly increase ridership, accomplishing this goal, Zreet said.
"[Parker Road] is considered a point of origination station because everybody who drives here catches the train to go somewhere else," Zreet said. "What if we reversed that and made this a destination station where people would come from downtown Dallas, downtown Plano or Richardson to come to this station?"
Zreet said DART has a history of working with developers and allowing them the build on their surface parking lots, assuming the developers replace that parking with nearby structured parking. Jarrell agreed, adding that if the DART line is extended north, the Parker Road station will no longer be the end of the line and the amount of parking needed would be diminished.
Several members of the public who attended the meeting suggested adding sit-down restaurants to the area, saying the area was lacking them. Another person in attendance was Chris Caso, the chairman of the city's planning and zoning board. Caso called for the area to feature mixed-use development.
"It seems as though if you have a mixed-use with maybe a medical building and a college, that would be the type of use that would get people using the transit," he said. "I don't know if just having an office building is going to get people [to ride DART] ... You might want to look at more than one use so that if you have the college and the medical facility -- and if there is a nursing or biology program -- they could use the two simultaneously."
Jarrell said another meeting will be scheduled in the next 30-60 days, with additional meetings being held as the developers continue to refine their plan and come up with how the property will be laid out.
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A college is interesting. Collin College is the only public institution of higher education in Collin County. Four acres isn't very big for a college, so it probably would have to expand somewhere.
A hospital or a research center sounds interesting and useful. I believe that biotechnology is in its infancy, and we will see much more growth from it in the near future.
Dining establishments would be good, too. That area has a few fast food offerings, but the only real dining is about a mile South, in downtown. Entertainment center might be good. Maybe even a museum?
We could have something unique; that's what I'd like to see. Something unique, inspiring and that doesn't make the neighborhood a pain to traverse. Plano is a quiet, bedroom community ideal for families. I don't want that changed.
Whatever goes in there, I hope it does not include alcoholic beverages or attract rowdy behavior. "