opinion

Bangert: Developer targets boarded-up State Street corner near Purdue. WL: 'Finally'

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – In summer 2014, West Lafayette hired artist Alexandria Monik to dress up the plywood boards nailed over the windows on one of the city’s most conspicuous corners a few blocks from Purdue University.

Mayor John Dennis, at the time, called it “a temporary thing” at the corner of State Street and Northwestern Avenue.

There, plans for a five-story project – with stores and a restaurant in the basement and first floor, apartments up top – had fallen apart two years earlier when developers ran into financial trouble. The Where Else? Bar moved across State Street to Chauncey Hill Mall. Fresh Mix, a salad and smoothie place, disappeared.

Monik presented a mural in a series of panels that were meant to tell, as she described, a progression – starting on the State Street side and moving around to Northwestern – of someone feeling scared and lost, to finding happiness and then giving that to someone else. She said her artistic hope was that people could relate to it for a season or two.

“As well as cover up some ugly boards with bright colors,” Monik said. “I am honestly always surprised to still see it there.”

The end days could be coming soon for Monik’s piece – and for a building that has been a high-profile source of embarrassment for the West Lafayette Village for more than five years.

This week, developer Marc Muinzer’s Chicago-based South Street Capital filed plans with the Tippecanoe Area Plan Commission for a five-story project at the northwest corner of State and Northwestern. With retail space on the ground level and 40 apartments above, the project could be up for city approval in March or April.

“ASAP,” Muinzer said about his timeline. “The time has come to replace the boarded-up buildings sitting on the best corner in the market with a beautiful boutique, mixed-use project.”

Erik Carlson, West Lafayette’s development director, said he welcomed the news.

“That corner has been a point of what you might call unhappiness for long enough,” Carlson said. “We’re glad something’s finally in the works.”

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The plan isn’t a total surprise. It follows an epic deal – at least in West Lafayette terms – that shuffled ownership of three prominent properties near Purdue and put two of them in Muinzer’s hands.

Here are the basics of that transaction along State Street hill, which surfaced in September.

Loren King, CEO of Trinitas, a Lafayette-based development company, is under contract to buy Chauncey Hill Mall, an anchor of property at the southwest corner of State Street and Chauncey Avenue. King has said Trinitas plans to take up to a year, working with West Lafayette and Purdue officials, to decide what sort of project will replace the 2.5-acre strip center that has 25 shops, bars and restaurants and has been a fixture near campus since 1979.

Muinzer picked up the property at State and Northwestern. He also got Chauncey Annex, a two-story retail building across from Chauncey Hill Mall, at the northeast corner of State Street and Chauncey Avenue.

Earlier in 2017, Muinzer bought the Miller Building, a historic structure on the northeast side of State and Northwestern. (Reference point: It's the home of Greyhouse coffee.)

“I cold called Mr. (Joe) Livesay about 20 years ago and asked him how to invest in real estate near Purdue," Muinzer said, referencing a late Lafayette developer who built a number of projects near campus. "He told me, ‘Only buy the best of the best locations,’ and I haven’t forgotten that. There is no better location than the corner of State and Northwestern.”

Muinzer said – and Carlson confirmed – that he first asked the city and county planners to allow him to build a taller building at State and Northwestern. West Lafayette zoning ordinances limit building heights to 35 feet, or roughly three stories. The city has negotiated with builders through the planned development process to bend that rule often, including three project of 10 or more stories in the works in the Village area now.

But Carlson said the city wasn’t comfortable with anything more than five stories among the oldest strip of buildings near the corner of State and Northwestern.

“I initially asked for eight stories,” Muinzer said. “The city said if I kept it at five stories, I could increase the apartment density from 44 beds in the old, 2012 (plan) to whatever my heart desired. I said, ‘You got a deal.’”

The plan filed this week includes 116 beds.

Muinzer said that corner is the start of his plans, even as West Lafayette officials show they’re starting to pull back the reins a bit on development along State Street.

Muinzer said this week that once he can get the project going at the boarded-up property, he’ll turn to plans for Chauncey Annex. There, he wants to build a 17-story, mixed-use building. That would be across the street from Rise at Chauncey, a 16-story project under construction on the former property of University Lutheran Church. That project was designed to come within a few feet of the maximum height allowed by the Federal Aviation Administration that close to Purdue Airport, about a mile away.

“If I can get the FAA to change the flight plans,” Muinzer said, “I’ll seek even taller.”

Carlson said the city has reservations about that idea, even after its $120 million revamping of State Street that was meant to rev up construction in walking distance to campus.

Muinzer argues that West Lafayette is early in a growth cycle for Purdue, which has added 2,803 additional students – up 7.2 percent – since fall 2014. Purdue set a fall semester enrollment record with 41,573 at the start of this academic year.

“I’m bullish and looking to acquire more,” Muinzer said of the near-Purdue market.

Carlson has repeatedly said the city wants to see vacancy rates and how the rental market shakes out after 2019, when 2,100 beds from the other three high-rises are available. Maybe then, he said, the city would be open to another massive project.

“For now,” Carlson said, “we’re just glad to know something’s happening with that boarded up corner. It’s been way too long.”

How long?

When Monik was installing her murals, today’s Purdue seniors would have been arriving on campus for the first time, driving past the plywood on their way to residence halls or walking past en route for their first Den Pop at the Discount Den during the traditions segment of the Boiler Gold Rush orientation week.

“I will be sad to see it go, but it has been going gradually for a long time, anyway,” Monik said. “I definitely didn't think it would be on there for as long as it has been.”

Reach J&C columnist Dave Bangert at 765-420-5258 or at dbangert@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter: @davebangert.