November 7, 2014 | Green Street

Copied from St. Louis Business Journal

Growth in The Grove: $85 million Grove development planned

SUBSCRIBER CONTENT: Nov 7, 2014, 5:00am CST

Grove
DILIP VISHWANAT | SLBJ

A mixed-use development in The Grove will be anchored by a grocery store and 250 apartments units.

Brian Feldt

Reporter- St. Louis Business Journal


A grocery store and more than 250 market-rate apartments are part of the first phase of a $73.8 million development planned for the eastern end of The Grove neighborhood.

Green Street St. Louis has 4.5 acres of land under contract at 4001 Chouteau Avenue to build the apartments, which will sit atop 65,000 square feet of commercial space, with about half of that space earmarked for a grocery store.

The land is next door to the nearly completed Commerce Bank facility at 901 South Vandeventer Ave. Commerce Bank is the seller of the property. Terms of the deal, which is expected to close in early 2015, were not released.

Brian Pratt, vice president of development for Green Street, said the company is in talks with several St. Louis-area grocery stores as well as a few from outside the region.

The project will include more than 550 parking spaces for public and private use.

Phil Hulse, managing principal of Green Street said the development will serve as “an iconic entrance to The Grove” and introduce new housing alternatives to the neighborhood, which is mostly made up of rehabilitated older buildings.

Pratt said developers are seeking $14 million in subsidies from the city of St. Louis to help finance the development.

Brooks Goedeker, executive director of Park Central Development, a community development corporation serving neighborhoods that include The Grove, called the project a potential “gamechanger” for the area and its future.

“It could really take care of everything for us,” he said. “It’s the biggest site and surface lot we had available in the neighborhood. If we can receive some quality development there, everything else falls into place.”A planned second phase, estimated to cost about $11.7 million, would include another 15 studio apartments with 20,000 square feet of commercial space underneath. Acquisition of that land, at the intersection of Chouteau and Manchester, is being negotiated between Green Street and property owners, which include the city’s Land Reutilization Authority.

Green Street which has $50 million to $100 million in projects underway at any given time, is one of St. Louis largest commercial developers, with 235,000 square feet of commercial space completed or under construction in 2014.

The Grove projects, once complete, would give Green Street two high-profile developments that bookend the area. The company recently completed its work on Urban Chestnut’s $6 million second location at 4465 Manchester Road, on the western edge of The Grove.

Green Street has hired Zanola Co. to complete a feasibility analysis for the first project to assist in finalizing details.

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