San Marco Dayton LLC, a group of primarily local investors who are minority community members, plans to revitalize the vacant West Side Chevy building at 800 W. Third St. into a mixed-use development that is stylish and contemporary. The investment would add to a growing number of redevelopment projects planned for the Wright Dunbar business district and nearby areas that people believe will attract more foot traffic, as well as new residents and businesses. San Marco Dayton LLC wants to transform the 50,000-square-foot former auto dealership building into retail space on the ground floor and market-rate apartments on the upper levels, said Lumpkin, who described the group as mostly local investors. The construction timeline likely will be 18 to 24 months, and the hope is to finish the project around the same time the Third Street Street bridge reopens, Lumpkin said. The Third Street bridge, which is the most direct way to get to the Wright Dunbar business district from downtown,. “We don’t have minority developers,” he said. “Here’s an opportunity for that, and we thought, why not develop our own community, instead of waiting for somebody else to come in and do it for us.”
This was significant to me because this article highlights development that will take place 0.2 mi away from the site I will be designing for. Since the co work space and this retail/apartment will be a 5 minute walk apart, I think it’s important to consider the residents living at the apartment complex as potential users of the space. The article continually mentioned “market-value” apartments, which I think will be important to understand in terms of who will be able to afford them and what this will do to the local economy.
