Courier Journal - October 25, 2005, By Matt Batcheldor
Earlier proposals faced opposition
A new developer with a new plan for the 18.8-acre Stallings estate on Herr Lane across from Ballard High School will meet with neighbors tomorrow.
Hagan Properties is proposing Providence Point, a mixed-use development that would include eight three-story condominium buildings, a wide three-story retail and office complex with 138,000 square feet of space, and two additional retail and office buildings closer to Herr Lane with a total of 33,000 square feet.
Hagan attorney Bill Bardenwerper said the development doesn’t require rezoning but needs approval of a revised development plan by a committee of the Louisville Metro Planning Commission.
The proposal has not yet been filed with the commission.
Bardenwerper hopes to have the plan approved by the committee by December and complete construction next year.
If the proposed Providence Point is approved, it would put to rest more than 15 years of disputes over the property and leave in its dust three earlier failed development plans.
Jefferson Fiscal Court rezoned the property from residential to commercial during its final meeting in 2002 before local government merger, after rejecting the proposal in 2000.
The developers sued after the 2000 rejection, but in 2002, at their request, Jefferson Circuit Judge Ann O’Malley Shake dismissed the lawsuit and sent the zoning case back to Fiscal Court so it could reconsider it.
Some opponents of the development who had intervened in the lawsuit as defendants objected to Shake’s ruling and went to the state Court of Appeals.
That court ruled last year that Shake had erred, and returned the case to her.
Hagan developed this plan to address the previous objections of the defendants in that case.
Defendant Dan Heneke, who owns a commercial real estate business near the Herr Lane site, said he is happy with the current plan because it has less “commercial intensity” than the previous ones.
The last plan for the property – for Thurman Ballard LLC to develop 156,000 square feet of stores, offices, a restaurant and a bank – has been scrapped, Bardenwerper said.
Some neighbors and property owners have long fought proposals for the property, primarily contending that they are incompatible with the area and would cause traffic problems.
But now, Bardenwerper said, the remaining neighbors involved in the lawsuit have agreed to drop it if Hagan will meet strict criteria – including that the developments have no more than 46,000 square feet per floor and are built of at least 75 percent brick and manufactured stone.
The current proposal reflects those criteria.
Theresa Stanley, chairwoman of Brownsboro Road Area Defense and a chief critic of proposed Stallings developments said she is most concerned about traffic on Herr Lane.
But she said she will wait to see what the developer comes up with.
“I think everyone that I have talked to is just kind of holding their breath (until) finding out what the final plan is,” Stanley said.
Hagan President T. Kevin Flanery said the proposed development is aesthetically appealing. The condos will each have courtyards and parking beneath them.
The main building will be broken up by multiple Georgian-style facades and divided into several small shop spaces.
Sidewalks will connect the development to adjoining neighborhoods.
He said he envisions “light retail” in the main complex, such as a boutique, café, day spa, dry cleaner and coffeehouse. Offices will fill the floors above.
Behind the shops, two separate two-level brick parking decks will double as barriers, blocking the development from the neighborhoods behind it.
The development’s main entrance will be at the same traffic signal as Ballard High School, and it also will have two other entrances on Herr Lane.
Bardenwerper said the development will not connect to neighborhood streets.