FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Indiana-based development group Trinitas Ventures is trying to develop a 676-bed housing complex in downtown Fayetteville. However, due to the city's parking laws and a tied vote from the planning commission, the contentious project had been put on hold.
Now, after the Fayetteville City Council voted for an appeal, the development group may be able to move forward.
The project eyes a property on Center Street, with offsite parking at 155 N Powerhouse Ave., the site of the now closed Powerhouse restaurant.
Powerhouse Seafood and Grill closed permanently on July 2, 2023, after more than 30 years of business, according to the restaurant's Facebook. Nearly a year later, the building remains vacant.
Some in Fayetteville say they want to preserve the building and offer it to local businesses or restaurants. Others don't care about what happens to the building, they just don't want it to be razed and turned into parking.
"While we are very supportive of the addition of more housing, which will help alleviate our current housing crisis, we don't think turning this, or any, downtown space into a parking lot is a good use of that land," said DeLani Barlette, the founder and president of Fayetteville Strong.
Fayetteville Strong is a local community group that works to make Fayetteville more walkable, bikeable, and equitable, Bartlette said. She explains that the bigger issue highlighted in this is rules that are outdated and hindering development in the city.
"It's another example of how our outdated development codes (such as residential parking minimums) are producing worse designs and preventing more housing from being built. We hope we can find a solution that brings desperately needed housing to our community without sacrificing valuable downtown real estate to such unproductive — and unattractive — uses like surface parking," Bartlette said.
The residential parking minimum that Bartlette refers to is a city requirement that for every bed in a residential unit there is certain amount of parking spaces. For the 676-bed student housing project, 439 parking spaces are required. The development group has determined that while 245 of those can be onsite, 194 would have to be offsite.
The complex itself is slated to be located on Center Street off the Frisco Trail. The complex would be about a five-minute walk from the offsite parking at the Powerhouse lot.
Trinitas has gone down different avenues to solve this issue, considering multiple different areas for offsite parking before landing on the Powerhouse lot.
During a planning commission meeting on April 8, the commission voted 4-4, shooting down a proposed conditional use permit that would've allowed the project to move forward with offsite parking on the Powerhouse lot.
Without the parking issue resolved, the development was effectively on hold.
Commissioner Jimm Garlock was wary of the project, saying that Fayetteville has spent too much on building up the downtown area to turn a once active space into a parking lot.
Commissioners that voted in favor of the permit say that building anything else on that lot would be difficult due to low-hanging powerlines and other issues that could stifle development.
During the Fayetteville City Council meeting on May 7, an appeal was passed, allowing the project to move forward with building offsite parking on the Powerhouse lot.
Included with the appeal was a letter of support from the Underwood family, who owns the Powerhouse lot property.
“We just declared a housing crisis,” Councilmember D’Andre Jones said. “Although it’s not a perfect project, I believe it meets our needs.”
The resolution passed 5-3.
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