Meadowbrook developers, city work on final details
Developers and Prairie Village city officials continue to work out the details of the proposed redevelopment of the former Meadowbrook Golf and Country Club as the project heads toward an important series of votes next month.
Meanwhile, traffic remains a key concern as planners, elected officials and neighbors wrestle with how to adequately handle hundreds of new residents and park visitors entering and exiting the property bordered by 91st and 95th streets and Nall and Roe avenues daily.
“There’s going to be about 350 cars sharing that one main artery (at Nall Avenue) in and out all the time,” said City Councilwoman Sheila Myers during a meeting Monday. “I see that as a problem.”
VanTrust Real Estate plans to develop a senior center with 120 assisted-living units, 90 skilled nursing units and 120 independent living units as well as a mix of 53 single-family lots, 70 twin-home units, 280 luxury apartment units and a 50-room boutique hotel and restaurant on 45 acres. The company plans to sell the remaining 84 acres to the city for a park and other green space.
The company’s plan originally called for exits at Nall Avenue and West 92nd Terrace to the west, at Rosewood Drive and 94th Terrace to the south and at Roe Avenue and West 91st Street to the northeast.
VanTrust eliminated the Roe Avenue connection in response to opposition from residents in the Kenilworth neighborhood, who said residents and park visitors would add too much traffic to their streets.
During a special Planning Commission meeting last Thursday, commissioners and nearby residents warned that reducing the number of exits to two would put too much stress on those points. They even asked for a traffic signal at the Nall Avenue exit, even though city traffic officials say it’s not warranted.
“Nall is heavily trafficked right now and I’d hate to see that abused,” Joan Nordquist, who lives on 92nd Terrace, told the commission.
The Rev. Ted Pierce, associate pastor of Rolling Hills Presbyterian Church on Nall Avenue, said that his congregation was “ecstatic about what is happening right across the street” but advised caution on traffic, noting that 350 children attend the church’s preschool.
Lindsay Olsen, who owns commercial property at the 94th Terrace access point, said his early support for the Meadowbrook development has soured because the Roe Avenue exit was eliminated.
“Any traffic that is going north is going to go out the Nall side,” Olsen said. “Any traffic going east, west or south is going to come out the Rosewood to 95th Street exit. We’re taking 4,000 vehicles a day — probably three-fourths of those —through our property.”
Some commissioners advocated reopening the Roe Avenue exit, but Richard Muller, executive vice president of VanTrust, said it would increase opposition to the project. Instead, the commission asked him to work with city staff and Overland Park traffic officials who oversee the west side of Nall Avenue to consider installing a signal at the new exit.
Commissioner James Breneman also asked Muller to also consider adding an exit to the southeast corner of the property at 95th Street. Muller said the company considered that possibility but much of the area is in a flood plain and engineering costs for that road could be as much as $1.3 million — compared with an overall road budget of less than $3 million.
In the end, the planning commission voted 5-0 to recommend approval of the development as well as rezoning the land for mixed use, tacking on 27 conditions such as recommending the number of parking places in the apartment garage, ensuring school buses can pick up children living in the development and limiting major delivery vehicles coming to the senior living center and inn during off-peak traffic hours. Those recommendations are scheduled to go before the City Council for a final vote on Dec. 7.
At that same meeting, the council is expected to consider a redevelopment agreement with VanTrust covering the entire project as well as officially signing off with the Johnson County Park and Recreation District on a master plan for developing the park.
“We’ve been looking forward to reaching this milestone for a long time,” Muller said after the five-hour planning commission meeting. “A lot of people have worked really hard to get here, and we’re thrilled with the outcome.”
On Monday night landscape architect Kelly VanElders, who is working with the park and recreation district to design the park, detailed for the City Council the tapestry of walking trails, playgrounds, natural areas and open spaces that will be created, often incorporating the existing golf course landscaping.
“This park will be able to fulfill a lot of the needs of this part of the county,” VanElders told the council.
The city plans to buy the parkland with a series of general and special obligation bonds that would be repaid through a tax increment financing district covering the entire property.
Tax increment financing, or TIF, allows the city to pledge future property tax gains on a piece of land to help pay for its development.
The council on Monday delayed creating a transient guest tax that would apply to the boutique inn on the property and help pay off those bonds after members said they wanted to avoid applying the tax to people who rent out rooms or their entire homes through online services like Airbnb.
Council members asked City Attorney Catherine Logan to change the proposed definition of a hotel, which is set in state law, from any operation with more than two bedrooms to one with more than five.
This story was originally published November 13, 2015 at 9:34 AM with the headline "Meadowbrook developers, city work on final details."