The Roeland Park City Council got a closer look this week at the details of a proposed $50-75 million mixed-use development at The Rocks site, where the city pool was located a few decades ago.
Driving the news: Austin Bradley, executive vice president of the project’s developer, EPC Real Estate Group LLC of Overland Park, updated the council Monday on the company’s progress since the council approved entering a 90-day memorandum of understanding last month.
The details: Plans call for the following components, according to Bradley’s presentation:
- About 280 apartments
- A two-story restaurant of up to 5,000 square feet, possibly with a rooftop patio
- Retail and commercial space
- A parking garage for the project’s residents that will be minimally visible
- A private-public plaza that will be “really more of a beer garden environment,” according to Bradley
- Fitness facilities and other amenities
What happens next: EPC met the MOU’s timing requirements in submitting site plans, building plans, a construction estimate, underwriting and financials, Bradley said.
- Now the company is working on an agreement to buy the land from the city, which Bradley said he hoped to deliver to the council early next month, by the Sept. 9 deadline.
- The next steps would include creating a preliminary development plan and a tax-increment financing plan.
What they’re saying: Bradley told the Shawnee Mission Post after Monday’s meeting that it was too early in the process for him to have details on the range of apartment rents or sizes.
- The estimated project cost is now “trending towards the upper end” of the $50 to $75 million range, he said.
- Bradley added that he hoped to start construction in mid-2023 and finish the project about 20 months later.
Key quote: “These infill, highly desirable locations are kind of our bread and butter, especially mixed-use and multifamily,” Bradley said at Monday’s meeting.
Going deeper: The project does set aside some units as “affordable.”
- What that means, according to the MOU, is that a minimum of 5% of the project’s apartment units shall be set aside for renters making at or below 60% of the average median income in the Kansas City metropolitan area.
- The project also must have at least 3,500 square feet of retail space.
Discussion: Some councilmembers asked how traffic would be handled traveling between the project site and nearby busy streets, including the well-traveled Roe Avenue which connects to Interstate 35 just north of the site.
- City Administrator Keith Moody said the city would require a traffic study as part of determining traffic restrictions to and from the site.
Zooming out: EPC is the company behind The Locale project on Johnson Drive in Mission, the planned active living senior community on Shawnee Mission Park in Fairway and the Avenue 80, 81 and 82 projects in downtown Overland Park.
- EPC’s involvement with The Rocks project follows recent efforts by Sunflower Development Group to develop the site.
- Mayor Mike Kelly, who is running for Johnson County chair this November, told the council in June that the city and Sunflower couldn’t come to a final development agreement.
- The city and Sunflower had entered into a 120-day memorandum of understanding for a mixed-use development at the site.
Jerry LaMartina is a freelance journalist who contributes frequently to the Shawnee Mission Post and other Kansas City-area publications. He can be reached at lamartina.jerry@gmail.com.
