For four decades, Joe Edwards built the Delmar Loop organically, relying on independent stores and an abundance of nearby rental property. Then, when condos began sprouting up in Clayton’s DeMun neighborhood and downtown, the same transformation began in U. City.
Today, Loop developers are working on Kingsland Walk, a planned 98-unit complex with condos and apartments, plus roughly 20,000 square feet of retail space. Construction begins on the first phase, at Vernon and Kingsland avenues, later this year, at an estimated cost of $36 million (with $5.5 million in tax abatements).
It follows on the heels of the towering Mansions on the Plaza development on Delmar Boulevard three blocks east of Interstate 170. That mix of 200-plus condos and apartments took five years and $70 million to finish.
City manager Lehman Walker says developers are capitalizing on the city’s assets—though that didn’t work for the Loop Living development, just a block from the proposed Kingsland Walk. Its high-end condos rose in 2006, and most remain empty.
Will the same fate befall Kingsland Walk? Careful phasing-in and a significant retail component will make the difference, Walker predicts.
