The Tuscaloosa City Council rejected a plan Tuesday night to build a riverfront apartment complex that also featured eight to ten storefronts and restaurants from Carter, an Atlanta-based development company.
The planned development was presented to the Riverfront Advisory Committee and the Tuscaloosa Planning Commission in December, and representatives from Carter significantly revised their plans to address the issues that those meetings raised.
The group removed 160 bedrooms from the plans and more than quadrupled the retail space allotted in their designs after the December meetings. The proposed four-story site, as presented Tuesday, would have featured 694 bedrooms above 30,000 square feet of retail space, capable of housing eight to ten stores or restaurants.
Members of the council and community praised the planning of the development and the professionalism of the developers from Carter but said that while the planned complex was beautiful, it was not what the city needed long term.
“I’ve never worked with a group of people as professional as this group,” said Councilman Kip Tyner. “And one day I feel like I feel good about it, and the next day I have more questions.”
Tyner said, however, that he represented his people, and the members of his district were strongly opposed to the development.
“The problem is that I haven’t had the first person in my district vote in favor of it,” Tyner said. “This group has been extremely professional in how they’ve handled things and responded to our input, but I have to look at my constituents as well, and I’m torn. I’m just torn.”
Mayor Walt Maddox spoke the same way of the company, and said that their planned site was great for a short-term boom, but he worried about the longevity of the project.
“When I was five years old, I came into the den and beside the Christmas tree was a shiny new yellow bicycle,” Mayor Walt Maddox said. “I remember it to this day. I loved it, and I so was happy to have it. For a long time, it was great. But over time, it began to rust. It didn’t wear as good, and I had to move on to something else.
“What I see tonight is analogous to that Christmas morning,” Maddox continued. “I have no doubt that what would be built there would be applauded, and probably for a few years it would be an asset to the Riverfront, but I think we have to look at the bigger picture and how time is going to treat this decision.”
Several community members were also against the idea of the complex being geared primarily towards students. Among the oppositionists was Joan Barth, representing Tuscaloosa Neighbors Together.
“This place is meant to be for the community, for everyone, and this is a development where units are sold by the bedroom. It’s designed solely for students,” Barth said. “The retail development below the apartments is appealing, and it’s part of what we want, but if there are students living above it, think about what retailers are attracted to the students living right above them? It would be a shame for this area to come to be known as ‘Strip West.’
“I thought about how to say this delicately, but there’s just no other way,” Barth said. “Students tend to be involved in relationships that involve a lot of sleepovers. So when there is a sleepover, there is another car. And so actually it’s not four cars per unit that are going to be in this area, but sometimes six. Our members are also concerned about the noise and the general mess associated with housing dedicated to students.”
Taylor, Carter’s President, said that the development would have provided more than 250 jobs and $50 million to the city over the course of ten years.
Four members of the council voted against the complex, two voted for and one abstained from the vote due to a conflict of interest caused by his personal business holdings.
