CREJ - Retail Properties Quarterly - November 18, 2015
When Thomas F. Sloan dug a well on his squatter land some time in the summer of 1866, he inadvertently tapped into an underground aquifer. When he awoke the next morning, part of his farmland was covered in water – this was the birth of Sloan’s Lake. The Sloan’s Lake area will experience a different kind of flood in 2016, in the form of massive re-gentrification and the construction of a high-end retail and multifamily urban city center. This is the rebirth of Sloan’s Lake. Sloans is the name of the redevelopment of the former St. Anthony Hospital site located on the south shore of the lake. This seven-city block development is under construction from West Colfax Avenue to 17th Avenue. The signalized intersection at Colfax and Raleigh Street will become the main entry to the massive 17-acre, mixed-use development that will have 850 new for-rent and for-sale residential units, a community park, an eight-screen movie theater and over 50,000 square feet of retail space. Raleigh Street will become a European-style shared auto and bike parkway. It will be wider than Denver’s minimum requirements in order to accommodate additional pedestrian amenities, street trees and sidewalk cafes. The existing office tower at Raleigh and Conejos will be renovated completely. Out goes the 1960s concrete slab wall panels, and in comes brilliant floor-to-ceiling window storefronts and modern office space. Depending on where you stand in the building, you can see clear views of downtown Denver, the foothills to the west and south of the city and, of course, the expanse of Sloan’s Lake Park. “I would pit the views from the Penthouse of the Conejos Street office building against any small office building in the city,” said Jonathan Bush of Littleton Capital Partners. Bush is developer of Block 7 of Sloans. “Not enough people have experienced the breathtaking view of the city and the mountains from Sloan’s Lake, and the proximity to both is unmatched by any multiuse development in the metro area. Five minutes to downtown and 15 minutes to the foothills.” LCP’s project, located on Block 7, consists of a 6,000-sf multitenant retail building on Colfax Avenue and a 50,000-sf office building with 8,000 sf of ground-floor retail space. Running along Raleigh Street will be 4,500 sf of the retail space along with a 2,000-sf proposed patio/beer garden. Alamo Cinema shares the block on the west side and all of Block 7 will have shared access and use of the existing parking garage north of Conejos Street. “Grasping the idea of building condominiums in the city of Denver with Colorado’s vexing construction defects law in place was a challenge, but once we saw the views of the mountains and downtown from what would be a penthouse condominium on the lake, we knew it was a no-brainer,” said Brian Levitt of Nava Development. Nava is building Denver’s only new condominium project on the books for 2016 on Block 1 of Sloans. Most new condominium growth in Denver is at a standstill due to the 2005 law that is blamed for creating an overly litigious environment around construction defects claims and thus resulting in a dearth of new, affordable condos or town-homes in Colorado, according to an editorial in a local newspaper. Nava’s project also will contain two retail spaces earmarked for chef-driven restaurants. Trevor Hines, Levitt’s development partner, is the company’s CEO. After Nava made headway on the condo development, Hines’s father, Gerald D. Hines – the founder of one of the world’s largest real estate companies – decided Sloan’s Lake was too strong of an opportunity to pass up. His company, Hines, is moving forward on development of Block 2, adjacent to Nava’s block, with a 275-unit apartment tower. Hines has developed over 270 million sf around the world. The “play” aspect of Sloans began with Alamo Cinema breaking ground this year to open a new boutique theater running first-line Hollywood films, independents and classics. The developers of the project are looking to collect some of the top chefs and restaurateurs in the city to open new venues, as well as some favorites along the Raleigh Street parkway, including the Lower Highland favorite Highland Tap & Burger.