Local business owners won't pay for it, and now it appears neither will the City Council. The "it", of course, is the extension of 50th Street from O to R. *sigh*
A new Hy-Vee in the 48th and O corridor would be a nice, attractive addition to the area, especially relative to what's there now. I can understand why the City pursued the deal, and why Hy-Vee made their proposal contingent on the 50th Street extension. What irks me is how the City keeps flubbing these economic development opportunities after promoting them so heavily. John Q. Hammond's hotel evaporated; the Verizon RFP had to be scrubbed; and now this. I would even add a project like The Grand Theatre as an example of an opportunity lost. Is it just a string of bad luck, or is it symptomatic of problems endemic to the City's economic development policies and procedures? (That's an actual question, by the way, not an accusation disguised as a question.)
Lincoln can do well, of course. Downtown's Embassy Suites is a good example of economic development success, and even Verizon will be an overall success once the RFP mess gets sorted out.
Hopefully the Hy-Vee deal can be salvaged (or replaced by something even better). Regardless, the City needs to figure out what it can change to better help prevent these snafus. They aren't good for the City's image, and they don't do anything to build the community's faith in major projects like Antelope Valley, the proposed Downtown parking garage/high rise, or a new arena/convention center.
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I wouldn’t praise the success of the downtown Embassy Suites too much…don’t forget the years of bungling that preceded it. Demolishing a block for a downtown mall, the mishaps with relocating all of those businesses and eliminating a beloved block of stores, the loss of the anchor store which led to the mall project falling apart, and then a once-thriving downtown block sitting as a vacant parking lot for about 10 years before someone finally decided to give the city an opportunity to forget that embarrassment. It turned out okay eventually, but there was plenty that went wrong before.
I would argue that all of that bungling wasn’t in any direct way associated with the Embassy Suites deal, and so it’s not fair to lump the two together. Contrast that situation with the project that eventually became The Grand; The Grand is very directly the result of large failures at both the public and private level.
But you do make a good point. Even if the Embassy Suites deal itself went relatively well, it is haunted by the ghosts of shenanigans past. Unfortunate, that, since the hotel has been a very positive addition to Downtown since its opening.
I, for one, was shocked to see that HyVee is considering closing their store at 48th and Leighton. WTF? That’s the only grocery store in the area; 48th and O has SuperSaver, Target (some groceries), etc. Doesn’t East Campus and University Place neighborhood support a grocery store? Every time I pass that place, it’s completely jammed with cars. Anytime I go in to shop, it’s pretty busy. What the heck?
That is odd about the 48th and Leighton HyVee. Couldn’t agree more with your observations.
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