Article Month(s) 2006

From the July/August 2006 issue of New Urban News

How to mitigate the impact of big box stores

Robert Steuteville

Courtesy of Continuum Partners

There are many ways to integrate large-format retail stores into a pedestrian-oriented environment. The choice depends on the budget and the unique circumstances of each main street or urban center. Belmar, a new urbanist grayfield development in Lakewood, Colorado, employs four strategies. A downtown that is being built on the site of a former regional mall, Belmar incorporates a Dick’s Sporting Goods of 80,000 square feet, a 65,000 sq. ft. Whole Foods, and a 64,000 sq. ft., 16-screen, multiplex theater. Belmar also includes a series of “mid-box” retailers like DSW, Pier 1, Linens ’n Things, and Party America. These large retail/entertainment uses fit into a downtown that will eventually have 1,400 residential units, offices, civic uses, a hotel, and scores of small shops and eateries.

Big box stores in suburbia are detrimental to walkability and human-scale environments because they come with large blank walls, are built with cheap materials, produce unwieldy blocks, require large surface parking areas, and often demand sizable loading facilities. The developer, Continuum Partners of Denver, dealt with each issue in a creative way. This article examines strategies, issues, and solutions related to large blocks, liner buildings, and parking.

THE FULL WRAP
The biggest challenge was probably the theater, at the heart of the 104-acre site. “The theater would have done better at the start if it were at the edge, but in the long run we felt that it is better for everybody if it were placed at the center,” says Tom Gougeon, principal and chief development officer for Continuum, who was interviewed by phone and email. The location decision meant that the entire theater box must be enclosed with high-quality, mixed-use buildings.

Unlike most multiplexes, Continuum set high architectural standards for Century 16 Belmar. Wrapping the entire building meant that all of the architecture budget could be put into the entrance. “The architect [Fehlman LaBarre of San Diego] did a great job — it was built to a community performing arts center standard,” Gougeon says. Not only do the liner buildings hide plain walls and inexpensive materials; they also conceal the choppy shape of a building containing 16 theaters.

The theater is lined with three mixed-use buildings and a parking garage, which has ground-floor commercial space. All the mixed-use buildings have housing over retail, are three to four stories high, and include rental apartments, for-sale condominium lofts, and rental two-story townhouses.

Continuum and its designers faced a series of challenges, not the least of which was how to make the best use of the theater as an anchor and a hub of pedestrian activity. The theater was deliberately designed so that everyone would approach it as a pedestrian. “Everybody parks somewhere else and walks past the stores,” Gougeon says. “Nobody just parks and walks directly into the theater.”
Because the theater block is bounded by four important pedestrian streets, the plan calls for every segment of sidewalk to be lively. The mixed-use buildings all meet a relatively high architectural standard. The utilitarian parking garage, which will be visible on only one side, includes space for artisans’ shops and galleries on the first floor.

All of the mixed-use liner buildings on the theater block are detached from the multiplex, creating an alley for loading, services, and emergency egress in between the big box and the street-fronting residential and retail.

THE PARTIAL WRAP, ATTACHED
The Whole Foods market was built on the eastern edge of Belmar. While much of this building has been wrapped with ground-floor commercial space, the side that faces a major arterial has not (although the usual surface parking lot has been eliminated and the market has been built almost to the sidewalk).

Unlike the theater block, all of the buildings are attached and permitted and LEED-certified as one building. “But each [liner building] has a unique street address and will be recognized as an individual building by the public,” Gougeon says. Another difference is that the Whole Foods liners include only retail and office space. “It is probably true that this block was slightly easier to develop as one permitted structure under the code,” notes Gougeon. “But otherwise, I don’t know that it is dramatically different from the other blocks that have complicated mixed-use buildings interwoven with structured parking and a larger-format tenant.” Building code issues, including separations, wall penetrations, fire ratings, and sprinkler and ventilation requirements come into play whether lot lines exist or not. Housing would have added complications, but the location wasn’t right for residential use. “On the other hand, this block had to accommodate the largest tractor-trailers in a loading facility, something that most of the other blocks did not have to address,” Gougeon says.

THE PARTIAL WRAP, DETACHED
Dick’s Sporting Goods occupies the only building recycled from the 1960s Villa Italia Mall. The 135,000 sq. ft., three-story building was saved because it fit within the new street grid. In the old mall, it was a Foley’s department store. The building was redeveloped as a Galyan’s and the name was changed to Dick’s after a 2004 buyout.

Continuum renovated the entrances on two sides of the former department store — the first two floors of which are occupied by Dick’s, and the third floor by an office tenant — making them more interesting and pedestrian-friendly. Yet the building still has significant blank walls that need hiding. Three buildings perform this task, leaving two sides of Dick’s exposed — a street entrance and one that faces surface parking and an arterial thoroughfare. Continuum added lots of windows to add light to the building and make it seem more open. The signage on the street side is more human-scaled, says Gougeon.

Two sides of the Dick’s block face high-quality pedestrian streets with a fair level of architectural detail and shops that meet the sidewalk. The mixed-use buildings that form the edge of this block are not liner buildings per se, but they serve multiple purposes, including hiding the mostly blank sidewalls of the Dick’s building.

NO WRAP
The mid-size retailers, sometimes called junior anchors in the development industry, favor a more conventional suburban setting and were given one at the northeast corner of Belmar, adjacent to a major arterial. These mid-size stores typically range from 10,000 to 40,000 square feet, and they were placed side by side in a building of close to 90,000 square feet. They are served in the front by surface parking.

While the design is suburban, this part of Belmar was incorporated into the whole with care. Foremost, the urban block and street structure was maintained, enhancing walkability, allowing for pedestrian amenities, and retaining the possibility that these blocks could be urbanized in the future.

“You can walk to everything else from there; there are other structures sharing the block with other uses,” Gougeon says. “The urban wind farm in the parking lot adds interest. The block is on the edge of the district, so we can handle the loading requirements without creating problems. And we treated the sidewalk in front of the building more like a city street than a parking lot. So its dimensions, fixtures, furnishings, lighting, and landscaping help to integrate and humanize the otherwise very large and free-standing nature of these buildings and tenants.”

DEALING WITH BIG BLOCKS
The theater, Dick’s, and Whole Foods blocks are all large. They range from 700 to 724 feet in length and from six to nine acres overall. The best way to mitigate the size of these blocks is to make the experience interesting for pedestrians, according to Gougeon. “Managing those longer lengths and bigger dimensions involves a combination of active and transparent street-level uses; good furnishings, trees, and amenities; and internal pedestrian linkages through the blocks where possible,” he says. “We are retrofitting some of the longer block segments in front of Dick’s to add more shade, seating, planting, and amenities.”

In blocks this large, Continuum would ordinarily consider breaking them up with a subsystem of smaller streets. This was not possible with the big box blocks, “but we do have such a system (only partly built at present) in the large superblock where the main plaza is located. It is broken down by smaller streets that have more of a lane character and which can be closed at times to extend the public space.” Ultimately, the more varied and lively the uses, architecture, and streetscape design, the more the plan can accommodate longer dimensions, Gougeon believes. “If the block does not have life or activity, even a short distance will seem long,” he says.

LINER BUILDING ISSUES
Of all of the tools for urbanizing big boxes, liner buildings are the most complicated and potentially most expensive, according to Gougeon. Not only do the liner buildings present their own service, parking, and loading challenges; they also have to make a profit for the developer. Continuum insists that all buildings in Belmar stand on their own economically, rather than accept smaller or no profits on some buildings for the sake of enhancing the whole plan. “Even if the building ends up being single-loaded or has more complicated access or parking or service configurations, its costs and income have to produce a market return.” Gougeon says.

Liner buildings raise the following issues, Gougeon says:
• The depth of liners is likely determined by the block size and by the box that one is trying to wrap. That means that retail spaces are often shallower than they would otherwise be, and it also “generally means you have single-loaded buildings above the shops,” Gougeon says. “Those buildings are inherently less efficient (more corridor or vertical circulation per increment of usable space).” Views (although not necessarily light) are usually available in only one direction.

• Buildings may have to forgo elevators, because the small square footage of a liner may not justify the cost. Two of the three theater block liners have no elevator — they feature walk-up lofts and townhouses. The sale and lease value of these units stack up well against similar units with elevators, Gougeon says. Other amenities, such as a back deck, can make walk-ups highly desirable.

• A cost benefit of liner buildings is that some sides can be made less expensive because they are largely hidden. “These savings may or may not pay for the inherent inefficiencies in some of the liner configurations,” Gougeon notes. On the other hand, street-facing facades demand higher quality materials and more articulated architecture, because the presence of liner buildings presupposes a high-quality pedestrian street.

• If there is a service and/or egress corridor, the space in between the box and liner building must be dealt with. “These areas can be long, not very visible, and can become security concerns — often access needs to be controlled,” Gougeon says.

• Code issues driven by the proximity of buildings can affect cost, dimensions, and permitted openings. Egress must be provided for both the liner buildings and the box. If the buildings are long and have retail and restaurants on the ground floor, issues such as trash and grease trap locations can be tricky. If there is residential above commercial, parking might have to be in a remote location, which may influence what housing product is marketable in the building.

• Where two or three liner buildings are located in close proximity, Continuum has sometimes been able to share utility and/or telecommunications systems. “Those kinds of things can create some offsetting economies,” says Gougeon.

• Even in shallow liner buildings, the depth of retail on the first floor may be greater than the single-loaded residential dimensions above. “So on the second level you get an opportunity for outdoor space (private or shared or both) that can be a real bonus in an otherwise denser, urban environment,” Gougeon says. “And some are remarkably private even though they are embedded in the center of the district.”

• Because the theater block liner buildings are shallow, the retail spaces are relatively small compared to those elsewhere in Belmar. Many of the spaces range from 1,000 to 1,500 square feet. That means that retailers in these buildings are disproportionately local, Gougeon says.

Despite all of these challenges, the liner buildings have performed reasonably well in the marketplace. The residential space is nearly all leased and sold, and the retail space is close to 85 percent leased, Gougeon reports.

PARKING
The theater and Whole Foods blocks are served exclusively by structured parking (in addition to the on-street parking that is available throughout Belmar). The Dick’s block has both structured and surface parking. Only the mid-size retailers are served wholly with surface parking.

Parking garages are themselves huge boxes and require their own liner strategies. Garages in the Dick’s, Whole Foods, and theater blocks all have street-fronting commercial space. This helps to “animate the street and keep the garages from dominating the environment too much,” Gougeon says. “The garages are often essential to get a more urban solution, but they can be almost as bad as the large-format tenant in terms of street impacts if not handled well.”

The most creative example of this strategy in Belmar involves the 301,367 sq. ft., 866-car, four-level garage on the theater block. The portion of the garage that fronts a street contains 7,930 square feet of art studios and gallery space for photographers, designers, furniture makers, and artwork.

The surface parking lot for the mid-size retailers is also creative. Continuum built a wind farm that powers the lot lighting and sends energy back to the grid. That strategy took a negative — the largest parking lot in Belmar, and turned it into an attraction.

This article is available in the July/August 2006 issue of New Urban News, along with images and many more articles not available online. Subscribe or order the individual issue.