Boulder builders heading to Northern Colorado

What once was a trickle has become a rushing stream as developers, architects and land planners with headquarters in Boulder move north to put a Pearl Street stamp on downtown Fort Collins and Loveland.

And while they’re at work on urban infill projects, they’re also scanning the landscape for opportunities to keep them working in Larimer and Weld counties for the years ahead. The driving forces for the trend come from both sides of the Boulder-Larimer county line.

The case of Penny Flats, a downtown project that Boulder-based Coburn Development Co. is undertaking in partnership with the city of Fort Collins, illustrates how the Boulderites are here as much by invitation as through their own initiative.

A city request for proposals to build a large-scale commercial and residential project on the city-owned block yielded a slew of applications, including several from Boulder County developers.
Joining top pick Coburn among the three finalists was O’Connor Development LLC, another Boulder firm whose project portfolio mostly consists of office projects in Boulder and Louisville.

“Back in 2001 we made a strategic decision to grow the business and expand beyond Boulder,” O’Connor partner Brian Bair said. “We started looking up north and thinking about smart-growth opportunities and infill projects.”

The company landed one in Loveland, where it topped local developers in a competition for the right to fill the hole left by a demolished Walgreen store in the city’s downtown. As with Coburn’s Penny Flats project, O’Connor is in partnership with Loveland.

The scope of both projects is similar: Penny Flats will encompass 147 residential units for sale and 30,000 square feet of commercial space in four- and five-story buildings, making it the largest project on the city’s downtown drawing board.

The four-story Lincoln Place, O’Connor’s Loveland project, will feature 186 loft-style apartments for rent and 22,000 square feet of retail and office space.

The height and density of each project will bear the flavor of Pearl and Walnut streets in downtown Boulder.

The interest by Boulder County designers and developers in urban core projects is being driven by what’s happening on the fringes of Northern Colorado cities, one Boulder architect said.

“Obviously, there is a lot of suburban development going on in Larimer County,´ said Dan Rotner, Coburn’s managing director of design. “That added population will create demand for the amenities that the city centers offer.”

The trailblazers among the Boulder firms that have found opportunities in Northern Colorado are Wolff-Lyon Architects PC and Wonderland Hill Development Co. The two are partners in downtown Fort Collins’ Mason Street North project, under construction just north of the Penny Flats block at Mason and Cherry streets.

Wonderland Hill President Jim Leach, a pioneer in new urbanist and co-housing projects, said when Mason Street North was announced in 2001 he saw chances to expand the concept to other downtown districts in Northern Colorado cities.

“I think there might be other opportunities in the core area of Fort Collins and maybe in downtown Loveland,” Leach said. “Once we establish the market for it, there will be other chances. But you can’t take this particular product and just stick it anywhere. It’s got to be in a core area.”

The new residential units and business space that the Boulder companies are building won’t come cheap. Construction costs for Mason Street North likely will exceed $230 per square foot, meaning the cost one of the project’s larger units – a 1,600-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-story home – would exceed $350,000.

For Coburn and O’Connor, public partnerships have helped smooth the path toward project approval in ways the developers said they found refreshing after years of dealing with Boulder’s perilous development review process.

Bair said O’Connor’s nine-month approval route could not have been possible without the public partnership.

Loveland City Manager Don Williams “has really paved the way for us,” Bair said. “He’s been consistent throughout.”

Williams, appearing on a panel with Bair at a real estate forum sponsored by Colorado State University earlier this month, said O’Connor’s demeanor in pursuing the Lincoln Place project also was a linchpin in the partnership.

“Brian doesn’t act like a Boulder developer,” Williams said, tongue-in-cheek. “That’s a key to working in Loveland.”

The Penny Flats project, also benefiting from public partnership, is within three weeks of the project schedule that Coburn began with earlier this year. The phased development will break ground in fall 2006.

“We’ve found that in general, the city’s objectives are to encourage infill development,” Rotner said. “You have to do right, though. It can’t be just a free-for-all.”

As comfortable as the Boulder-based developers are with working in Fort Collins and Loveland, they also have an affinity for one another. It’s not unusual for partners in the companies to share a downtown lunch to talk about the progress of their projects.

“We all know each other pretty well, and we all talk about the projects,” Bair said. “(Coburn president) John Koval and I talked last week. And Jim Leach at Wonderland Hill and I are friends.

We keep up with what we’re doing.”

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