Results

Public Official: Jeff Perlman
December 2004 Session

Final Report

The City of Delray Beach brought two projects to the Design Institute

Description of Project 1:

The Four Corners Site

The City of Delray Beach brought the Four Corners site to the Design Institute in an effort to reevaluate existing market mixes throughout the city's western corridor and specifically, Military Trail. While most redevelopment has been focused east of I-95, encouraging redevelopment of the Military Trail retail centers will enhance the entire community.

If redeveloped in the most ideal means possible, The Four Corners site would serve as the physical model for similar sites along Military Trail and throughout the city. Officials would like to transform many of their high-volume and underperforming intersections into “nodes” for smart growth development and economic revival. Specific intersections may be ideal for Transit Oriented Development (TOD), serving as a gathering place for both the neighborhood and the immediate corridor. As with the Office Depot Site, this concept increases scarce real estate potential through adaptive reuse and zoning changes in key areas of the city.

The Four Corners Site presents the city with an opportunity for public-private cooperation and investment. In an effort to influence specific changes to critical intersections, the city would provide incentives to under-performing shopping centers. In turn, the shopping centers provide the city with a place and means for infusing specific needs.

Key Issues for Project 1:

1. What public policies can be adopted to attract investment and assist in creating or nurturing a cluster of new retail businesses? Given the site and surrounding neighborhood, what are realistic parameters for retail here?
2. What public policies can be adopted to insure investment in workforce housing at this site? Should this housing attempt to adopt the vernacular of the local neighborhoods or should a new vernacular for the node be established?
3. Assuming that workforce housing will be integrated into the site, how will it impact investment and interrelate with the retail?
4. Does the site have potential as a TOD (two miles from the Tri-Rail station)? Is the primary focus bus, transit or auto oriented and if a particular type of transit does receive more attention or focus, how will this impact the demographics and willingness for investment in the area? What improvements to local transit are required for a TOD to reach its full potential?
5. What other uses need to be included at the site(s) to assure that these nodes function as neighborhood focal points or centers? Is the “transit node as neighborhood focal point” a sound concept?
6. How can circulation and connectivity be improved at the site, the intersection, and along the corridor as a whole? How can pedestrian access and circulation be improved throughout?
7. Can “tired” shopping centers (at high-volume intersections) be transformed in a way that allows them to attract retail investment, workforce housing, and TOD, and serve as the neighborhood focal point?
8. In terms of the multiple visions for the site, how important are new land use categories, zoning districts, codes, and overlays? Which areas are in need of specific land use reform and what uses, scales, and densities are suitable for seamless integration between the quadrant, node, and neighborhood? Will the nodal design fit with the texture, context, and fabric found elsewhere in the city?

Recommended Actions:

•  Form public-private partnership for redevelopment on single site.

•  Create a master plan for Four Corners area, with unifying design guidelines and codes that dictate the uses, connectivity, and design; identify the characteristics of each public realm.

•  Establish zoning and development incentives for mixed uses, including density incentives for workforce housing--establish new zoning category with a set of density incentives.

•  Determine a separate identity for each quadrant, but unified through the public realm/design.

•  Pursue incremental development strategy.

Results
Following the Design Institute session the Mayor of Delray Beach marketed the Final Report to the Chairman's Club (comprised of the City’s largest businesses), Chamber of Commerce and to local civic clubs.

In May, the City Commission unanimously agreed to adopt the Final Report and instructed the city's planning staff to convert the report's recommendations into adoptable city code.

The City anticipates that formal adoption of the recommended overlay districts will occur sometime this summer.

The City has begun marketing the “potential” to several investors and 
corporations.

The Mayor states that the Institute was an invaluable experience that will pay 
dividends well into the future.

March 2006

The City has announced a plan that would propose an increase in the building height limits from five to eight stories in the Congress Avenue Corridor. In addition, they have expressed interest in building affordable housing near the Tri-Rail Station.

City officials continue to approach developers interested in the Congress Avenue Corridor, as well as business leaders wanting to move to the area.

Additional Contacts

Mayor Jeff Perlman
(561) 243-7000  Mayor@MyDelrayBeach.com

Planning & Zoning Department

(561) 243-7040  pzmail@MyDelrayBeach.com