While Woodinville and passing a downtown plan, Bothell’s plans to revitalize its downtown, including a major hotel project, is on target for completion.
Bothell claims to be leading the largest municipal downtown project in the state, and announced it’s on target for reaching the $650 million private investment goal.
Based on projections from private developers and Bothell's Building Code Council valuations for square foot, Bothell anticipates that by the close of 2012 both projects underway and projects proposed combined will total an estimated $207 million dollars of private investment in the downtown planning area.
“After collecting information from committed developers, we are anticipating new development in the pipeline to total around $207 million, said Bob Stowe,” Bothell City Manager. “That is one-third of our $650 million, twenty-five year private investment goal for the downtown subarea.”
Developers of the underway and proposed projects include MainStreet Properties, Wiedner Apartment Homes, Boulevard Place Associates, and the redevelopment of the historic Anderson Building by McMenamins, the well-known Oregon brewpub and hotel company.
In June 2010, the Bothell City Council approved an agreement with McMenamins, to purchase 5.41 acres from the city. McMenamins will open a 70-room hotel including a restaurant, pub, movie theater, live music entertainment, spa, community garden, community pool and community meeting space, while preserving the Anderson Building. Doors are expected to open Spring 2014.
In all, the projects add up to an estimated 1,500 units of new downtown housing and over 144,000 square feet of commercial space.
“Implementing the vision takes action” stated Mayor Mark Lamb.“During more robust economic times, the City leadership chose to set aside onetime development revenues for future capital investment. Over the past two years, the City has broken ground on $89 million in fully-funded projects as part of the total $150 million in planned infrastructure improvements for downtown. The momentum and fiscal discipline of the City has captured the attention of the private development community.”
“The investments are important, but what is even more important is that the community’s vision is becoming a reality,” said City Mayor Mark Lamb. “What we are seeing now is the implementation of a multi-year planning effort to redevelop downtown with new residential, retail, office, mixed-use and an expanded park system. The citizens showed a tremendous amount of visionary leadership when they developed the revitalization plan for downtown and that vision is yielding results.”
Since April 2010 the City has:
- Completed the $21 million Wayne Curve Project
- Relocated and aided 30 businesses
- Completed the first two phases of the $55 million fully-funded Crossroads Project
- Under contract to sell 14 acres of surplus land for private development
- Executed agreements for development of all but 1.5 acres of the property purchased from the Northshore School District, including a 7.4-acre, 400-housing unit project along with 30,000 square feet of retail planned by MainStreet Property Group, LLC
- Recruited McMenamins to transform the historic Anderson building into a 70-room hotel
- Launched a public-private partnership for a new civic campus block
- Removed 35,000 tons of contaminated materials from the downtown area in preparation for development
- Started storm water work in preparation for the Multi-way Boulevard Project
“This has all been accomplished without raising taxes during some of the most economically challenging times our nation, state and city have ever seen,” concluded Mayor Lamb.
