125 Apartments Coming to Commerce Bank Site?

A new 125-unit, mixed-use, independent living project is in the works for 300-350 N. Kirkwood Road, a site currently occupied by Commerce Bank and its parking lot. Sound familiar? No, this is not the Kirkwood Flats/UMB Bank proposal, (that one would be across the street), but rather a brand new project in what is turning into a rather hot part of town.

The proposal is specifically for a five story tall structure. The ground level would be comprised of 8,800 square feet of retail while the next four would be the aforementioned 125 independent units restricted to those 55 years or older. Opus is the developer.

The proposal calls for a total of 163 parking spots, 126 of which would be below-grade and 37 of which would be surface level. Those 37 surface spots would be positioned behind the bank.

The massing of the building is fairly strange. While it maintains the typical C-shape to ensure all residential units get decent natural lighting, the orientation of the C is peculiar. The structure will never be crowded by development to its South because Adams offers a natural buffer but by orienting its open side towards Adams, any future development of the northern portion of the lot becomes less desirable as apartments at the one structure would be left looking directly into the living rooms of the other from a very close proximity. Turn that thang 180.

Commerce Bank

While the most exciting part of the project for our purposes is the mixed-use structure, the reason for its existence is the redevelopment of the Commerce Bank branch that currently occupies the site. Rather than being a focal point of the design however, the bank seems to be an afterthought. While the lack of drive-thru is a big win, the building does little else to interact with the street. It’s main entrance appears to be on the structure’s South side (facing the mixed-use development); the building’s E. Washington facade is a blank wall; the entirety of the building is set back an unnecessary 10 feet from the sidewalk. This is, for all intents and purposes, a suburban design thrown, haphazardly, into an urban context.

Also part of the development is what Opus describes as a “linear park”. The park is, depending on the reliability of the renderings, essentially a small plaza that separates the mixed-use building from the bank. It might make a nice place to eat outdoors especially if one of the retail tenants ends up being the sort of fast casual restaurant that tend to find homes in these sort of developments.

But is it Good?

The proposal is good. Density is always good in my book. Ground-floor retail is sick. Between the Royal Banks of Missouri building across the street and the UMB proposal down the way, I’m ready to get the ball rolling and to rename this whole up-and-coming extension of downtown the Financial District. So yes, I would take approval of this project in heartbeat. But is it …good, good? Yikes man, the design could use some work.

First of all, I doubt this is the final design but this thing is ugly as hell. I still can’t decide if it’s too much brick or too little brick; if it was going for a contemporary look or is supposed to be some sort of ode to mid-century modern. The only real explanation I can come up with is that maybe the architects thought that by choosing brick the “character of the neighborhood” crowd might be appeased. This might be the one time I hope they aren’t.

Secondly, I don’t really get what’s going on with the Commerce branch being a separate building. 8,800 square feet of ground floor retail and Commerce doesn’t want to use any of it? Take the corner spot of the mixed use building, make your sign big as hell, do whatever you want Commerce, (it is your property and your idea after all), but a shitty single story building at the corner is strange to say the least.

Prospects for Approval

It’ll be hard to organize against both the Flats and this new proposal simultaneously. One of these two proposals will be deemed the lesser of two evils and get the go ahead. One of them is likely to draw the double team, pull over the free safety allowing the other to sneak behind the coverage, sports cliché, sports cliché, etc, etc. Because these two similar projects are competing for the public’s approval (or at least ambivalence) hopefully this means they will also push each other towards better design. The only variance from the zoning code being requested is for providing fewer parking spots than the 1.5 per residential unit that is required (132 rather than the called for 188). Given the older targeted demographic this variance seems relatively likely to be approved.

Timeline & Impact of COVID-19

Both the subdivision of the property and the code variations were listed on tonight, Wednesday March 18th’s Planning & Zoning Agenda. That meeting has been postponed as have all subsequent meetings until April 6th. There is no chance that a public, in person meeting is happening at that date either. As per law the bank portion of the development would receive automatic recommendation on 05/21/20 if not acted upon. The mixed-use portion of the project,however, would not receive automatic recommendation until 07/16/20. The logistics of some sort of remote meeting (which would be an exciting improvement in accessibility even after it is no longer necessary!) will have been worked out by then.