CREJ - Building Dialogue - March 2015
Reaching a new destination often requires new ways of doing things. That was the case for Depot Square at Boulder Junction, a $55 million transit-oriented development located at the gateway to downtown Boulder. It wasn’t easy. “It’s probably the most complex project I’ve ever been a part of,” said Jeff Pedersen of SEH, who served as the architect of record for the 400,000-square-foot project, led by Pedersen Development Group. Complex is an understatement. The infill development includes a diverse mix of office and retail spaces, a public plaza, LEED Silver-certified affordable housing, a boutique Hyatt hotel, a fully renovated 125-year-old historic train depot and an underground bus rapid transit station with a 400-car parking structure above it. Coming together after years of perseverance, and only after the merger of uncommon partnerships, the timing for a TOD like Depot Square is just right. Perfect Timing Demographics are shifting across America. Many young people are foregoing the suburban preferences of their parents and choosing to live and work in cities. This trend toward urban living, hand in hand with the growth and popularity of more sustainable public transit, is causing transit-oriented initiatives and developments to sprout up all over the world. Not just in major urban areas like New York City, Mexico City or Tokyo, either. To the list, add Austin, Texas, Oakland, California, Seattle, St. Paul, Minnesota, and – when construction wraps up in May – Boulder. In Boulder, drivers along Pearl Street have watched buildings rise up of out of the ground over the past two years, but the development itself has been a long time coming. Developing a Vision In the mid-1990s, the Regional Transportation District was stuck. RTD officials needed to increase parking facilities for a Park & Ride. But at the time, their available option involved constructing an additional parking structure along U.S. 36, a highway that serves as a major gateway to the city. Two parking structures at the entrance to the city? Not an ideal welcome statement to visitors entering Boulder. So RTD teamed with the city of Boulder to find a more suitable location for their Park & Ride – a location within the city. In 2003, RTD and the city of Boulder found what they needed at the intersection of 30th Street and Pearl Street. Jointly, they bought an 11-acre parcel for $11 million, setting aside a 3.2-acre parcel for RTD. Plans were laid out for the ambitious Boulder Junction – a multiphase, 160-acre transit-oriented urban village that transformed downtown Boulder into a multi-use destination. Then, the Great Recession. Neither the city nor the RTD had the resources to further develop the site. But their vision for a vibrant development connecting Boulder to the Denver metro area stayed strong. Uncommon Partnerships In 2010, believing that private investment could stimulate the development, the city of Boulder and RTD released a joint request for qualifications to develop the first phase of the transit village. The request was answered by local developer, Pedersen Development Group, with an assembled design-build team that included architecture and engineering firm SEH Inc., design firm Larsson Design and Adolfson & Peterson Construction. The project team suggested a modern mixed-use design that met the high standards of the city and addressed the transit needs of RTD officials. They proposed a 50,000-square-foot, six-bay, below-grade bus transfer facility with a parking structure directly above. The parking structure would be wrapped with 71 affordable housing units. The project’s namesake, a historic train depot, would remain, but be slated for adaptive reuse as a restaurant. A new street, Junction Place, would be constructed to better connect the development to the neighborhood. Designed as a “quiet street,” with paving similar to that of the pedestrian plaza, it would continue to a nearby city-developed pocket park. Their approach was approved. The PDC team was selected out of five candidate teams. Plan in place, this uncommon interagency, public-private team began work. A New Precedent Creating a true TOD, like Depot Square, demands more than simply developing land near a public transit station. TODs require public transport, yes, but they also call for integrated land uses and high-density, people-centered design. These parameters produced a few obstacles for the project team, due largely to the fact that the development type – urban, high density – was unprecedented in the city of Boulder. “The goal was to create a truly wonderful place, a more modern, open environment for transit users, residents, hotel guests, everybody,” said Pedersen, who studied architecture at the renowned Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. “But it was a little ahead of its time.” To do it right, to create a modern TOD in Boulder, an entirely new zoning class had to be created so the development could have an urban character with higher density. The project team also had to work with the community to adjust municipal design codes, which favored a far busier, more suburban look than the clean modern design envisioned for the development. Overcoming these obstacles required added efforts on the front end of the project, but the city and developers can now move ahead unheeded on future projects within Boulder Junction. Building Responsibly Sustainable design was incorporated throughout Depot Square. The affordable housing component, developed in cooperation with the city of Boulder Housing Department, is achieving LEED Silver certification. But the project team also implemented a new LEED certification called Neighborhood Development. Hailed as an antidote to sprawl, LEED-ND certification looks beyond the scope of individual buildings to include how entire communities are planned and created. “LEED-ND is perfect for a development of this nature,” said Brooke Schubert, SEH’s sustainability coordinator. “It gave the team a framework for making choices that resulted in a successful, and sustainable, end result.” Returning to Roots Over the past hundred years, the land along Pearl Street has hosted a variety of different uses. In addition to accommodating a train station, the land has seen rodeo grounds, even a mall. With housing, transit, retail and shopping, Depot Square at Boulder Junction will continue this tradition of diversity. And soon. Construction is on the final lap. The parking structure is nearly complete. The 150-room Hyatt Place Hotel is slated to be ready by the end of March, with the affordable housing and underground BRT station scheduled to be open by August – when rather than the sights and sounds of beeping forklifts and hard-hatted construction crews, passersby will experience a bustling inflow of travelers, shoppers and residents. People on their way.