Gethsemane's neighborhood

Star Tribune Tue, 13 May 2008 23:03:51 GMT
Maplewood's Gethsemane: A park with a use-by date

It was a sweetheart deal -- a $1 a year lease for a big city park. But the church that owns Gethsemane Park in Maplewood now wants to build senior housing there, a plan that has some neighbors feeling cheated. ... But the church instead decided that senior housing was its calling, White said. It formed a collaborative with Presbyterian Homes, a developer of senior housing across the Twin Cities, to develop the housing. It will include 61 units of independent living, 32 of assisted living, and 18 units in a "memory care" section, said project manager Bob Van Slyke, of Presbyterian Homes. The project would consume six acres of the 10-acre park, he said. The remaining four acres would be available for the city to purchase. But that's too many units in too little space, said Dan Stoerzinger, who lives across the street from the park with his wife and children. More importantly, it removes the only major park in the community to which it is safe for children to walk. "The footprint of this development is way too large," Stoerzinger said. "These are all one-and-a-half-story homes around here. The building is three stories high." Drewes is particularly worried that the project will require the city to widen and repair the road in front of her house to accommodate the increased traffic of dozens of seniors and workers. She said she simply doesn't have thousands of dollars to pay the city assessments that typically finance such work. Ahl said that those streets are currently slated for upgrades in 2012. Van Slyke said a traffic study performed for Presbyterian Homes showed little to no additional traffic burden. "We're good neighbors," Van Slyke said. "We've never had neighbors call us after we've built something and complained."

[[keywords: LandUse;Parks;Housing;Maplewood;]]