Arlie & Company

In the frenzy of development that continues in Eugene's far northeast corner, one name - Arlie & Company - looms larger than the rest.

Owned by husband and wife John Musumeci and Suzanne Arlie, the firm's namesake, the beginnings of a 40-acre "urban village" is taking shape north of Crescent Avenue. When complete, it will provide a community of boutiques, eateries, offices and professional services in addition to hundreds of units of high-end housing, where not so long ago sheep grazed and Canada geese honked and circled down to rest on their annual migration.

Just last month, the $53 million initial phase of the Crescent Village development was rated No. 14 among 131 projects on the Portland-based Daily Journal of Commerce's list of the top biggest construction projects in Oregon for 2006.

Crescent Village "is already being earmarked as a project that will change the face of development in Eugene," the journal trumpeted in the June issue of its Commerce magazine.

Arlie officials acknowledge that the company took a risk with this project, building a dense, diverse urban neighborhood in a community long accustomed to traditional subdivisions. But the company clearly believes it will find a market for its idea, and area banks appear to agree.

Scott Diehl, Arlie's chief operating officer, declined to discuss the financing of Crescent Village, but county records indicate that the firm has taken out a total of $21 million in lines of credit for commercial construction with Bank of America, Siuslaw Bank and Umpqua Bank.

Well under way, the first phase includes 40 units of three-story detached town homes and two four-story "town center" buildings with retail space on the first floor and three floors of apartments above - just over 100 units total in both buildings - ranging in size from studios to three-bedroom luxury units.

Apartment units will be ready for move-in during October. Sadie Dressekie, Arlie's marketing manager, said a property management company, HSC, began talking last week to about 150 people who had indicated an interest in renting in the village.

Arlie spun off the townhome construction to Oregon Estates, owned by Eugene developers Todd and Jill Bardwell, who teamed up with fellow builder Chad Ruhoff to build the townhomes. "We don't do single-family development; our focus is much more on commercial," Dressekie said.

The townhomes, ranging from 2,300 to 2,700 square feet, went on the market in March, with prices starting at $485,000.

Businesses are scheduled to open in October, including a coffee shop, sushi bar, rugs and interior store, ethnic food restaurant, fine dining restaurant, wine bar, gelateria, gourmet pizza restaurant, bank, spa and two women's clothing outlets.

Dressekie declined to name them specifically - competing commercial centers "have been known to poach," attempting to lure prospects away from Crescent Village, she said. But, she added, letters of intent have been signed on about 60 percent of the retail spaces, with leases under negotiation.

Plans also call for a 50,000-square-foot grocery store, which will serve not only residents of Crescent Village but will help to draw people from nearby northeast Eugene neighborhoods into the development, Dressekie said. Construction of the grocery store will be part of the project's second phase, she said, but declined to name a grocer.

Phase two also will add 24 tandem row houses facing the town homes, two more commercial buildings - one with housing and the other with offices above the first-floor retail- as well as some condominium units. All together, Crescent Village has been approved for up to 631 housing units, said Teresa Bishow, a longtime planner for the city of Eugene and now Arlie's planning manager.

Also 10 acres in size, the second phase has a total estimated value of $70 million, Dressekie said.

The remaining 20 acres of the project will be developed later, based on future market analysis, she said.

From a city planning point of view, Crescent Village is a dream come true, a from-the-ground-up mixed-use development that furthers the city's goals of encouraging neighborhoods that allow people to work, shop and pursue recreational activities close to where they live.

In pre-automobile eras, nodal development happened naturally, with basic stores and services aggregating where they were needed to serve surrounding populations.

But the ability to drive long distances changed everything, leading to long commutes to far-flung bedroom communities, with shopping and services available at strip malls or large regional shopping centers.

In an effort to reverse those trends, Lane County and the cities of Eugene and Springfield identified several desirable mixed-use, or nodal, development areas in their jointly adopted metropolitan-area TransPlan.

As part of the Chad Employment Area mixed-use center, Crescent Village most closely fulfills the goals of high-density residential use, commercial diversity and alternatives to automobile transportation, according to Eugene city planners.

"I remember when I came to Eugene five years ago, it cost me $15 to fill the tank with gas, and now it's closer to $40," Dressekie said. "People can't afford to spend so much time and money in their cars anymore - if they can walk downtown or down the street for the things they want, it's much more pleasant."

At the same time, people still value the traditional "main street" experience, and that atmosphere has been a driving force behind the concept of Crescent Village, said Gregory Brokaw, principal along with John Rowell in Rowell Brokaw Architects, designers of the project.

A land use planning firm did the "bird's-eye view" of the project, laying out the main commercial street and the pattern of adjacent streets, Brokaw said, "but that doesn't go into the building design or the relationships between the buildings and the people who will use them."

The main challenge at Crescent Village is to create the intimate appeal of a classic main street while minimizing the negative effects of driving and parking, Brokaw said.

"The two concepts had to work together, because realistically we know that many people aren't really going to live and work in the same place."

They solved the problem by putting tenant parking underneath the apartment buildings and locating general parking behind the retail businesses, with walkways through the buildings to the main street, which will be flanked by wide, pedestrian-friendly sidewalks, Brokaw said.

"We're trying to take all the places that people love to go, figure out why and try to make that happen here," he said.

Dressekie said that Arlie's willingness to develop the massive Crescent Village project on speculation shows the company's confidence in the desirability of the mixed-use concept.

"We did a tremendous amount of market research - face-to-face meetings as well as extensive telephone interviews - talking to people about how they want to live and what they want in their neighborhoods," she said. "We used the information we got to come up not only with housing plans but even the type of retail to look for, based on what people actually want and will move to a neighborhood to find."

The speculative nature of Crescent Village doesn't surprise commercial real estate broker John Brown, principal in Evans Elder Brown.

"I think it's such a unique and dynamic product that (Arlie) has to demonstrate what it is before people will accept it," Brown said. "It's kind of like a 'Field of Dreams' idea - build it and they will come."

Much of Eugene's in-migration consists of people with money coming from other parts of the country where compact development of the Crescent Village sort already is a way of life, he said. "I think it will be successful - I think it will do OK."

PHASE 1

Town homes and row houses: 40 town homes, 24 row houses

Apartments: 102 units; rents $600 to $3,000 per month

Retail space: 18,000 square feet

Total acreage: 10 acres of a total 40-acre project

Value: $53 million

- Arlie & Company

WHO'S BEHIND CRESCENT VILLAGE

Owner/developer: Arlie & Company

Architect: Rowell Brokaw Architects

General Contractor: Gale Roberts Construction

Town home builders: Oregon Estates, Ruhoff Home Builders

Row house builder: Pacific Crest Rock Builders

Landscape architecture: Kate McGee

- Arlie & Company

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