Calapooia Brewery is on the left, and a city-owned lot is in the center on the other side of Water Avenue and railroad tracks. In the background, Edgewater Village, on Feb. 6, 2022.
If you stand on Hill Street in Albany and look across Water Avenue and the railroad track — like in the photo above — you see a vacant lot of about one acre. It’s owned by the city of Albany, and the developers of Edgewater Village want to buy it.
George and Paula Diamond, the Edgewater developers, appeared briefly before the Albany City Council during Monday’s work session, held via Zoom.
“We’re interested in buying it,” George said. He added they would like to develop the lot to complement what’s been built in the Edgewater project, which has 58 houses and townhomes.
He didn’t say exactly what would “complement” the project in his view. When the Diamonds appeared at a recent council meeting to mark the completion of Edgewater, they displayed an image of the property with part of it as a parking lot.
More parking would benefit the restaurant of the Calapooia Brewing Company at Hill and Water, as well as a potential business in the space across Hill Street, a former garage.
In 2017 a contractor leasing the garage talked to the CARA urban renewal board about his idea for an enterprise modeled after the Pike Street market in Seattle. He hasn’t been heard from since, but any kind of commercial development would need more parking than what’s available on the streets.
The Albany city staff asked the council in January to declare the lot surplus and to invite buyers interested in building housing there, including “affordable housing.” But the council put off the question of what to do with the property.
Diamond addressed the council during “business from the public.” Mayor Alex Johnson II asked him to hang around until the end of the meeting, presumably so he could expand on his idea for the lot. But Johnson adjourned the session without calling on Diamond again. (hh)
There you go! An empty piece of land, so let’s pack a bunch of people on it! How about a dog park or something? Maybe a junkyard for the electric scooters?
You want a dog park? Buy it.
Maybe you could buy a few tents and turn it into another encampment.
Real Estate is booming and wages are rising. But inflation puts a dent in all of that. The Wall Street Journal today shows that inflation is mostly being drive by cost of Goods and Services.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-inflation-fall-any-pullback-depends-on-these-sectors-11646649003?mod=hp_lead_pos4
Ukraine & Russia are now a serious problem that can derail things world-wide.
Mr. Woods is correct. If we just appease Putin a bit longer, perhaps his nationalist ambitions will temper. And, if the Baltic States fall next….well who really cares about those places. Americans should never have to sacrifice anything just because of some other nation’s desire to be free of Slavic Thuggery. Plus, if you’re a big fan of history, you already know how well appeasement worked during Hitler’s rise to power.
If you read my post and think I’m for appeasement, you’re very mistaken and I don’t see how you got there from what I wrote.
Hi all
I retired to Albany a few years back. One recurring theme that puzzles me is city-owned vacant property. How did that come about? Foreclosure, goodoldboydeal, ?????
If the answer is “look it up” PLS advise where.
Happy to be here. BTW, Mom’s family moved fairly often thru Marion, Linn, and Lane Counties chasing employment. At one point Gparents sold the house to buy a more reliable car.
In this particular case, the city persuaded BNSF Railroad to give the property to the city as part of negotiations for a new franchise allowing the old Oregon Electric freight track to continue running down the middle of Water Avenue. You can search for the stories on this site. Happened about 2013 or so, if I recall. At the time the city was interested in redevelopment of what became the Edgewater site, and the railroad land was in the middle, a potential obstacle. For some reason the Edgewater plans were finalized without that particular parcel, and I can’t remember why. (hh)
I wish they had not given the lease back to the railroad. Would be nicer without the tracks there.
The City should rush to GIVE it to them. According to the CARA theory of economics, it’ll pay for itself with all that property tax it’ll generate.
I think Albany should mimic Portland and adopt a collective-oriented policy that mandates the highest and best uses of vacant public land as:
– affordable housing,
– community gardens and
– open spaces.
It’s time to abolish the capitalist-developer buddy system that has been in place since 2001.
Glad to read the Diamonds are interested. Supporting the area residences and businesses are a better use of the property than filling it with low income or tiny houses after the city spends $20 million to beautify the Riverfront.
Need to clear up the mystery of Diamonds proposal. Why so secret?
Also what is the asking price?
Maybe someone else would consider buying it on the open, as opposed to the closed, insider, secret, crony, market system.
Or is that what CARA prefers?
There is no secret. The Diamonds have not proposed anything yet – they just gave us notice at the meeting they were interested in doing so…
Price is TBD.
There has *NEVER* been a “closed, insider, secret crony, market system” with CARA. That is totally laughable…
good. But I want a chance to laugh at the asking price. Would you be so kind as to answer the question?
I don’t know it yet.
Once we lose public ownership of property, then the new owner could gate off the lot. This lot needs to be improved for public parking. Make decisions for the future and not just for today’s needs. Once the property becomes brick and mortar, there is no turning back.
That should be the philosophy for the local building boon.
Yes, I agree!
My sentiments exactly. IF the Diamonds Proposal does indeed include parking for the adjacent business, then I’m “all in.” But if not, then others should be allowed to bid in an “open market” public process, similar to the recent Hazelwood Park acquisition. Is that going to be allowed?