by Gary Nelson – Apr. 21, 2011
Arizona Business Gazette
A Mesa business leader said last week that residents and merchants need to begin paying heed to an emerging plan that will govern redevelopment in a large swath of the central city.
Otto Shill, president of the public-policy committee for the Mesa Chamber of Commerce, said language in the plan will eventually gel into rules affecting everyone in the area.
He made his comments to a chamber-sponsored community forum on April 13, the first of several that the business coalition will hold around town to raise awareness of key Mesa policy issues.
The plan in question is called the Central Main Street Neighborhood Area Plan. A citizens committee has been working on it for 16 months in hopes of a public rollout by summer and City Council adoption in the fall. Several public meetings will be held before the plan is final.
It will govern land use and building design in a nearly 4-square-mile area straddling Main Street from Extension Road to east of Gilbert Road.
A sibling plan was adopted for the western part of Mesa’s light-rail corridor several years ago.
Jeff McVay, a city planner, told the small audience Wednesday that the plan aims to transform the corridor into a pedestrian-friendly urban center with at least 4,000 more dwelling units than at present. Many would be in mixed-use buildings within arm’s length of the rail tracks.
Redevelopment probably would be most intense through downtown, with infill projects more likely east of Mesa Drive, McVay said.
“If the city does achieve even half the development potential here, we’re going to have a real significant amount of building going on,” McVay said.