Bicentennial Park/Pleasant View Dr. Trail is Completed!
Ribbon Cutting: Nov. 18th, 3 PM
The new asphalt walking trail along Pleasant View Dr. is completed! This is a great safety enhancement as there is not any sidewalk in this area, and also provides a continuation of the Pleasant View City walking trail that for many years has ended at the North Ogden border. This is a great addition to our trail network! Join us next week for the ribbon cutting.
Future of the Old Smith’s Building
I am happy to announce that the old Smith’s Building is now under contract to be purchased and redeveloped. The building was previously under contract with another developer, but that purchase fell apart and the building has sat vacant while we have been working to attract a new buyer/developer. This has taken some time, but has been successful. The developer is a partnership that includes one of the top retail developers in the US and a ...local partner: Mountain West. This partnership recently developed the aesthetically beautiful and highly-successful Oquirrh Mountain Marketplace (114th South/Bangerter Hwy). They have incredible experience in the retail market, and have relationships with all of the top stores & restaurants we hope to attract. See the flyer of the Oquirrh Mountain project for the types of stores they brought to the development: http://astro.mtnwest.com/…/72947/…/0/flyer/Flyer-72947-0.pdf
The developer will be taking down approximately 1/3 of the building to create additional parking, and will then remodel the remaining building into three large retail spaces. I think this is a better plan that dividing it into approximately 8-12 spaces in the previous development plan. We want the remodeled building to be beautiful and attractive, and the facade will be re-done. The City will be contributing some Community Development Area (CDA) funds to incentivize this redevelopment of the existing store by participating in the facade work and building remodel. Big thanks to Weber County and other taxing entities for assisting us in developing the CDA (Matthew G Bell, Kerry W. Gibson and Commissioner Ebert). The developer also intends to add a new pad across 2550 North from Subway.
The developer has identified roughly half of the tenants, and is working to identify the remainder. We cannot yet release the names of any tenants, but hope to be able to do so within the next month. I met with one of the major tenants on Friday and think it will be a great and practical fit for our city. There are some exciting discussions in the works for remaining tenants. Please remember that retail development is a private-market driven process—not a government-driven process. While we are working hard to help with the process and will use the CDA to incentivize the development, the decision of which stores will come is ultimately made by the private market, because a project like this represents significant investment and risk by the private market. In a free market, the government role is secondary and supporting. Also, please note that the process is slow and always involves delays, changes, new plans, etc. Please be patient and know that we are working hard on making something awesome happen here, and in other commercial areas of the city.
Oaklawn Park Restroom Rebuild Underway!
Will be Completed by End of Year
$235,000 Federal CDBG Grant Awarded!
I mentioned earlier this year that we had successfully obtained a $235,000 federal grant to rebuild the dilapidated, inadequate Oaklawn Park restroom facility. The City Council budgeted additional funds to complete the project, and we began demolition last month. The project is moving forward, and should be completed before the end of the year, with landscaping and plumbing to be finished next Spring. This is another great step forward for one of our most heavily-used parks! Special thanks to Gary Kerr from our Building Department who wrote the grant application and Parks & Rec Director Kyle-Tiffany Staheli for all their work on this project!
New Website is Live!
Our new city website is up and running! We are still working out a few final kinks, but please check it out at: http://www.northogdencity.com/ Big thanks to City Administrator Bryan Steele who led our effort on making the new site, Parks & Rec Tiffany Staheli for providing so much input and assistance, and all of our departments who created their new pages, and took photos, etc.
