ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, August 29, 1996 TAG: 9608290045
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MAG POFF STAFF WRITER
ONE OF ROANOKE'S MOST recognizable structures was bought by investors who own and work at Awful Arthur's. They plan to build apartments and maybe a sports bar and restaurant.
The former American Chemical Co. building - unavoidable to Interstate 581 motorists because of its bright orange exterior - has been sold to a group of developers who are proposing to remodel it for dwellings and an entertainment complex.
S. Todd Lancaster, proprietor of the Awful Arthur's restaurant chain, and one of the new owners, said Wednesday he plans to remove the orange paint that has caused so much public controversy.
His partners in Bullitt Avenue Limited Liability Co. are Jeremy Blackstock and Jason Ridinger, who work with him at the Awful Arthur's at Roanoke City Market. Lancaster also owns two restaurants in Richmond and others at Charlottesville and Urbanna. He is in the process of opening still another at Harrisonburg.
"Awful Arthur's is my long-term future," Lancaster said Wednesday. The new building, he said, will be "a side venture."
The partners paid $450,000 for the building, said Read Lunsford of Hall Associates Inc., who handled the transaction for both the buyers and the seller, the Peter C. Snyder Residual Trust.
Lunsford said the trust had owned the building for seven years for investment purposes and never had a development plan. The building is empty.
The building has 10,000 square feet on each of four floors. Lancaster could not say how much the partners expect to spend on renovation.
Tentative architectural plans, drawn by Balzer and Associates of Roanoke, are being circulated among local contractors for cost estimates.
Those plans call for a sports bar and restaurant on the first floor, Lancaster said.
The second floor would be held for expansion as an entertainment center if the few games in the bar-restaurant - a virtual reality arcade for adults - prove popular, Lancaster said. These will be virtual reality games for adults - an adult arcade, Lancaster said.
Current plans show 11 apartments on each of two upper floors. The flats are being designed for professionals interested in living downtown. But Lancaster said the number of apartments could change because he has found interest in units that are larger than the proposed 700 to 800 square feet each. He said the partners are leaning toward creating larger but fewer apartments.
If there is enough interest in apartments, Lancaster said, he is willing to scrap plans for the restaurant and devote the entire building to them.
Matt Kennell, executive director of Downtown Roanoke Inc., said apartments like those Lancaster is planning are "definitely critical to the total development of downtown Roanoke. This city is ahead of most others in downtown revitalization, he said. But apartments are "the missing piece of the puzzle."
Kennell said the most recent trend is demand for large luxury apartments. Wealthy people, he said, want to be "part of the quality of life downtown."
Lunsford said the building's walls are 18 inches thick at the base, so traffic noise from I-581 and Elm Avenue will be minimal after new windows are installed.
Signs in the building indicate it was in use by Nelson Hardware Corp. in the mid-1930s, Lunsford said.
It passed from the Nelson family to the operators of American Chemical, Lunsford said, but his research failed to turn up a date. The janitorial supply business was then acquired by Frank Selbe, a Roanoke lawyer who painted the building's exterior bright orange with bright blue trim. Selbe sold it to the Peter C. Snyder Residual Trust seven years ago.
In another downtown Roanoke development, Corned Beef & Co., a Jefferson Street restaurant, said it will expand Sept. 6 into an adjacent building that formerly was occupied by Ward's Rock Cafe. Corned Beef & Co. already uses the roof deck on that building.
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: PHILIP HOLMAN STAFF The garish paint will be among theby CNBfirst things to go from the old American Chemical Co. building.
Planners say the apartments intended for the building are critical
to downtown Roanoke's continued revitalization. color