THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 24, 1994 TAG: 9411240678
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN WEINTRAUB, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long : 106 lines
To most City Council members, the failed Lake Ridge development is a 1,200-acre opportunity.
An amphitheater, a golf course, a few schools and a 400-acre office park like Corporate Landing would barely fill half the property that the council wants to buy.
The land straddles Landstown Road in the rural area south of Princess Anne Road and west of the Municipal Center. About 30 times the size of Lynnhaven Mall and its parking lots, the property could be a catalyst for business growth or a major buffer protecting farmland; it could be a draw for tourists or a way of providing a better quality of life for residents.
In searching for ways to use the property, several council members said they want to rethink the city's priorities. Lake Ridge, they said, could be part of a new vision for Virginia Beach.
Councilwoman Louisa M. Strayhorn said that before publicly discussing her ideas for the land, she wants to confer with other council members to ensure that plans for Lake Ridge mesh with broader goals for the city. Strayhorn said she is working to schedule a council retreat to discuss Lake Ridge and other land-use issues.
``We have so many identified needs that there's no waste involved here,'' she said. ``I can assure you that there isn't anyone on council that wants to spend a penny of the city's money for something that would be useless.''
The city should buy the property now, Strayhorn said, because its sale price presents a rare opportunity. But she and other council
members would not reveal an exact price. One indicator of Lake Ridge's market value is the $10 million that NationsBank - which held the loan on the property - paid for it in a public foreclosure auction last spring.
Lake Ridge is assessed at $21 million; NationsBank paid about $240,000 in property taxes on it last year.
Not all council members favor buying the land.
Councilwoman Nancy K. Parker said she would be interested only if the city could get an extraordinary deal.
``I think that there has to be a real good price for us to be able to buy this property, and I'm not sure that the bank and the city will come to that same point,'' she said.
Councilman John D. Moss also opposes the purchase. At Tuesday's council meeting, he criticized the process the council has used to discuss the issue. Until Moss' comments, all of the council's discussions had gone on behind closed doors.
Lake Ridge is a bankrupt development project that has been valued, by various appraisers and would-be buyers, at prices ranging from $7.25 million to $44.5 million. It is not worth much today except to the city, several builders and developers said Wednesday.
Private developers would have a hard time building on the site because of the restrictions imposed in a 1991 rezoning. The restrictions would add about $18 million to the cost of developing the land. Because the council has the power to change those conditions, it could develop the land more cheaply.
``If anybody private had to buy it, either they'd have to live up to the (development restrictions), which I don't think anybody could, or they'd have to start changing them and maybe carving the property back up,'' Councilman John A. Baum said Wednesday. ``I don't think anybody can do much without making a lot of political promises.''
The apparent demise of the Southeastern Expressway this week also devalues the property, several developers said Wednesday. The expressway was to have been the primary access road to Lake Ridge, and without it, the land will lose its appeal to large-scale developers, they said.
Private developers would also have a hard time getting water on the site, at least in the short term.
Gerald Divaris, one of the region's largest developers, said Wednesday that the city could solve a lot of its long-term economic development needs by buying Lake Ridge.
The city could build an amphitheater, provide a campus for a university or research and development facilities and expand its municipal office space, he said. If he were in charge, Divaris said, he would swap Corporate Landing, the city's vacant 400-acre office park on General Booth Boulevard, for land at Lake Ridge.
``I think the city absolutely should buy it,'' he said. ``The opportunity is for the city to acquire a prime piece of land adjacent to the Municipal Center which is available today at probably the best possible price that it would ever be available.''
The purchase would also guarantee that Lake Ridge would never become the city-within-a-city office and industrial park that previous owners had planned. Divaris, who controls a significant amount of land in Pembroke, would like to see that area become the city's primary business district.
Tuck Bowie, president of the Tidewater Builders Association, also thinks the city's purchase of Lake Ridge makes sense.
As a home-builder, Bowie said the purchase would be good for his business because it would provide more recreational opportunities for residents.
``As a taxpayer in the city of Virginia Beach, it may or may not be a good deal depending on what they end up paying for it,'' he said. ``I think it's just too early to speculate.''
The council has not yet formally decided to buy the property and has no firm plans for how it would be used. Baum said he has seen several preliminary sketches that show a 100-acre amphitheater near Princess Anne Park, a golf course, several school sites, some industrial space and high-priced residential development.
But even if the council pursues the purchase now, Baum and other council members said, it would probably delay a decision on the property's use until it has done some hard thinking. ILLUSTRATION: Map
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