Rockway (formerly Park City South) - Saunders/Lake Wheeler Apartments and Retail

The city’s plan is for all of lake wheeler near the park to be redeveloped, including the existing residential. Definitely agree that taking advantage of both views would have been smart.

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Maybe we won’t see a fixed crane in this project. Already starting to pour concrete.

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Here’s the view from the greenway side. Per the site drawings this is approximately where the bridge across the creek is supposed to go. Lot of landscaping work to do on the creek frontage, I hope they actually do it. Kind of worried it’ll be value-engineered away and left as a sprawl of privet and ailanthus and kudzu and no bridge.

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Lots of renderings, floor plans here:

image

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That is a nice looking building

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Awful, fussy architecture that continues to confirm Park City South will be nothing like the quality of the original renderings.

But the site plan is interesting, with the organically shaped ground level.

And I assume this is a parking podium covered by a public plaza which spills down to the street, which could also be really lovely.

image

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The only question is - how long before they cut this out of the site plan?

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I love this! I noticed, or rather didn’t notice a parking deck, and lo-and-behold: UNDERGROUND PARKING!

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I haven’t looked too closely at the terrain here, but to my eyes it kinda looks like they’re using some tricks to make the parking seem like it’s underground, while they’re not actually digging much below the existing grade. Win-win in terms of minimizing cost and concealing the parking.

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Thanks for pointing this out. I zoomed in a little for folks who are interested in checking it out more.

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That being built I like it

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It’s not just a big glass box, some mixed angles and surfaces broken up by balconies. So an improvement over other projects.

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Lets go ahead and expect this to be value engineered out and hope that it isn’t. Can’t be disappointed when you never had expectations to begin with.

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Fussy is right. Jamming 5 different mediocre wall treatments together is less than the sum of its parts.

I’d rather have simple glass boxes.

Ground level looks great, though! And this is miles better than what’s there now.

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Then you would complain about how they are just plane glass boxes.

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Well, someone would. If you’ve got a middling architect (or a value-engineered project brief), I’m firmly in the “just build a simple glass box” camp. Or at least a nice grid like the new city hall tower.

Abolishing the appearance commission would be a step forward to more exceptional design like this original plan. This isn’t the home owners association.

You keep saying this but it has never made sense to me… why would abolishing the appearance commission result in better appearing buildings? Genuinely curious about this take, because you’ve said it often…

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Well one it’s because the appearance commission is literally against the law no other MAJOR CITY HAS IT. Also it may give some demand for premier design cause there no regulations. The NC State law that says it’s S.L. 20-15-15 sign in 2015. City have planning commissions yes but not appearance commissions plus aren’t you tired of all the bland buildings here we complain a lot on this form about it. Also this is NOT THE HOME OWNERS ASSOCIATION.

I think you misunderstand the Appearance Commission’s role. It’s not like a developer comes along and says, Hey, I want to build this awesome building, and the AC says, oh, no thanks. Only bland buildings here please. If anything, a developer comes along and proposes bad design or things against city code, like a bare parking deck with no screening next to some homes, and the AC says no, actually, you need to do better.

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