The Belt Buckle - Connecting Downtown
A 15 space surface parking lot between City Hall and the Eagle Theatre is proposed to become a restaurant, professional office space and roof top hangout in downtown Sugar Hill.
The newest project in downtown Sugar Hill would bring a “date night” restaurant, office space and rooftop experience to downtown between City Hall and The Eagle Theatre.
The Facts:
The developer would acquire approximately 6,000 square feet of property next to City Hall which is currently a 15 space surface parking lot (which includes one reserved space for the Sugar Hill Marshal’s office) to construct a three story retail and office building.
The proposed use is a three story building. This would include two street level suites - one for a high end restaurant and another for restaurant or retail, two levels of office space and an upper floor rooftop experience.
The current zoning allows the use by right - meaning the developer does not have to rezone the property for the proposed restaurant and office use.
The developer would purchase the property from the Sugar Hill Downtown Development Authority.
The property would go from a currently property tax exempt status to privately owned and property tax paying status.
The proposed use would create dozens of jobs. The current use is a surface parking lot.
The existing city hall parking deck will remain.
The decision by Mayor and Council is only for review of the design of the building.
Here is the proposed building per the application available on the city’s website:
Here are higher resolution renderings.
Here is the location from an aerial photo.
History and Planning
The 15 space surface parking lot was intended to become a building. When I began serving on the Downtown Development Authority in 2012, I was told that was why the surface lot was built there by city staff at the time. I was told that water and sewer were in place for the future building.
There’s also plenty of planning evidence of that as well.
We previously covered the 2008 comprehensive plan in a two part series. In the work program, there is a line item about the future city hall. It refers to the acquisition of a 3.7 acre parcel for a “new mixed use City Hall facility”.
Also remember from the 2008 Comprehensive Plan the goals for downtown, which this project would meet.
As previously covered, in 2012 and 2013, the new city hall opened and the direction given by then Mayor Gary Pirkle and City Council to the Downtown Development Authority was to “attract developers and investors and to ease and facilitate the construction of a vibrant downtown for our citizens to enjoy.”
While we haven’t covered the 2014 Void Analysis and Downtown Master Plan Overview yet, here are some relevant portions of that plan that support the planning for this project.
The downtown framework plan shows a building on the parking lot.
What About Parking?
The concern expressed by at least one councilmember has been around the loss of the 15 parking spaces and the parking that will be needed by the customers and employees of the new building.
This is a valid concern. So let’s investigate parking options around the vicinity of the building for parking options and availability.
Option 1 is the existing City Hall parking deck with 64 parking spaces.
Option 2 is the 350 public parking spaces in the Lyric parking deck that is about 350 feet from the center of the deck to City Hall.
Option 3 is the city owned 45 space surface parking on the former Atlas auto repair property. It’s 620 feet from City Hall.
Option 4 is The Landing which is a city owned 55 space surface parking lot. It’s about 900 feet from City Hall.
Option 5 is the city owned E Center parking deck with 85 parking spaces. It’s about 590 feet from City Hall.
Option 6 is the on-street 80 parking spaces between the Eagle Theatre to the historic cemetery and down Temple Drive and Church Street. There’s a lot more parking on West Broad, but this is immediate vicinity.
That’s a total of 679 public parking spaces within the major downtown campus immediately walkable to City Hall and this proposed new development.
This new development will remove 15 spaces (not included in the 679 space count) or about 2% of the total parking space count available. 98% of the parking will remain.
“The more parking your downtown has, the less there is to do. The less there is to do, the less reason there is to visit. The less reason there is to visit, the deader your downtown becomes. It’s a simple formula.” - Jeff Siegler of Revitalize or Die
What about parking utilization?
Since I have a downtown business, I’ve been taking pictures throughout the day of the various parking assets outlined above since Monday, March 30th. I plan to add through Monday, April 13th. You can judge for yourself the utilization of the spaces - the Google Photos album linked below includes the meta data for the various times throughout the day. If you’re reading this article prior to April 13th, the album will be updated as new photos are added through the 13th.
What I believe you’ll find is that there is plenty of available of parking - at all times. The parking might not be immediately adjacent to the destination but it will be within a few hundred feet of it. There’s about 40 steps for every 100 feet. Destinations in downtown are within, at most, a few hundred steps of your destination. A few extra steps for the tradeoff of an incredible place within your own community is worth it.
To see the date and time of the photo, click on the “i” for photo information.
Taking the bigger picture into consideration, the under construction greenway bridge at Stanley Street will make the Sugar Hill Church parking lot easily and safely accessible for downtown. The church graciously allows the public to use for parking for downtown and is especially useful for large events like concerts and Sugar Rush. The bridge will be completed this year. The church parking lot includes hundreds of spaces.
“Parking is not a downtown attraction; successful businesses are. Know the difference.” - Jeff Siegler of Revitalize or Die
Why This Location?
The developer is proposing a high end restaurant and rooftop that overlooks the Bowl. The reason this property is known as “The Belt Buckle” is because the property is the central location for downtown on West Broad Street - where everything is connected together.
By extending the retail/restaurant from the E Center, it will encourage pedestrians to continue on to the retail that is part of The Lyric down Temple Drive, connecting the two main arteries of commercial development in our downtown. And the more restaurants we have downtown, the more competition there is to drive higher quality.
The location lends itself to a significant architectural building as well as this building will match the quality of the E Center and Eagle theatre, continuing the high quality development of buildings downtown.
We currently have limited space in downtown to allow for the expansion of commercial and office space to attract new businesses and retain existing businesses as they expand. Investment that increases the commercial office space in downtown (this would add approximately 12,000 square feet of office space) is critical to the economic vitality of our city.
Our downtown is built to prioritize people - places for people to live, work and play. The automobile is secondary in downtown. We’re trading a small surface lot for jobs and millions in investment in our city.
Conclusion
The Belt Buckle project will bring one of the highest quality buildings in Gwinnett County to downtown Sugar Hill, adding a high end restaurant and bring more professional service jobs to our city. It represents millions of dollars of investment into our city in exchange for the sale of 6,000 square feet of city owned property.
It will also increase the daytime population for downtown, helping local restaurants increase their lunch time demand.
This is a no brainer. It is exactly the type of development a strong community should want.