A proposal to build a new surface parking lot in downtown Little Rock encountered skepticism over creating more of what one city planning commissioner called "dead space."
As a result, the Little Rock Planning Commission has held off for another month considering what is now proposed as a 100-space parking lot at Second and Louisiana streets to serve employees of Stephens Inc., the privately held investment banking firm, and tenants in the 25-story Stephens Building at 111 Center St.
Second and Louisiana Properties LLC, a Stephens-linked company, purchased the four buildings that once stood at the site for more than $4.5 million. The buildings recently were demolished under a city demolition permit obtained by East-Harding Inc., a Little Rock contractor.
The city planning staff had endorsed the proposed parking lot. A staff analysis that concluded it was an "appropriate use for the property" noted that it was in an area of the city that contained several surface parking lots and thus "should be compatible with surrounding uses."
Craig Berry, a member of the planning commission, disagreed.
"We have right now, if you look right now at the empty parking spots -- surface and parking decks -- in the 100 and 200 blocks of Scott and Main and now Louisiana," he said at a commission meeting Thursday. "And to me, I would think you're cannibalizing the principle of what we're supposed to be doing downtown. That's not what we're supposed to be doing downtown."
While parking lots provide convenience, they offer little in the way of developing downtown as a vibrant part of the city, he said.
"It's not a mystery that when you have parking lots and parking decks in downtown you have dead space," Berry said. "There's no street activity. There's no level of interest. No one hangs out and chats around a dark parking lot at night.
"I know there's a convenience and expedience to that, but I'm very concerned that not much care and aforethought has been brought into this."
The Stephens Building is served by an adjoining parking deck, but a Stephens representative said Friday that the company has lacked enough parking for its employees and building tenants for some time.
"For our tenants in the building and for our employees, we've had a critical shortage of parking for them," Frank Thomas, a Stephens spokesman, said Friday. "It's been critical for some time. We still believe that it's a good use for that property for the people who work on the 25 floors of our building."
But Berry said he wished the proposal had not been part of a broader discussion of downtown development.
"I understand the need for parking," he said. "It just seems kind of precipitous that a large institutional employer would not have a conversation about what is the public interest in negotiating this for downtown."
Stephens representatives asked to delay consideration of the proposal until next month after a second Planning Commission member, Robbin Rahman, indicated he also opposed the project.
Second and Louisiana Properties LLC, led by Kevin Burns, senior vice president and associate general counsel for Stephens, acquired three of the buildings on the site for $4.3 million earlier this year from Louisiana and Third Properties LLC.
Louisiana and Third is organized by Philip Miron, a partner in the Little Rock law firm of Hyden, Miron & Foster, which housed its offices in one of the buildings at 200 S. Louisiana St.
The buildings also acquired in the deal included the former headquarters of VCC, a general contractor, at 216 S. Louisiana St. and the Tripp Building at 209 W. Second St.
Second and Louisiana acquired a fourth building, La-Salle Place, at 212 S. Louisiana St., in a separate transaction from 200 Louisiana Street Development Co. Inc., headed by Sam Alley, for $378,000.
Metro on 09/14/2019