Housing, marina slated near Towhead Island
Sheldon S. Shafer
The Courier-Journal
Ground will be broken next Friday for the $200 million RiverPark Place between River Road and the Ohio River near Towhead Island.
The Army Corps of Engineers recently approved a permit for the project just upriver from Waterfront Park.
The permit clears the way for a riverfront development that city officials first envisioned in the early 1990s. A project called FallsHarbor at the 42-acre target site fell through in 1999 after years of plan revisions.
The RiverPark Place project will feature 621 dwellings, the area’s largest Ohio River marina, and commercial, office and extensive park space.
“RiverPark Place will be a unique neighborhood on Louisville’s waterfront,” Metro Mayor Jerry Abramson said. “Our city was founded because of the Ohio River, and we have worked hard in the past decade to reclaim it.”
RiverPark Place “has been a long time in coming,” said David Karem, president of the Waterfront Development Corp., which is overseeing the project.
Steve Poe, chief executive officer of the Poe Cos., is the lead developer on the project. Other partners are Louisville businessmen Nolen Allen, Clyde Ensor and Mike Ehrler, and architect K. Norman Berry. Berry’s firm and Goody Clancy of Boston designed RiverPark Place.
The housing will be in four five-story buildings along River Road and two 16-story towers closer to the river.
Included will be 552 condominiums, both townhouses and loft units, and 69 apartments. The condos will sell for $139,000 to $1.5 million.
Since last summer, when sales began, nearly 100 of the condos have been secured by contract. And of 150 boat slips in the marina, about 40 have been sold, said Shannon Haste, RiverPark’s director of sales. Some of the slips cost as much as $65,000.
Mike Scheid, a financial adviser who lives in northeastern Jefferson County, has made a down payment on a $359,000 condo on the fifth floor of one of the towers and also secured a $30,000 boat slip. He and his family, who enjoy boating, may keep their home and use the condo for summers and weekend getaways, he said.
The ground floors in the six buildings will have total of 40,000 square feet of commercial space, including a fitness center, probably two restaurants and five to eight shops. There will also be about 12,000 square feet of office space.
Eric Schreiner, the Poe Cos.’ president of construction and development, said the marina will probably be completed by late summer.
One of the towers and two of the buildings along River Road will be completed in fall 2008. The other three buildings are slated to be finished in late 2009.
A wide walkway will be developed near the river’s edge through RiverPark Place and connect with Waterfront Park to the west.
To elevate the housing out of the flood plain, the buildings will be constructed on a huge platform, 12 feet above River Road. About 800 spaces for parking will be under the platform, with another 800 spaces above ground.
The $200 million financing “is expected to be locked up in four to six weeks and won’t be a problem,” primarily because of the swift advance sales, Schreiner said.
The development agreement with the city calls for the partners to pay the city 4 percent of the proceeds of all condo sales and 4 percent from the sale of the boat slips in return for use of the city-owned land. The partners eventually plan to buy the site, Schreiner said.