In February, Garrison Group Inc. president Todd Smith
unveiled a plan to develop a 3-acre high-end shopping center at the corner
of South Grand and MacArthur avenues, where the vacant Esquire Theatre now
stands. On Nov. 30, Kerasotes, the Springfield-based
movie-theater chain that owns the site, declined to extend an option, in
effect killing the project that many thought would be a major catalyst to
reversing years of economic decline [see Todd Spivak, “Man with a
plan,” Feb. 24]. Kathleen Sorensen, president of Washington
Park-Knolls Association, who worked with Smith to see the project to
fruition, hadn’t heard the news until she spoke with Illinois Times. “Wow,” Sorensen says in disbelief.
“I am disappointed, and I’m sure that’s how everyone else
feels.”
Sorensen had hoped the project would improve
aesthetic appeal on MacArthur and set the pace for more upscale development
in the area. Smith, too, wanted the project to serve as a model for other
developers looking to build in the inner city. “It’s a unique property,” Smith
says. “We were trying to develop a very unique, specialized piece of
property, and that takes time.”
Kerasotes did not respond to requests for comment.
However, Smith, who had been courting potential users of the property,
speculates that the company simply decided to put the property back on the
market to gauge interest. Though Smith says that he “certainly
understands that is the property owner’s call,” his company had
invested exploration money in traffic studies, infrastructure planning,
professional design studies, and hiring an architectural firm. He won’t give a dollar figure on how much his
firm spent and cannot now be recouped, just that it was “tens of
thousands.”
“Call it the expense of learning,”
he adds. Meanwhile, Smith says that he isn’t quite ready
to give up on the MacArthur site. “We believe strongly in that specific
location,” he says. “In looking back on the project, my hope is
that we were at least successful in raising the awareness of positive
development of neighborhood retail in Springfield. “That location is a good location, and
something will happen with it.”
This article appears in Dec 15-21, 2005.
