CentrePointe plans revised as work on Lexington project ramps up

CentrePointe developers filed new plans this week for the long-stalled downtown Lexington development as work at the site has ramped up over the past week.

The new plans, filed Wednesday, call for keeping the same design and configuration — two hotels, an office tower as well as restaurant and retail space — but gives the developers flexibility on the number of floors for each building.

A previous plan called for apartments or condominiums for both hotel buildings. The new plans would allow the developers to put those apartments or condominiums on top of the proposed office tower, at the corner of Limestone and Main streets, which was originally planned to be 10 floors.

“The plan and the designs of the two buildings are still the same,” said Dudley Webb, of the Webb Companies, the developer of the project. “This will just give us flexibility to add floors to the office building instead of the two hotel buildings.”

The proposed hotel building, on the corner of Vine and Upper streets, was originally 18 stories — a 13-story hotel with five stories of condominiums on top. The Webb Companies are now asking for an 11- to 12-story hotel. An apartment building and extended stay hotel, on the corner of Upper and Main streets, was originally approved for 12 stories. The new request would decrease the number of floors to seven or eight.

Webb said developers of the hotels decided condominiums or apartments would not work. The footprint needed for hotel rooms verses apartments or condominiums is different. The residential units will work better with the office tower, Webb said.

Under the new plans, the office tower could be between eight and 12 stories. That would allow the developers to add two or three stories of apartments or condominiums or none.

“We are leaning toward adding the two stories of apartments or condominiums to the office tower,” Webb said Thursday.

Because there are changes to the heights of the buildings, the new plans will have to be approved by the Courthouse Area Design Review Board, which approves designs of buildings in the downtown core.

Brandi Peacher, design officer for the city and staffer for the Courthouse Area Design Review Board, said the new plans will be reviewed by the board at its meeting on Nov. 9.

Meanwhile, employees of D.W. Wilburn Construction have been unloading re-bar and other materials needed to build the three-story underground parking garage this week. Wilburn signed a contract in early October to build the garage after several months of limited activity on the site.

Questions about how the development will be financed have dogged the project since it was originally announced in 2008. Webb said Thursday the Webb Companies and Joe Rosenberg, who owns much of the land that CentrePointe sits on, have raised the money privately to build the garage. The group still plans to ask the Kentucky League of Cities to issue bonds to recoup their investment after the garage is completed, Webb said.

The garage will take at least seven months to complete, Webb said. Once it is completed, the hotels, office tower, restaurant and retail space will be built on top of the garage, Webb said.

“We hope to have construction completed in 2018 with the hotels opened sometime in the fall of 2018,” he said.

This story was originally published October 20, 2016 at 4:51 PM with the headline "CentrePointe plans revised as work on Lexington project ramps up."