Madison City Council OKs big housing developments on South and East sides | Local Government

The proposal by McGrath Property Group, which will provide 192 apartments, 13,500 square feet of commercial space and more than 200 parking spaces in a three-floor garage, is the fourth iteration of a project for the site at the corner of East Olin Avenue and John Nolen Drive on the South Side. The council voted unanimously to approve a required rezoning, the last main nod needed.

Also Tuesday, the council unanimously approved the placement of new streets and rezonings as part of the ambitious Oscar Mayer Special Area Plan on the North Side, a move that will allow a developer to offer a $150 million roughly 550-unit low-cost housing project near a prized wetland that’s the first private proposal under the city’s plan.

The council also approved a required rezoning for Threshold Development’s five-story housing and commercial redevelopment that will replace four smaller structures at the corner of Cottage Grove Road and Monona Drive, and passed a plan to move to hybrid, in-person and online council meetings starting on July 12. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the council hasn’t met in person since March 17, 2020.

In April 2021, McGrath offered a controversial, 18-story project with 291 apartments, 12,500 square feet of commercial space and parking that would have razed the Coliseum Bar, 232 E. Olin Ave., and the Wonder Bar, 222 E. Olin Ave. The building would likely have been the city’s third-tallest and the tallest with a residential component.

But the Plan Commission blocked it and McGrath in mid-November offered a 12-story plan with the Wonder Bar moved elsewhere on the 1.5-acre site. In December, McGrath cited rising costs and informally described a much smaller project — likely four or five stories — over two levels of parking that would have allowed the Wonder Bar to stay put.

But McGrath returned to the 12-story project, a height that complies with a recently approved South Madison Plan. The new proposal calls for demolishing the Coliseum Bar for the 12-story building with 192 apartments with a range from studios to three-bedroom units, 13,500 square feet of commercial space, many amenities, and 202 covered and 23 surface parking stalls and bicycle parking.

The Wonder Bar, emblematic of the outposts Chicago gangsters established as roadhouses along highways on the outskirts of cities or in rural areas in the 1930s for bootlegging, will be preserved in its present location and eventually updated as needed when a new tenant is found for the building, Lance McGrath said.

“It always feels great to get a project approved,” McGrath said Tuesday. “This one was especially challenging and it took several design iterations to get to this point but we are very pleased with this outstanding project that seems to satisfy most concerns.”

McGrath hopes to start construction in September with occupancy in the spring of 2024.

Maximizes housing, open space

Meanwhile, the council opened the door to the first big private development under the Oscar Mayer Special Area Plan. Lincoln Avenue Capital of Santa Monica, California, is proposing two six-story buildings, one with 250 apartments for seniors and the other with 300 units for families, on the former Hartmeyer property near a large natural area with wetlands, trees and open space adjacent to Roth Street and west of the former Oscar Mayer meat processing plant.

City staff had disagreed with the developer, Ald. Syed Abbas, 12th District, neighborhood groups, and environmentalists over where the city should place new streets in the area, which could influence the number of housing units and how much open space near the development site is preserved.

An original location supported by four city agencies and the Transportation Policy and Planning Board, would have extended Roth Street toward Coolidge Street to create an east-west connection between Packers and Sherman avenues, and merged Huxley and Ruskin streets to create a north-south connection between Aberg and Commercial avenues. The new streets would cross like an X near the redevelopment site.

An alternative, endorsed by the Plan Commission, eliminates the X and makes the connections with two T intersections and is backed by Abbas, the Sherman Neighborhood Association, Friends of Hartmeyer Natural Area, and the Four Lakes Group of the Sierra Club.

The alternative placement would maximize the amount of housing in the proposed development, preserve more open space and trees sooner and place the road slightly further from open space, while still allowing the Roth Street railroad crossing to be relocated to the south on the new east-west street connection — a key move to creating better access across the larger Oscar Mayer planning area, they said.

The council voted unanimously for the alternative street placement and related rezoning of property, including land for a conservation district, consistent with the land use recommendations in the special area plan. Lincoln Avenue Capital is expected to submit a land use application based on the decisions.

“It’s a win-win for everybody,” said consultant Melissa Huggins, speaking for Lincoln Avenue Capital.

The council also voted unanimously to approve Threshold Development Group’s stalled, roughly $20 million housing project at the busy corner of Monona Drive and Cottage Grove Road on the city’s East Side.

Threshold intends to demolish the former Jade Monkey bar building and Exhaust Pros muffler shop, a tattoo shop, all vacant, and the popular Java Cat Coffee shop to make way for a five-story structure offering 69 apartments, a UW Credit Union branch, Java Cat in a new space and underground parking.

In late 2020, the developer won city permission to raze the roughly 26,300-square-foot Lakeside Shopping Center, the Jade Monkey — which relocated nearby — and muffler shop to make way for a $40 million redevelopment with two, four-story buildings that would have delivered 188 apartments, 20,350 square feet of commercial space and parking.

But the project stalled when Threshold was unable to secure the shopping center because the lone remaining tenant at the time, Nerdhaven Arcade, has a long-term lease with the current shopping center owner and the tenant declined a buyout. Since then, the shopping center on the 200 block of Cottage Grove Road has been refilling with tenants, including the return of an Ace Hardware.

After more than two years of online meetings, the council voted unanimously to approve hybrid, in-person and online meetings at the City-County Building starting on July 12 and continuing at least through Sept. 6.

• Follow CDC and Public Health Madison and Dane County recommendations.
• The mayor, council president and vice president, clerks, council chief of staff and city attorney should be in-person.
• Staff should be able to participate online at discretion of the mayor.
• The public can be in-person or online.
• Keep the council quorum the same, 14 members, and count it from alders in room and joining online, with a strong desire to have members in-person with mask wearing an option.
• Some seats wouldn’t be available to the public in the council chambers but there would be an overflow room.