More Unnecessary Development in A2

"Ann Arbor City Council OKs 42 North student apartments off Maple Road
Posted by Judy McGovern | The Ann Arbor News September 09, 2008 08:26AM

Hours of debate, fact-finding and agonized decision-making ended Monday when Ann Arbor's City Council OK'd a controversial student-apartment project off South Maple Road by a 7-4 vote."

42 North (a large-scale apartment complex aimed at student tenants) is a perfect example of an unnecessary development that is helping to ruin the landscape of Ann Arbor. The location of this development faces peaceful Dicken Woods Nature Area and will be a neighbor to the single-story, ranch-style development known as Surrey Park. This will be the tallest development (3 stories) south of Pauline Blvd. along South Maple Rd. It will have some 120 apartments and nearly 500 parking spaces.

Basically, almost nobody who lives in the area surrounding 42 North wants it built but it will be built. Grace Bible Church benefits greatly from this sale of property (which will also destroy two perfectly good ranch homes that were once homes for the ministry). Not only are they flush with cash but they will now have a built-in group of young people that they can proselytize within walking distance of their church.

Plainly, the area does not need such a development. Besides the obvious demands on local roads, storm drainage, and utility consumption, it is simply incongruous with its neighbors. A much better fit would have been a modest condo or single family home development but those models may not have been as financially attractive to either the church or potential developers. But everyone has asked the simple question: where do they think they are going to get all of the student tenants that they are aiming this development at? The University has recently expanded on-campus housing. New (much closer) off-campus developments have already been authorized. And nearby apartment complexes are all advertising for more tenants. Where are all of these new student tenants going to come from?

I'm disappointed in Grace Bible Church, the Ann Arbor City Council, and Mayor Hieftje. Such a decision begs the question: who runs Ann Arbor? It isn't the citizens. It isn't the Mayor. It isn't the City Council. Apparently, it is the developers who run Ann Arbor. Developers who are powerful enough to bull-doze local people and their government by threatening to bring in the lawyers and whip out a lawsuit which is exactly what happened in this very sad case.