City could buy land for riverfront park

BY EMILY BATTLE

Date published: 9/26/2007

BY EMILY BATTLE

A long-talked-about riverfront park is showing signs of moving closer to reality.

City staff have negotiated a deal to buy land that Tommy Mitchell owns at 717 Sophia St. for $950,000.

Mitchell's is one of three properties Fredericksburg leaders want to buy in order to transform the area at the river end of Charlotte Street from a collection of buildings and parking lots into a park.

The City Council approved a design for that park--seen as a starting point for a larger, linear park that would encompass the entire city riverfront--last night.

Turning that one-page design concept into an actual park is expected to cost around $3 million, a sum that does not currently appear to be set aside for that purpose in Fredericksburg's long-term construction plan.

That number also doesn't include land acquisition. The city expects to use the $1.1 million it anticipates getting from the sale of hotel land at the corner of Caroline and Charlotte streets to buy some of this land.

But in addition to the $950,000 Mitchell parcel, Fredericksburg leaders still want to buy a retail property next door owned by Franklin Liebenow and the Wings on the Water property.

The $950,000 price for Mitchell's property is lower than the $1.2 million price ceiling Mitchell set when he offered the city an option on the property last year, but it's a little higher than the land's recently assessed value of $877,000.

The price is contingent on the city giving Mitchell a forty-foot-wide public right-of-way known as "Lafayette Boulevard extended." It leads from the end of Lafayette at Sophia Street to the Rappahannock River.

Mitchell would also get a narrow alley across Sophia Street from the land the city wants to buy. Mitchell would have to demolish the former thrift shop on the land, pull up the asphalt parking lot and remove an underground storage tank.

The city would pay his tipping fees at the landfill and would contribute $5,500 toward demolition costs.

The council did not take action on the sales contract last night, but it did set in motion some bureaucratic procedures that will be necessary for the sale to occur.

The Planning Commission has to review the proposal to give Mitchell the right-of-way at the end of Lafayette. It is scheduled to hold a public hearing on that Oct. 10.

The Sophia Street alley transfer won't go to the commission this time, because that body approved it back when Mitchell was talking about building a hotel on that block.

On Oct. 23, the City Council will hold hearings on both of the right-of-way transfers, and will vote on the sales contract.

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Date published: 9/26/2007