Wilson Avenue - WKTV Journal

By Joanne Bailey-Boorsma

In 2000, Gary Granger bought a piece of property on the south side of 56th Street between Ivanrest and Wilson avenues. Seventeen years later, his company, The Granger Group, broke ground on a new residential development that is estimated to be valued at more than $100 million.

On Thursday, Sept. 27, residents, Wyoming city officials, and members from The Granger Group met at the end of Niles Drive for the groundbreaking ceremony for The Reserve, which is located off of 56th Street between Wilson and Ivanrest avenues.

“The Reserve housing development has gone through numerous iterations over the past year and we are grateful after owning this land for 17 years to be moving forward with this project,” said Project Manager Ryan Granger. “Granger Group believes Wyoming is a booming residential and commercial market and we’ve enjoyed working with the community to get their insight into this project as well.”

The project will add 175 single family homes, 138 single story flats, and 190 luxury apartments to the existing 131 single family homes that are currently there. Through input from the community, Granger said they got a sense of a real desire to be connected so the new development also will include a community center, a dog park, tennis courts and walking trails that will provide access to existing trails such as Kent Trails. The development is actually close to one of the largest shopping districts — which includes RiverTown Crossings mall — in the Greater Grand Rapids area.

Granger Group President Gary Granger said infrastructure was put in place shortly after the property was purchased, and he noted he is excited about finally being able to extend Niles Drive through to Wilson Avenue.

Wyomig City officials and Granger Group representatives at The Reserve groundbreaking.

“It has been a process,” Gary Granger said, adding that the team had to work through several concepts.

“The city did a new master plan, envisioning that Wilson Road would primarily be a bedroom community and not so much commercial,” Granger said during the open house about the history of the property. “Believe it or not at the time, we were not so crazy about it. We wanted to do commercial because we thought with the mall, Coscto, and all the other things just a couple of miles from here, we thought all that commercial would work all the way back to the expressway.”

Granger said the team had to take a step back and reconsider how the property would look as a bedroom community and he now believes the development could help “southwest Grand Rapids to really be on the map.”

“Most people think about where is the place to be in Grand Rapids and most people think the major market opportunity is northeast,” Gary Granger said. “We are exactly on the opposite side of that. I happen to believe this will be the premier housing destination.”

Granger Group, which has completed several projects in the Metro Village located around Metro Health University of Michigan Health, expects to complete The Reserve by 2021.

The rezoning request for the proposed Reserve at Rivertown PUD has been pulled from the Nov. 6 meeting.

Per the request of the developer, a proposed rezoning for the 56th Street and Wilson Avenue area has been taken off the Wyoming City Council’s agenda for the upcoming Monday night meeting.

The Granger Group had been seeking a rezoning of an an additional 98 acres to a development on Wilson Avenue and 56th Street. The additional acreage would have been combined with an approved 2001 current planned unit development (PUD) for that area bringing the PUD to a total of 211.2 acres.

Granger spokesperson David Jackiewicz, with First & Main Corporate, confirmed last week that Granger was requesting the city council postpone the hearing on the rezoning so as “to allow the Planning Commission to review an updated PUD plan we recently submitted…” Jackiewicz confirmed that on Oct. 19, Granger Group did submit an amendment to its original 2001 PUD that would include a mix of condominiums, townhouses, and single family homes.

Granger started the rezoning process in August. In that proposal of the 211.2 acres, there would have been zero office space but about 3.57 acres of retail space and 686 total housing units. Those units would be 316 single family lots and 370 apartments with no multi-family housing. The Planning Commission had recommended denial of the rezoning request to the Wyoming City Council, which has the final decision on rezoning.

The rezoning request had meet with much opposition from residents currently living in and around the development. At a Sept. 5 City Council meeting, at the Granger Group’s request, the council decided to delay a decision until its Nov. 6 meeting. Company officials stated at the meeting that it was their desire to work through the issues and come up with a plan that would have a mutually satisfying conclusion.

Some of the concerns expressed by residents were:

decrease value to existing homes
density too high in one spot
increase traffic along 56th Street
violation of current property owners’ rights
developer does not need to max out the density on the PUD
residents should have input on changes
growth assumptions of 1 percent are too low
putting a strain on local police and fire services
there already are lots of other options for luxury apartments
other developments such as The Haven have not open and the full impact of those on school and community resources remain an unknown

“It [was] higher right now with M-6, I get that,” said Wyoming resident Jason Gillette, who was discussing the traffic on 56th Street. “Even without that, it is very high traffic in the area. In the evening, I’ll be coming and have to wait 20 minutes…depending on what time you come through.”

Gordon VanMeulen, who is with the Wyoming Citizens for Planned Progress, said everyone understands that there will be development in the area, but it needs to be sensible and balance.

“The 2020 Land Use Plan and Wilson Corridor Report recommended multi-family housing on the northland as a buffer to the RiverTown Crossing and single family homes on the southend,” VanMeulen said. He stated his group is not in favor of the rezoning because of current issues with the Granger Group’s Rivertown Valley, density and number of multi-family units and the failure to follow the 2020 Land Use Plan and the Wilson Corridor Report.

In a staff report presented to city officials, staff said that the proposed rezoning does comply with the 2020 Land Use Plan falling under the 4 units per acre overall density. The proposal called for 3.66 units per acre.

“When you buy some property next to some vacant land you should really understand can and might be done there,” said 3rd Ward Council Member Robert Postema at the Sept. 5 City Council meeting. “And when we have a PUD in place that is exactly what has been done. Those homeowners have a right to expect what was going to be built behind them. It was all planned out in the PUD. The exact nature of the building may not have been built as it was but the idea that they would have some condominiums behind them, some open space, and then apartments way up by Wilson that was pretty well established.”