Often a figurative question answered with platitudes from politicians about their vision for the future, the issue of the look of Bloomington, especially the downtown, is a literal debate.
In February, the Bloomington City Plan Commission approved a controversial plan for the six-story Graduate Hotel, which is to be built on Kirkwood ?Avenue.
The controversy for the new hotel was centered on the plan commission’s approval of a height wavier, allowing for the construction of the 70-foot hotel.
“We want good growth, we don’t want out-of-control growth,” said Chris Sturbaum, a member of the Bloomington City Council and Plan Commission. “And we want people who are growing up to have a place to come back to and work and a place to start their businesses.”
Sturbaum, who voted against the Graduate Hotel’s height wavier, explained the rationale for the approval by the plan commission.
“There was a really strong desire to have a more diverse population downtown, and a hotel is an alternative to a monoculture of student rentals, so that was a positive,” Sturbaum said. “To have that positive they needed a certain volume, and that was a formula that people were wrestling with. The compromise they made was to accept the larger size in an area that wasn’t really designed for quite as large a scale.”
Development in Bloomington is a key issue as the mayoral primary heats up.
Two of Bloomington’s Democratic mayoral candidates called press conferences at City Hall to criticize construction of large buildings in the Bloomington downtown.
“The recent approval of the too-tall Graduate Hotel is a mistake that would scar this iconic corridor,” said Democratic candidate for mayor John Hamilton in a press release.
Without citing the hotel specifically, Darryl Neher, another Democratic candidate for mayor, criticized large-scale development in Bloomington.
“If we fail to act, we will continue to possibly lose Kirkwood, our courthouse square and even some of our neighborhoods to the shadow of other outside developments being built by out-of-state developers,” Neher said in a prepared statement.
Both Hamilton and Neher have called for adjustments to the city’s Unified Development Ordinance and Growth Policy Plan.
Sturbaum said the city is encouraging development in the Certified Tech park adjacent to downtown Bloomington, though it seems the city’s vibrant downtown will always be a target for real estate developers targeting an increasing student population ?at IU.
Though Sturbaum said he would like to see developers take Bloomington downtown aesthetics into plans for new building, he said the city only has so much power.
“We’re not Napoleon,” he said. “We can’t say, ‘You must build everything this way,’ which is what he did for a while.”
