One of the most encouraging development projects in the Richmond region is the recently announced plan to redevelop the dilapidated Cloverleaf Mall in Chesterfield County. Crosland LLC, based in Charlotte, N.C., has purchased the mall from Chesterfield County for $9.2 million. Crosland proposes to raze the old mall by 2008, build 200,000 square feet of commercial space and erect more than 500 residences by 2011. (See the article by the Times Dispatch.)
Cloverleaf, built in 1972, was one of the region’s first malls but it fell into decline as Chesterfield’s growth frontier pushed south. As with so many malls built in the 1970s, the retail complex had nothing to offer but its newness. It was architecturally undistinguished, and it was surrounded by strip shopping-center dreck, which has outlived its planned obsolescence as well. Rather than integrating with the surrounding community, the mall stood apart from it, separated by vast parking lots, unwalkable roads and physical barriers. Meanwhile, the old, 60s- and 70s-era housing in the region, paragons of early “suburban sprawl,” had failed to create the sense of place, or character, that inspires homeowners to reinvest and upgrade. Instead, the middle class abandoned the area for bigger houses on the development frontier, and they were followed by lower-income residents who couldn’t keep them up.
Despite its prime location at the intersection of Midlothian Turnpike and the Chippenham Parkway, Cloverleaf has been plagued by the loss of tenants and business traffic. Just since 2000, retail sales have declined from $45.3 million to $11.7 million. Seeing potential for a major re-development project, Chesterfield County acquired the property in 2004 with the aim of stimulating private-sector interest.
The beauty of this new Chippenham Place project is that it will move 500 people closer to the Richmond New Urban Region’s core. They will be served by existing infrastructure — water, sewer and superb road access. There is no need (I think, but have not confirmed) to build new schools, police stations and fire stations. Although Chesterfield County is preparing an unspecified “economic development package” for Crosfield, anything the County spends is likely to be a fraction of what it would cost to provide infrastructure and services to the huge new projects sprouting along Rt. 288 on the region’s southern growth frontier.
If Chippenham Place accommodates the population growth of the Richmond region by 500 households, that’s 500 households that the Commonwealth of Virginia doesn’t have to provide new transportation infrastructure for. Question: What does the state transportation plan do to encourage more re-development projects like Chippenham Place? Instead of dumping money on new roads in fast-growth counties in a hamster-in-a-treadmill effort to keep up with new growth, why isn’t the state doing everything it can to bolster revitalization projects all around the state?