A recent walk on a lovely evening through the Fairview project seemed to bring confirmation that it was doomed to be very auto-dependent and that the "village center" concept for a neighborhood commercial hub was essentially dead.
On one of the corners of the village center was a sign for a church.
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| A church on the "Village Center" of Fairview |
The "Acts Center" appears to be a direct reference to the Acts of the Apostles in the Christian Bible.
Its full name would be the Acts Center for Global Evangelism, and focus on "Evangelist Equipping," "Pastor Equipping," and "Church Mobilization."
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| Site aerial, keyed to comments here |
While fundraising for the Acts Center seems still very much in early stages, and not necessarily any sure thing, this would be a significant deviation from the original village center and main street concept for this area. It will be very much a drive-to, even regional, destination, and not any kind of walk-to neighborhood retail, restaurant, or other service.
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| Older and new construction at The Grove |
Hardly a block away on Strong Road, apartment living at The Grove remained pretty autoist. One person only was out on the street with a skateboard. No others were walking.
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| Vilage Center and "Walk Every Day" Fairview Master Plan (2004) |
Nearly twenty years ago the original vision was for lots of walking, including trips to "village center shops" and a main street.
It's not possible to go back for a mulligan, but as we think about neighborhood hubs and Climate Friendly Areas, the City really should have more interest in analyzing why development in Fairview has strayed so far from the vision in the original Master Plan, and what the City might do differently so that successive attempts at more walkable development yield stronger results. The Fairview project is a laboratory, and we are not paying enough attention to it as a case study.
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| Dirt piles by new sidewalk and swale on Reed Road |
The upper hillside along Reed and Battle Creek Roads is yet undeveloped, and maybe there will be more interesting things to do there as the first round of plans is adjusted or outright superseded.
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| Backside of Magnolia project at Fairview |
One interesting variation was on a part very near Fairview Industrial and abutting the forthcoming Fairview Park.
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| Another Magnolia project on 12th Street (May) |
The paint and trim strongly resembled a project seen earlier in the year on 12th Street.
It turns out there are a whole bunch of them! They are generally boxy smallplexes, infill on smaller lots, some of them flag lots, like the one on 12th. Some of them may have been made possible by new middle housing zoning.
While there is some real scale here with six sites and repeated plans that appear to be off a basic template, it's a kind of smallplex development I don't think we have much seen here in Salem. So that will be interesting to watch, and maybe there will be more to say another time.
At Pringle Creek Community, the oldest part of the development, there was what looked like it might be the first small apartment block there.
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| Maybe an apartment block? |
It had been nearly all single detached housing, and this too will be interesting to follow.
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| Revisiting the Fairview Park Master Plan (from June Parks & Recreation Advisory Board) |
Finally, the City is also cranking up a "refinement" addendum on the Fairview Park Master Plan. The City says they are going to "re-engage the community to confirm priorities, refine the design of master plan elements...and obtain probable cost estimation."
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| Fairview Park in 2016 Master Plan |
It will be interesting to learn more about what prompted doubt on priorities in the plan.
You may recall a couple of years ago that the area of the notch at the "bottom" of the park map was donated to the City for a plaza, to be "named after the Ward Family."
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| Donated to the City for a plaza (2021) |
That will be directly across the street from the proposed church. It may be that these are some of the ingredients prompting the new refinement effort. Additionally, the original site for a "history plaza" might be moved to the new plaza, and that could open up more park space. So there is some shuffling of space that might be done also.
Altogether, even with very real disappointments, the Fairview project continues to be fascinating and worth closer attention.
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