The Fort Harrison Reuse Authority won approval from the City of Lawrence last night for the final phase of a decade-long redevelopment
of Fort Benjamin Harrison. 
The roughly 90-acre Lawrence Village at the
Fort calls for a new downtown with shops, offices and public plazas (pictured) mixed among as many as 1,000 condos, townhouses
and apartments. The area to be developed is bounded by Post and Lee roads and 59th and 56th streets. Plans for the community
were developed by the Reuse Authority in partnership with Carmel-based Eden Land & Design Inc., the city of Lawrence and Indianapolis-based
Browning Investments Inc. The Reuse Authority plans to begin site improvements in August.
The roughly 90-acre Lawrence Village at the
Fort calls for a new downtown with shops, offices and public plazas (pictured) mixed among as many as 1,000 condos, townhouses
and apartments. The area to be developed is bounded by Post and Lee roads and 59th and 56th streets. Plans for the community
were developed by the Reuse Authority in partnership with Carmel-based Eden Land & Design Inc., the city of Lawrence and Indianapolis-based
Browning Investments Inc. The Reuse Authority plans to begin site improvements in August.
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But I have to wonder if the region isn't being overdone with town-center or new urbanist mixed-use developments. You've got the Village of West Clay, Carmel City Center, and the Mohawk Hills redevelopment in Carmel. Then there is both River Place at 96th/Allisonville and the proposed town center idea around 116th St in Fishers. Add to that some of the stuff going on in Saxony, and the proposal for a new urbanist development around IN-32 in western Washington Township/Westfield. That's just Hamilton County. Then there's the massive mixed-use development near 86th and Keystone in Marion County. Now Lawrence is in on the mixed-use, high-density new urbanist development. And of course, we're increasing density in Broad Ripple with condos crowding over the Monon Trail. And you naturally have continued condo/loft/townhome development in and around downtown Indy, including the latest attempt at redeveloping the Market Square site.
So with all that, is there enough demand for this kind of high-density mixed-use development to support all of these projects? I just feel like something has to give. All of these projects to varying degrees are counting on luring retail, office, and residential development. If one of those components fails to materialize, what does that do to the project? I'd bet money that one or several of these projects end up looking VASTLY different from the way they are currently proposed. West Clay and Carmel City Center are already pretty far along. The stuff downtown and in Broad Ripple are going to happen no matter what. But I'd bet that among the Lawrence project, the two Fishers projects (RiverPlace and the city center idea), and the 86th/Keystone project, two or three of those will end up dying or becoming something altogether different before they are finished.