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expressed concern about incremental development and felt that critical mass was necessary to attract people <br />to downtown. She said the City should also take into consideration the challenges developers faced in <br />obtaining financing for projects. She commented that the escalating costs of construction meant that if her <br />project had been started six months later it could not have been built. <br /> <br />Mr. Zelenka asked if the condominiums had any public investment. Ms. Tate replied that the only public <br />investment was the multi-unit property tax exemption (MUPTE) and without that exemption it would have <br />been much more difficult to sell units. <br /> <br />Ms. Bettman questioned why downtown property was more expensive and had higher value when the <br />downtown area was identified as depressed. Ms. Tate replied that property value included the structure as <br />well as the land and most developers would demolish an existing building to build a new one, making it more <br />costly to develop in downtown. <br /> <br />Mr. Gaydos thanked the panelists for their presentations and opened the question and answer period. <br /> <br />Replying to Ms. Bettman's question, Mr. Prichard said a factor in the cost of downtown property was <br />parking. He gave the example of a higher return on a parcel when it was parking than after a building was <br />constructed, making parking the highest and best use of property downtown. <br /> <br />Ms. Bettman asked if the downtown and urban renewal plans were sufficient to meet the need to guide <br />overall development. Mr. Diethelm said development of the train station area involved developing what was <br />in essence a small refinement plan that had community involvement and support. <br /> <br />Mr. Korth said a plan could evolve in many ways but whatever the project, it should be well thought out in <br />advance. He said there needed to be some decisions about the vision or direction to guide the project. He <br />said it was difficult to proceed with a project when there were too many different perspectives involved. <br /> <br />Mr. Diethelm said the downtown plan was general and did not provide much guidance on things that would <br />be important in developing the area. <br /> <br />Mr. Bowerman commented that the development code was like a master plan and was so specific it almost <br />functioned as a template. He said many developers were interested in a performance pathway in the code to <br />allow flexibility in meeting the City's goals. He said that performance pathways had been successful in <br />other cities in encouraging vibrant community development. <br /> <br />Mr. Clark observed that demand-driven development was a successful model and asked what there was in <br />terms of demand for downtown. Mr. Diethelm replied that there needed to be a reconception of what <br />downtown would become. He did not think that was a retail center; the goal should to target a downtown <br />residential population of 5-6,000 people and that would carry with it a demand for certain goods and <br />services. <br /> <br />Mr. Prichard said based on an evaluation of the costs of redevelopment, he concluded that retail, office and <br />market-rate housing were not currently feasible; what would work was affordable housing and condomini- <br />ums. <br /> <br />Mr. Bowerman believed that critical mass was necessary and it had been demonstrated frequently that a <br />dense urban experience was attractive to a segment of the population. He said downtown Eugene, having <br /> <br /> <br />MINUTES—Eugene City Council April 16, 2007 Page 4 <br /> Workshop <br /> <br />