Marin Independent Journal
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Friday, June 30, 2006
Deal Near on Pini Hardware Site
Downtown Novato merchants hope the pending sale of the former Pini Hardware site will bring in a new anchor store that could revitalize the area.
"This is the next step in the program, the next peg in the hole," said Steve Jordan, president of the Downtown/Old Town Merchants Association.
The Prado Group, a San Francisco real estate development firm that created The Village on Redwood Boulevard and helped lure Trader Joe's to the city earlier this year, is in talks with Pini owners Steve Saunders and Charles Young to purchase the property.
Because the sale is not yet final, Saunders would not discuss what plans the new owners might have for the store.
"As far as the retail business goes, I can't really speculate," Saunders said. "I know there's a number of businesses that people in town want, such as a bookstore. But as for any specific plans, I haven't heard anything."
However, Prado President Dan Safier says his group may go forward with a plan that would combine a street-level store with second-story apartments.
"If we do look at the potential for mixed-use, we're looking at 10,000 to 15,000 square feet of ground floor retail space on Grant Avenue with two or three apartments above it," Safier said.
That's exactly the kind of development Novato officials have been encouraging in the city's downtown redevelopment district. Safier said he had worked closely with city redevelopment administrator Ron Gerber.
"This is part of a whole 'new urbanism' idea that encourages people to move back downtown," said John Williams of Sperry Van Ness Commercial Real Estate Advisors, the Novato business that helped the owners of the site find a buyer. "Developers and planners alike come to look at it as a new thing, when it's really just people going back to the way things were done in the old days."
Local retailers say the west side of Grant Avenue has struggled since the 2004 relocation of Pini Hardware, which had acted as an anchor for the area.
"They were affected in the same way that those of us on the east side were when the city left," said Jordan, owner of The Gift Carousel. The City of Novato moved its offices to Redwood Boulevard last year after its Old Town buildings on Sherman Avenue were condemned.
"I think everyone on that end of town is going to be happy as clams if it provides the kind of base that Whole Foods will for the east," Jordan said. "My guess is that someone of that caliber (the Prado Group) will bring in a well-known anchor that will draw people to the area."
At least one west end merchant is happy to hear of a possible sale, though still waiting to see what the new owners will bring.
"What we need is a big store," said Darin Chase, manager of Watts Music, next to the Pini site. "We don't need another three boutiques and a salon. We need one store that will be a draw."
Safier, however, says his group is keeping all of its options open.
"When we design a building,
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we try to allow for maximum flexibility, allowing it to accommodate either single or multiple tenants," he said.
Novato officials and business owners have been working to revitalize the downtown for 14 years. However, much of the attention has focused on "Old Town," the section of Grant Avenue east of Redwood Boulevard.
"There's been a lot of interest downtown since the Trader Joe's and Whole Foods properties were approved," Willliams said. "People want to go where things are happening with their investment money."
The redevelopment of the Pini site suggests the entire downtown area is becoming attractive to businesses and shoppers, said Tom Adams, management analyst for the city.
"Now that the sidewalks and the road improvements have gone in, we're looking for things to happen on both sides of Grant Avenue," Adams said.
Pini Hardware moved to the 1107 Grant Ave. site in 1946, after its original location, a small general store, burned to the ground. It remained a fixture in downtown Novato until its owners, needing more space, moved to 1535A South Novato Blvd. in 2004.
"In the late '40s and early '50s, the west side of Grant, on the other side of Redwood, was really a new place to consider," Williams said. "People didn't think of it as being part of downtown."
The building's unusual size and design made it difficult to sell at first, Williams said.
"It's a vintage building, and it's 100 feet deep, where most of the shops downtown are 70 feet deep at most," he said.
Should the deal go through, work on the site could begin by the end of 2007, Safier said.
"I can't give you any definite schedule, because we're still in the conceptual stage. We haven't submitted any plans yet," he said. "But depending on the approval process, we could begin construction late next year or early the following year."
The group intends to take its time with a project developers feel is especially important, he said.
"We want the tenant to be someone who draws the community," Safier said. "This is a space that has an impact on the surrounding area, and we want it to be a magnet for shoppers."
That's music to the ears of Watts manager Chase.
"I hope it's good. I hope we know soon what it is," he said. "And I hope it doesn't take forever to go in. We've been waiting for the movie theater to open for 16 years."
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