On Tuesday, the City Council will be asked to provide a new agreement with Blake Hunt Ventures to build something on the long-vacant lot in Centerville. Blake Hunt first got the job by promising a supermarket.

That flopped, but now they’re back with a housing developer and a project with ground floor retail and apartments on top. Some of the apartments would be live work units, which I don’t think Fremont has a lot of. Anyway the neighbors have said they don’t want housing there, so I might be in for long night at Tuesday’s City Council meeting.

Here is the outline of the proposal from the staff report:

1. Approximately 35,000 square feet of rentable retail space on Fremont Boulevard;

2. Approximately 200 to 300 residential rental apartments and live-work units. The residential
units would wrap around two parking structures and along the proposed new private street
between Post Street and Fremont Boulevard. It should be noted that the developers would not
accept language requiring that the project be built to a condominium standard, explaining that
instead they typically build to “first class apartment standards,” which would include laminate
counters and floors, and electric appliances. In addition, there would not be individual water
heaters in each unit, (each building would have a centralized boiler system), and sound
attenuation finishes would not include extra layers on floors and ceilings. The developer
explained that such upgrades would be cost prohibitive.

3. A pedestrian-friendly new private street bisecting the property from Fremont Boulevard to Post
Street that aligns with the entry to the commercial use on the east side of Post Street (Dale
Hardware) and that provides both pedestrian and vehicular circulation elements and a focus for
project entry features and plazas.