The city of Spokane Valley appears ready to give final approval this month to the latest version of the proposed Sprague-Appleway Revitalization Plan, says Mayor Rich Munson.

The city hopes to attract a variety of private development projects by jump-starting a city-center district through its own development of a new City Hall in the University City Shopping Center, which is at the core of the revitalization plan, Munson says.

Though the city says the revised plan has 70 substantive changes from a previous draft of the proposal, including retaining one-way traffic on the section of the Sprague-Appleway couplet most heavily used by commuters, some observers say it still has its problems.

One of the critics' contentions is that in trying to attract a variety of land uses, the plan limits the size and types of retail uses that already exist in some areas of the corridor, which could discourage further economic development.

Steve Wineinger, owner of Pro Sign, a Spokane Valley sign and awning business, has opposed sign restrictions in the plan that would apply to his clients. He says he also opposes what he sees as a lifestyle of walking, vertical living, and mass transportation that the city is trying to impose through land-use zoning at the heart of the plan.

Munson says the city is interested in buying a 2.6-acre site west of Dartmouth Road, across from the ICT Group Inc. call center, where it intends to develop a 60,000-square-foot City Hall building that would get the revitalization effort rolling.

"We're negotiating the purchase of the land, although leasing it isn't off the table," Munson says. The land is owned by University City Inc.

He says the city has set aside more than $5 million for the land purchase, but adds, "I hope it isn't going to cost that much."

The total estimated cost of the planned City Hall is $18 million, Munson says, adding that the project would be funded partially through bonds, if voters approve.

"We fully intend to go to voters to ask for some funding," he says. "We feel if we can get it built, it will attract private development."

Scott Kuhta, the city's revitalization project manager, says the city hopes to reach an agreement to buy the site this year, but no project schedule has been set.

Bernardo Wills Architects PS, of Spokane, and GGLO LLC, of Seattle, are doing preliminary design work on the proposed city center, which would include the planned City Hall.

The latest draft of the revitalization plan shortens the original controversial proposal to return the 2.5-mile Sprague-Appleway couplet to two-way traffic, Kuhta says. Under the revised plan, Sprague Avenue would continue to carry westbound traffic and Appleway Boulevard would carry eastbound traffic between the Sprague-Interstate 90 interchange and Mullan Road, which is the 1.5-mile section of the couplet that's most heavily traveled by commuters. A one-mile stretch of the couplet between Mullan and University roads would be returned to two-way traffic.

Eventually, Appleway would be extended three miles east from its terminus at University to Sullivan Road, if Spokane Valley can negotiate a right-of-way agreement with the county, Kuhta says.

The cost of the transportation system in the revised revitalization plan hasn't been calculated yet, but Kuhta estimates it will be a few million dollars less than an earlier estimate of $41 million because most of the one-way couplet would be retained. Most of that original estimated cost—$24 million—would be for the extension of Appleway from University Road to Sullivan Road, he adds.

The transportation section of the plan includes creating two east-west core streets running between and parallel to Sprague and Appleway in the U-City mall area, and a north-south connector road parallel to and between Dartmouth and University roads, just east of the call center.

The core streets, including a recently constructed north-south street between Appleway and Sprague, just west of Percy's Caf Americana, would divide the heart of the city center into six roughly 2.5-acre blocks, Kuhta says.

The proposed revitalization plan, although scaled back in its reach from a proposal that drew heavy opposition last year, retains a concept that eventually would convert the U-City mall site into a pedestrian-friendly city center with office and retail uses, Munson says.

It also would encourage residential development south of Appleway, designate two commercial centers with one near the Sprague-I-90 interchange and the other west of Vista Road, and encourage a mix of retail, office, lodging and medium-density housing in certain areas along the Sprague-Appleway corridor that currently are dominated by retail uses.

The City Council could decide to adopt the revitalization plan at its regular meeting on June 16, Kuhta says. After it's approved, the revitalization plan probably wouldn't go into effect for 60 to 90 days, to allow projects to proceed that were planned before the revitalization plan was developed, he says

Design plans would require that buildings be close to sidewalks and that parking areas be beside or behind buildings in some sections of the Sprague-Appleway corridor.

Minor construction at current sites that don't conform with the plan would be allowed, although major additions, expansions, and replacement buildings would have to comply with the design criteria for the revitalization plan.

Some private-sector criticism of the revitalization plan has focused on whether new design standards and land-use restrictions can work well on land that's already developed and succeed in creating demand for varied uses.

Munson, however, says some action must be taken to attract varied land use and stop the economic decline of the Sprague-Appleway corridor, where he asserts the amount of retail space exceeds the demand for it.

"You can't get much uglier than Sprague," he says. "We're trying to resolve it with relatively positive changes in zoning."

Developers will be able to pencil out projects with more confidence about the future than they can without a revitalization plan in place, Munson says.

Changes in the revised plan include an allowance for billboards, although they would be capped at their current number, Kuhta says. The earlier draft of the proposal called for eventual elimination of billboards in the revitalization area.

Used-car sales would be an allowed use under the revised plan. A previous proposal called for new-car lots only, Kuhta says.

Some connecting streets formerly proposed outside of the city center have been removed from the revitalization plan, Kuhta says.

"We have some big super blocks without a lot of connecting streets, but retrofitting new streets in suburban places is difficult to do," he says.

Dwight Hume, a Spokane land-use consultant and critic of the previous draft of the revitalization plan, says planners have attempted to address concerns about current land uses that wouldn't comply with the revitalization plan, but haven't eliminated cause for such worries totally.

While current uses that would be considered nonconforming under the new plan would be allowed to continue, lenders and insurers don't like dealing with the uncertainties of nonconforming uses, he says.

"Nonconformity is the worst consequence of a major plan change, no matter how they wrote it," he says.

Wineinger, who owns Pro Sign, adds that a consequence of the plan will be losses in property value for some commercial property owners.

"Some business financings are based on real estate appraisals," Wineinger says. "Rezoning a commercial property to retail and residential uses reduces the property value, causing collateralization problems. Insurance companies would not pay to rebuild a damaged nonconforming business."

Wineinger says he's not opposed to the idea of a new City Hall or a small city campus. "I am opposed to the city trying to exact a way of life that none of us wants at the expense of such a large group of the population who invests their life savings in commercial real estate and businesses," he says.

Hume says that one positive notion about the plan is that it would provide some degree of predictability for developers.

"Developers might not like the plan, but in my experience, they like the fact that they know what they can do," he says.