This story is a partnership between the Nashville Scene and the Nashville Banner. The Nashville Banner is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization focused on civic news. Visit nashvillebanner.com for more information.
Metro is planning its first significant work at the Global Mall at the Crossings since purchasing it for $44 million.
The city has decided to demolish the mall — leaving the four anchor buildings standing — partly due to water damage, Metro chief development officer Bob Mendes tells the Nashville Banner.
When then-Mayor John Cooper announced plans to buy the mall and lease part of it to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the main structure of the facility could have been used to house the medical offices. But VUMC ultimately backed out — in part because of negotiations over the roof — and plans for the site since then have not included use of the main structure, Mendes said.
The deal’s accompanying legislation passed the Budget and Finance Committee late Monday night
“Every version of a master plan or vision for the mall involves the interior being gone, and it is in poor condition right now,” Mendes says. “The four anchor buildings are completely fine, but the interior portion has water intrusion that is significant and appears to be deteriorating. … Since the interior needs to come down at some point anyway, we’re going ahead and looking at what the pricing and timing would be to demolish the interior.”
Mendes opposed the acquisition when he was a member of the Metro Council, in part because he said the deal was “loaded with unknown cost.” Now some of those costs are becoming apparent. Around $4.5 million secured in a past capital spending plan should be more than enough to pay for the demolition, Mendes says, and the administration is planning to increase the Global Mall line item on the capital improvements budget from $40 million to $75 million. (Funding for projects in the CIB must be allocated separately, so including the line item does not mean the city will spend that money on the mall next year.)
A master plan for the mall site is currently being developed, and Mendes says it should be presented to the Planning Commission by the end of the summer.
Metro Councilmember Joy Styles, whose District 32 includes the mall, tells the Banner she is fine with the demolition because it’s “what we were going to do anyway.”
She says she supports the general framework unveiled in August, including child care, housing for artists, park space and other amenities. Earlier this month, she told WKRN she was “utterly livid” at the prospect of moving a public health clinic to the property. Speaking with the Banner in March, she shut down any discussion of affordable housing at the Metro-owned property.
“I don’t want to hear about what the whole city wants for my district,” Styles said in March. “I want to know what my community wants for our district.”
But the O’Connell administration views the project differently. Â
In her latest Metro Council recap, @startleseasily reports on approval of the Global Mall purchase, plus unhinged but fun vibes
“Hopefully there’s agreement that, after the city has invested $45 million so far on a 70-acre mall, it’s clearly an asset for the city,” Mendes says. “It will need to work for the southeast part of the county, but it’s clearly an asset for the whole county.”
Mayor Freddie O’Connell picked the property’s library and community center as the site of his transit referendum announcement last week, and a WeGo transit hub will also one day help anchor the property. The goal, Mendes says, is for “private development partners to pay for as much of [the infrastructure costs] as possible, like we’ve done on the East Bank, but we need the CIB to reflect a more realistic value of the infrastructure needs at the mall.”
Styles responds that she is “looking forward to holding the administration accountable to the community plan that has already been presented and figuring out if there are additional needs and wants that can be supported.”
