Progress has continued on The Paddocks Apartments and Townhouses over the past month. The first building erected was a townhouse building. The exterior is not complete with the exception of the garage doors which are scheduled to be installed within the next week. We upgraded the initially specified faux stone facade accents to actual fieldstone. It looks great! This also follows Culver’s Charrette recommendations for continuing a fieldstone theme on new construction in Culver wherever possible. The driveway base is in place and we are working on scheduling asphalt. Paving may have to wait until the second drive is complete, but Phend & Brown is looking at ways to expedite this for us.
Inside the townhouse building, the walls have been insulated, drywall has been hung & finished and painting is underway. We are expecting delivery of cabinets in the next day or two. Things will be changing rapidly there as we move through finishes.
The three apartment buildings are all under roof and are at various stages of completion for infrastructure. We are currently waiting on siding to arrive for installation to begin on those exteriors. All interior infrastructure is in place on the west apartment building and insulation is underway this week. Drywall installation should follow shortly.
The second townhouse building at the far end of the site has footings, frostwalls and underslab infrastructure in place. All of the wall panels are on site and framing should begin as soon as the slab has been poured. We expect that to happen yet this week.
The other exciting news here is the finalization of a landscape plan. This project is going for NGBS Silver status and part of that point system requires a Sustainable Landscape. We have contracted with Cardno to provide this for us. We asked them to include a presentation to the Culver Town Council, since some elements differ from current ordinance requirements. That presentation was made on the 12th. You can find more on that, including a short video of that presentation in a previous post here. The plan will go through some additional tweaking, but we have a great start here. We hope to have plantings completed by the end of this year.
We’re pleased with how things are coming together and the kind comments we’re receiving about the project. We continue to feel that this will be a great addition to the Culver community and our proud that this is our contribution to Culver’s Stellar designation.
One of the things that IHCDA wanted to see in our RHTC application for The Paddocks Apartments was a Sustainable Landscape Plan. We chose to meet NGBS Silver status for this project.
To help us with this, we contacted Chris Kline, Sustainability Manager, at Cardno. I have personally worked with Chris and Cardno in the past on various projects through my association with the Lake Maxinkuckee Environmental Fund. Chris brought in Christine Dittmar as the project manager. We had several conversations regarding our goals and preferences including a couple of site visits and several plan reiterations. The current version is what you see below.
The key is a bit hard to read at this scale, so briefly: Green is standard lawn turf. Dark green is a low-mow fescue similar to what you would find in the rough of a golf course. The orange area is a prairie buffer between The Paddocks and the adjacent property. The pink is a detention pond planted as a pollinator garden with native wild flower plants that will have rotating blooms. The dark purple at the top is another detention pond which will have a variety of native plantings that can tolerate the fluctuation of water associated with the pond.
The goal was to have the best of both worlds here. Because this complex is geared towards families, we wanted adequate areas of turf where children would have the opportunity to play. These areas of turf are also used to border the native, naturalized areas, thus giving them definition. In some of the transition areas, we have included fruit trees for interest. Signage will be included to explain to residents and passersby what they are seeing.
Along with the turf recreation areas, Cardno has included a natural playground area, a fire pit and a community garden. An area for a second community garden has been set aside if a second is warranted; otherwise it will remain another area of turf.
We asked Chris to include a presentation to the Culver Town Council which was made at the May 12th meeting via Microsoft Teams. Since this was an online presentation, We also requested that it be recorded to be shared. The presentation to the Council was abbreviated in order to be cognizant of their time, but the long version was recorded here:
It will be interesting to see this come to fruition. We expect the majority of this landscape to be in place yet this year as the site work wraps up. The first units should be available for rent sometime late this summer.
Marty Oosterbaan gave an Stellar Update to the Culver merchants on the weekly Zoom call Friday. The item that caught my attention was the community sign project. I remembered that from the Stellar presentation and I think it’s a good idea. Basically, the plan is to establish electronic signs in all of the Marshall County communities, similar to the existing Lions Club sign in Culver, where community and regional messages can be displayed. This would be a just another form of communication supplementing internet and newspapers. Community events can be listed and can be cross-listed between the communities to promote local events.
I am working on a similar project for the Francesville Salem Township Public Library so I shared some of those cost estimates. (An electronic sign runs between $25k & $35k per Vanadco Sign) I have a few more thoughts on how this sign should be handled in Culver, so I thought I would share them here:
I think this is a great idea and has a lot of potential. As always, the Devil is in the Details. Good luck, Marty!
“The sacrifices that are demanded of Americans today may be necessary, but they must never become customary. The purpose of our government is to keep us alive, yes, but also to keep us living and working, as is our right.”
Larry P. Arnn, President of Hillsdale College – Excerpt from the Imprimis, March/April 2020, Volume 49, Number 3/4