The planned development site on Bloomington's southwest side.
(Courtesy, Bloomington Plan Commission)
Correction: The audio previously attached to this article misstated Tyler Ridge's first name. This article has been updated.
Developers want to bring about 4,250 homes and commercial space to undeveloped land on Bloomington’s southwest side, but nearby residents doubt the area can handle the density the project would bring.
Sudbury Development Partners, LLC wants to rezone nearly 140 acres of land north of RCA Community Park so it can build five new neighborhoods there, collectively called “Summit District.”
The developers plan to build a mix of single- and multi-family homes, condos, apartments, and townhomes. They also hope to bring office space, retail space, restaurants, and hotels — as well as a fire station and a trailhead.
The five neighborhoods that will make up Summit District (Courtesy, Bloomington Plan Commission)
Residents of Arbor Ridge, a nearby, largely retirement-age HOA neighborhood, say the area’s infrastructure may not be able to support the project. They also worry the new activity brought to the area would irreversibly alter their peaceful lifestyle.
Kelli Wesley has lived in Arbor Ridge since 2007. She said the neighborhood has not changed much since then, and this project threatens that.
“I could get on board with it if it was less dense — a lot less dense,” Wesley said. “It’s like putting another city in. It’s like putting Mooresville or Martinsville in that plot of land over there. It’s obvious why that’s not desirable for anybody that lives here.”
Kelli Wesley (Devan Ridgway, WFIU/WTIU News)
Wesley said all the new residents will mean more traffic than the area can handle.
Arbor Ridge’s main entry point is Weimer Road — a roughly one-and-a-half mile, two-lane road partly in the city and county.
Residents say Weimer, which would also lead into the proposed development, floods often and is a frequent source of traffic backups because of a one-lane bridge near Tapp Road.
Randy Craw lives across from Arbor Ridge to the west of Weimer Road. He says the road is dangerous as it is and cannot support the amount of traffic the project would bring.
“In the 25 years that I've been here, we've seen the volume of traffic on Weimer Road increase exponentially to the point that you have to be careful getting the mail out of your mailbox, because of the volume of traffic and the rate of speed that they cut through,” Craw said.
Randy Craw (Devan Ridgway, WFIU/WTIU News)
He also questions how stormwater will be managed and worries non-permeable surfaces in the development may cause water runoff onto his property, which is in a floodplain.
“There’s going to be a lot of people, roofs, blacktop — and all this water has to go somewhere,” Craw said. “Instead of percolating into the field and just going into our groundwater table, it’s now just going to run down a lot quicker and hit the creek. The creek cannot handle the volume of water, and then the people downstream will be reaping the consequences of the excess water as it goes down.”
Co-developers Tyler Ridge, of Ridge Group, and Travis Vencel, of Sullivan Development, said traffic concerns will be addressed by extending nearby Adams Street and Sudbury Drive and reconstructing and realigning Weimer Road.
“Adams will connect from the north to the south; the two existing sections of Adams will connect, and that will become the main northwest corridor through this development,” Vencel said. “Sudbury will connect from Weimer to Adams.”
Travis Vencel (Courtesy, Zoom)
Vencel said the development team has completed a traffic study, which is being updated with additional input from the city. The study looks at the existing intersections and identifies issues that need to be addressed immediately and ones that could be addressed in the future.
“Some of those intersections today have inefficiencies in the way they operate,” Vencel said. “Some of them, they might need a turn lane; some of them might need some timing — but there is nothing in the traffic study that says initially there need to be major improvements other than what we already know today.”
A mobility plan for the Summit District project (Courtesy, Bloomington Plan Commission)
The developers also plan to extend a sidewalk parallel to Arbor Ridge. The HOA would be responsible for maintaining and repairing the sidewalk when necessary because the city says it is in front of the neighborhood.
Residents say their HOA fees will increase as a result. Wesley said the HOA believes the sidewalk is behind the property, not in front of it.
“We’re probably going to have to build a fence or something like that,” Wesley said. “We’d like to get the developers to help us do that as an expression of goodwill. That would go a long way.”
To be built, the development must first go through the city’s plan commission.
July 2023 plan commission documents show the developers initially proposed a reduction in environmental protection standards. They later said they would alter their petition to meet the city’s environmental regulations.
Ridge and Vencel initially wanted to build up to 6,000 homes but have since scaled back. They also anticipated a roughly eight-year timeline for the project but now say it will take closer to 12 to 15 years to complete.
A resident previously wrote to the city saying they think the project could bring 10,000 residents to the area.
But Ridge said there’s no way to accurately determine the population because he and Vencel are not developing the entire project.
“We can’t speak for what other developers will (do),” Ridge said. “We can’t tell you, in eight to 10 years, if multi-family is going to be the hot button anymore. Perhaps it’s commercial; perhaps it’s boutique hotels.”
Tyler Ridge (Courtesy, Zoom)
Per the city’s regulations, at least 15 percent of the total units built must meet the city’s requirements for affordable housing.
The plan commission is slated to take up the petition for another hearing at a special session March 19.
Once the plan commission weighs in, the city council will have the final say on the project.
Isabel Piedmont-Smith represents the council district where Arbor Ridge and the planned development site are.
She called the project an overall net positive because it helps address the community’s housing needs, but she still has many questions about aspects including road sufficiency and connectivity, stormwater and wastewater.
“I think we need to move carefully on this, because it is so big, and it will have a very large impact on our city,” she said. "I think it is feasible to have this many units, but only if you upgrade Weimer road; only if you upgrade the stormwater system (and) other things that are already problematic in that area."
She continued, "That will be the big question for me: are those upgrades going to be made sufficient for the number of new residents, and who's going to pay for that?"
Piedmont-Smith said she does not yet know how she will vote on the developers’ request.
