The Portage Redevelopment Commission plans to address a variety of issues at the Portage Mall, starting with the crumbling parking lot.
Redeveloping and improving the mall has been a priority of Mayor Austin Bonta since he took office last year.
“It’s either one day going to stick out as a sore thumb or a crown jewel,” he said. Bonta, obviously, would prefer the latter.
“We want to build our downtown, and we very much don’t want to ignore the buildings in the mall,” he said.
Redevelopment Director Dan Botich told the RDC Thursday the parking lot “does need some repair and tender loving care.”
The city has been meeting with property owners in the mall, individually and in groups, to address the parking lot. Complicating the issue is that the property on which the buildings sit extends into the parking lot. Fixing the parking problems requires all the building owners to agree on the solution.
The city has come up with a variety of proposals to address the parking situation. One would be to just have the RDC buy the lot and repair it.
But deliveries have to be factored in. That’s why the latest proposal calls for a service road to be developed behind the buildings at the mall.
“It’s a lot of money to spend for a parking lot that basically serves one area of the city,” Bonta said.
Bonta proposes not just a parking lot with fewer perils for drivers, but also making the Portage Mall a hub of the downtown, something the city has attempted to do for the past several mayoral administrations.
“It’s the idea of us purchasing the mall’s parking lot, taking the parking lot out and replacing it with a road with parking on either side,” he said. “You would have more parking that is actually in the parking lot.”
“You park there and you walk downtown much like you would any downtown,” Bonta said. “I don’t actually know if we have commercial space with parallel parking in the city currently,” but this could be a trend-setter for Portage.
Planning and Community Development Director Tom Cherry doesn’t know of any, either.
Multiple property owners, according to Bonta, have said, “This is something I think would be great.”
“The sidewalk would be a benefit. It wouldn’t just be the current sidewalk; it would go out a bit more,” Bonta said.
The streetscape would resemble a typical Main Street type of downtown, he said, with crosswalks connecting the mall to any development to the east. Trolley stops could be added, too, if a trolley service is launched in the future.
The next step is to conduct appraisals of the parking lot so the RDC can decide whether to buy those portions of the parcels. The price for each property owner wouldn’t be enough to plan a fancy vacation, Bonta said.
Also on the RDC’s radar is a long-vacant building in the mall, formerly the home of Curly Joe’s, a bar that no longer operates there.
The idea is to purchase the property, rehab it and make it more marketable so it can be put back to use. The RDC authorized an appraisal to see how much it would cost to buy it.
Looking to next year, the RDC began looking at whether to create grants for façade, signage and landscaping grants at the mall.
Doug Ross is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
