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REALTORS® Land Institute members Ben Crosby, ALC, CCIM, Norma Nisbet, ALC, CCIM, CIPS, and Bob Turner, ALC, each told a special tale of site selection that went down to the dirt when it started but built up to the heights by the time it was completed.
Turner, a broker-owner with 25 years of experience, defined transitional land as “when internal or external conditions change the highest and best use of a land parcel from its current use to either a higher or lower value use.”
Turner took a detailed look at the remarkable suburban Memphis development named Parkside at Shelby Farms. Situated next to a conservation easement park, a former site of the county penal farm, the development is a high-density mixed-use plan that relies upon a TIF (tax increment financing) vehicle for financing the $200 million proposal.
Key to Turner’s plan is the Rails-to-Trails program, dedicated to creating a nationwide network of trails from abandoned rail lines, one of which borders the development site and leads to Memphis ten miles away.
After obtaining the land under option, Turner said, the next steps toward transition include designing the proposed layout and uses, meeting with the Planning and Zoning boards, taking feedback, filing for zoning with the Land Use Control Board, and a steady escalation up the local government chain to get to approvals and groundbreaking.