Published: August 24, 2008 10:02 am      

Business springs up in Depot

TRAVERSE CITY -- A decade ago it was a barren, oft-odorous section of town still scarred from the city's early industrial days.

Today, there's a public and private renaissance going on at the north end of Boardman Lake. There's a state-of-the-art public library next to a refurbished city park, intertwined with a coffee shop, cafe and farmer's market.

Two popular walking and biking trails come together, and visitors can hop in sun-powered eco-cars.

It's been a gradual, yet remarkable evolution around the city's old railroad depot area south of Eighth Street in Traverse City. Millions of dollars in public and private investment projects transformed a ghost town industrial site to a vibrant commercial hub surrounded by modern public amenities, another small but trendy slice of the city determined to make a name for itself.

"The area's really, really come along," said local businessman Martin Lagina, who bought the old railroad depot property about 10 years ago. "I'm real happy with what's gone on down there."

For years, locals wondered what to do with property around the depot. The once-industrial north shore of Boardman Lake took a back seat to commercial and residential growth in other parts of the city.

Strong odors wafting from the nearby sewage treatment plant emphasized the area's lack of appeal.

But the "Depot District's" fortunes began to turn in the late 1990s, when the Traverse Area District Library Board chose Boardman Lake's shores as the site to replace the old Carnegie Library.

The city and county then spent millions to overhaul the sewer plant, largely mitigating the odors that for years plagued the neighborhood.

The city also went to work on Hull Park, transforming a minimal public space into a modern waterfront park with docks, a small fishing pier and a new boathouse. The state teamed up with the city and Garfield Township to build a recreational trail along Boardman Lake that linked to the popular TART Trail, a move that routed hundreds of bikers and walkers through the area each week.

The steps helped attract significant private investment. Local builder Gary Wilson scrapped plans to build a car wash along Eighth Street almost 10 years ago in favor of a mixed-use development with ground floor offices topped by mid-priced condominiums.

The buildings were designed like old railroad structures, and played off the look of the nearby depot.

"It was uncharted waters," Wilson said. "There was nothing down there at the time."

Wilson invested about $2.8 million to build 10 office/retail spaces and 11 condominiums. He sold them all in short order.

"I hit the project just at the right time," he said.

Meanwhile, Lagina plugged away at renovating depot buildings. He's put roughly $1.5 million in the structures and made them available for various commercial operations, including a coffee shop, home furnishings store, a European-style cafe and a theater arts facility. He also equipped the depot with solar power.

Outdoors, the depot area hosts a weekly farmer's market that is home to Skegemog Gardens, a Williamsburg greenhouse and nursery that relocated from State Street downtown.

"We've done much better here than we did at the other spot," manager Ryan Croy said. "The bike trail brings a lot of people in."

The city will continue to play a key role in the depot area's evolution through its ownership of a two-plus-acre vacant parcel sandwiched between the old railroad station and Eighth Street.

Plans for an affordable housing project there fizzled a few years ago, and while the city isn't actively marketing the property, it continues to draw interest from would-be developers, city planner Russ Soyring said.

"This could be a really cool, in-fill type of neighborhood," he said. "The whole composition of all the uses down there is starting to develop some interest around the area."

But a challenge still remains.

"We don't have a catchy nickname yet," Lagina said. "Maybe we should have a contest."