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GRANDEVILLE AT ARBOR LAKES

Lakeview Drive & 80th Av. N., Maple Grove

Type: Multifamily/Rental apartments

Units: 440

Height: Four stories

Lot size: 24 acres

Developer: LeCesse Development Corp.

Details: A Florida-based company has submitted plans for a new, large-scale apartment community in Maple Grove's Gravel Mining Area near the Arbor Lakes retail center.

LeCesse, of Altamont Springs, Fla., is seeking to replicate the success of its CityWalk development in Woodbury with a similarly large-sized effort in Maple Grove to be called GrandeVille at Arbor Lakes.

The Maple Grove City Council in April approved a planned unit development concept plan submitted by LeCesse, which calls for a total of 440 rental units in a pair of four-story buildings over 24 acres northeast of the shopping center.

Tom Hayden, LeCesse's director of development, told the council that like CityWalk, the Maple Grove buildings would feature heated, above-ground, four-story parking garages that allow residents to walk directly from their units to their cars without having to use an elevator.

The plans also call for approximately 10,000 square feet of neighborhood retail space detached from the residential structures.

Hayden said that between 600 and 800 people would live at GrandVille, which would have up to 55 percent two-bedroom units and the rest one-bedroom. Under Hennepin County guidelines, 10 percent of the units would be reserved as affordable.

If approved, GrandeVille would be the largest single multifamily project ever built in the suburb and would become a key cog in Maple Grove's plans to attract high-density uses to the former gravel mining lands, said Community Development Director Dick Edwards.

"It's exciting to see this proposal come through," he said. "The multifamily market is on fire right now."

Since the original approval of 1,750 units of high-density housing for Opus Corp. in 2003, the city has been chipping away at that total in the Gravel Mining Area. Opus completed the 194-unit Bridges at Arbor Lakes townhouse project there before throwing in the towel. The 153-unit Maple Grove Senior Living was completed last year.

With the GrandeVille proposal, Edwards said, the city is coming closer to realizing its vision of turning the Gravel Mining Area into a "walkable," urban-style enclave.

DON JACOBSON

Don Jacobson, a freelance writer based in St. Paul, can be contacted at hotproperty.startribune@gmail.com.