Longmont looks to bolster retail: real estate activity in this Boulder County boomtown has paused, but not for a commercial break.

• Author: Lewis, David

Longmont long ago was a dusty satellite of Boulder with a decaying downtown. When high-tech companies started moving into town, Longmont became better known as a business park center, and downtown perked up, too, thanks in part to the Longmont Downtown Development Authority.

More and more people arrived to work those high-tech jobs, and Longmont earned a reputation as a residential hotbed. And now that residential construction and sales are sputtering, Longmont's retail development scene is sizzling.

Longmont is about midway through a process of transforming the compass-point gateways to the city. Mainly that means big retail developments or upgrades, with much more, mostly mixed-use, development on the way.

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"Commercial development has been plugging along steady the last few years, while residential development has dropped off significantly," says Phil Del Vecchio, community development director.

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Last year, 282 single- and multi-family homes were built in Longmont, compared with: 502 in 2005; 843 in 2004; 856 in 2003; 983 in 2002; and 1,641 in 2001.

By contrast, the value of Longmont's commercial and light-industrial construction (which Del Vecchio says is more or less balanced between the two) has tallied this way: $64 million in 2006; $59 million in 2005; $20 million in 2004; $16 million in 2003; $14 million in 2002; $37 million in 2001; and $76 million in 2000, still the record.

The Longmont-Area Comprehensive Plan defines those gateways and the "special standards that apply to them," Del Vecchio says. "It makes the most sense to have those kinds of developments very accessible to transportation routes, and we are sensitive to how they appear aesthetically."

A case in point is Longmont's northern-most Wal-Mart Supercenter, near U.S. 287 on Main Street (not to be confused with the westerly Wal-Mart, by the Twin Peaks Mall, which probably will close).

Longmont required Wal-Mart to "submit a design acceptable to the City Council, and that ended up adding almost $1 million to the cost of their construction," Del Vecchio says. "However, the Wal-Mart folks agreed that it turned out great for them."

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The city's next Wal-Mart Supercenter, and Wal-Mart's easterly gateway project, Sand-stone Marketplace, were approved by the Longmont City Council in March. That Supercenter, too, will look uniquely Longmont.

Then there are the flagship commercial developments to the south--Harvest...