By: Deborah Johnson Wood
Chris Kelly stood in his office at Parmenter O'Toole law firm in downtown Muskegon's Edison Landing and gazed at the sunlight glittering on Muskegon Lake just a few yards away. This is the view Kelly and his partners at Lakefront Development, LLC are hoping a few more businesses will take advantage of at the growing residential/commercial development.
So far, three businesses have settled on the 34-acre SmartZone—Grand Valley State University's Michigan Alternative and Renewable Energy Center (MAREC), VidaNova Condos, and Parmenter O'Toole. That leaves ten lots still to develop—one with hundreds of feet of lake frontage.
VidaNova is building phase one of the planned 44 residential condominiums and 40 boat slips. True North, the latest group to sign on, has yet to break ground on an office and retail center of over 20,000 square feet.
"There's a lot of activity in downtown Muskegon," Kelly said. "They just opened a giant Harley-Davidson dealership, a new engineering firm, and there's been 15 or 20 new buildings in the last 10 years."
Kelly hopes that the diversion of US Business 31 from Seaway Drive along Shoreline Drive, which borders Edison Landing, the commercial renaissance of the former Muskegon Mall site, and Brownfield tax incentives will encourage other developers to take a risk. As he stands outside his building, he watches the activity on the lake.
"I'm standing here on the boardwalk watching a fishing boat come in," he says, "and a big freighter just left."
Source: Chris Kelly, Lakefront Development, LLC
Photo: The view from the deck of one of VidaNova condominiums at Edison Landing (photo by Brian Kelly)
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Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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