Officials approve plan for ‘sustainable’ development

South City to rise on Foote Homes site

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Memphis’ first modern “sustainable subdivision’’ where stores, churches, schools, transit stops, day care and other services are within walking distance was backed Thursday by the Land Use Control Board.

The board approved without debate the South City plan for redeveloping the eastern 26 acres of Foote Homes.

South City is the name for a $210 million redevelopment project to be financed largely with federal Choice Neighborhoods Initiative grants. Planners aim to transform a sprawling area near Downtown with $167 million for housing, about $25 million for neighborhood improvements and $18 million for social support programs.

The focal point is Foote Homes, the public housing project that opened in 1940. Foote’s 420 apartments would be replaced by 600 modern apartments.

The 26-acre site, owned by Memphis Housing Authority, is bordered by Danny Thomas to the west, Mississippi Boulevard to the south, Vance on the north and Lauderdale on the east. The western half

of Foote Homes, west of Danny Thomas, is to be redeveloped in a later phase.

The project by McCormack Baron Salazar Development includes a mix of 349 apartments in townhouses and apartment buildings, including some mixed-use structures that house shops, offices and homes in one unit.

All the apartments will be within a half-mile of a library, fire station, two food stores, Booker T. Washington High School, and two churches, and within a quarter-mile of an existing transit stop, plan documents say.

The plan features smaller lots and yards and more diverse kinds of housing with a denser population to create “a more sustainable relation of the subdivision to the environment,’’ states a staff report for the Office of Planning and Development.