Video Showcases Proposed Design for The Corners / Von Maur Project

A new 3-D marketing video of The Corners redevelopment project and Von Maur store illustrates the proposed design, including an underground parking structure with direct access to the department store's first floor.

The four-minute video offers a sweeping street to sky perspective of the planned on 19 acres southeast of the Blue Mound-Barker roads intersection off I-94 — site of the former West Pointe Cinemas and , as well as a strip mall and .

The video was created by the project's lead architect, Development Design Group Inc. of Baltimore, the same firm that designed Bayshore Town Center in Glendale.

The project continues to be shopped for potential retail, office and restaurant leases by the Marcus Corp. Marcus and Town of Brookfield officials are continuing to refine details of public financing help through a town tax incremental financing district. Towns generally do not have authority to create those tax districts, but to allow the Town of Brookfield to create one only for The Corners project.

Town Administrator Rick Czopp said Wednesday the goal remains to break ground on the project in 2012 to be open in time for the 2013 holiday shopping season. Katie Falvey, Marcus' director of real estate, could not be reached for more details Wednesday.

Both Czopp and Nancy Justman, executive director of the Brookfield Convention & Visitors Bureau, said the 3-D video helps people better envision the dynamic upscale project with a green mall area.

"Obviously, we’re super, super excited about this development," Justman said. "It really solidifies Brookfield as Wisconsin's shopping destination."

Between Brookfield Square mall on the east and The Corners on the west, there are about 150 retail opportunities, Justman said. The Corners would add jobs and increase area tourism and marketing, she added.

"Hopefully, we can convince people to stay for the weekend," to shop the corridor and benefit local hotels, Justman said. 

Czopp said an engineering firm was continuing to refine designs and costs, saying he could not give estimates on the likely amount of the tax district package.

Under a tax district, the additional property taxes collected on the new development is diverted from the rolls of the general town, schools, county and technical college and used instead to pay for associated public improvements.

The district would help fund new sewer and water lines and roads "and I'm sure a portion of the parking structure," Czopp said, which is the most expensive improvement. The large underground structure would be built into the sloping hill between and the strip mall with Applebee's, and would extend under several buildings.

Parking decks are not common in the town or city, although one was proposed to be added to Brookfield Square mall in the city's own tax incremental financing district for that area between the mall and the Executive Drive office park.

"It's a new concept here, it's different," Czopp said. "The whole thing that makes this project is the parking structure and it’s not your normal dark and bleak structure. You can see it has lights and possibly a water fall feature.

"We are faced with harsh winters and this parking structure is going to be very inviting," he said.

Czopp said the tax district is "taking a little bit longer because the project is so big.

"We want to make sure that all the financing is in place and that everything is done properly and conservatively," he said.

Rather than being built piecemeal or in phases, Czopp said he expects the project to be built in one major push, which would help ensure the public improvements are paid by the project and not taxpayers.

"It will be done almost all at one time... as one gigantic project," he said. "That's why it’s taking so long not only with the financing but the engineering, which can change more of the estimates of the cost. We're not putting in sewer and water lines and a road with the hope that something’s going to come in. And Marcus doesn't want to do that either."

Czopp said he was not aware of specific tenants that have been lined up but said Marcus officials have been upbeat after attending national retail conventions, despite the slow economy.

"I’m quite confident that Marcus is working full steam ahead in getting it leased up," he said.