Columbus, GA: Baker Village Revitalization Plan

The Housing Authority of Columbus, Georgia and its development consultants, Boulevard Group Inc. and Wallace+Perdomo, Inc. developed a strategy to enable the Baker Village community to be revitalized as a new mixed-use, mixed-income community. The proposed revitalization of this 590-unit public housing community located in South Columbus covers an area of approximately 66 acres.

The W+P plan for Baker Village focuses on key physical plan elements to create unique neighborhood areas within close proximity to retail and services and interconnected by a new system of pocket parks/open green space and a new and existing system of streets and alleyways. Specifically, the physical plan and design for this Revitalization Plan is based on the following four principles of design:

• Recognize the highest and best uses for locating buildings on-site
• Promote use of a variety of housing and building types to create a true neighborhood character
• Reinforce Columbus South as a "gateway" neighborhood into Columbus
• Make connections to a proposed citywide greenway belt at the southern portion of the site on the former railroad tracks.

To be built in three phases, the proposed redevelopment replaces the existing housing with 568 units of new multi-family rental and for-sale units: 90 senior units, 69 for-sale units (at 3-4 dwelling units per acre) and 409 multi-family rentals (at 11 dwelling units/acre) in a combination of one-and two-story single family, duplex, townhouses and garden apartment configurations.

The architectural character of the new housing building types responds to the existing craftsman style vernacular found in the surrounding neighborhoods. Future commercial development, in the form of a new town center, is proposed on 5.4 acres of the site and a potential new elementary school on a portion of the Baker Village site (+/- 3.1 acres) and the existing Baker High School site.