The Landmark at Talbot Park - Site Plan
Art Collins, the developer of the proposed “Landmark at Talbot Park”, will present his new development proposal at the November 20th meeting of Wards Corner Now. The meeting is at 8:30am at the Fitness and Wellness Center on Newport Ave. Your attendance is requested.
Wards Corner Now - Wards Corner, Norfolk, Virginia 
After attending the Wards Corner Now meeting this past Saturday it has become apparent that we need to keep talking about this project, and work with Mr. Collins to get a development that will benefit our community. If we don’t, we will wind up with a disaster. We need to realize at this point that we are not going to get condominium or single family homes on this tract. Mr. Collins is offering us the best possible opportunity to turn this property around.
Two extreme things can happen at this point. First, if we totally obstruct him, he can (and will) just say “to heck with you people”, and leave us with what we have. This property is deteriorating at an exponential rate, and will not improve. Second, we let him do what he wants without our involvement, and we wind up without any protection against the negative points we have recognized, and conditions that protect only his interests, and allow him to back out of this deal when things don’t go his way. Again this will leave us with a potential mess not much better than what we have now.
If we remain diligent, and work with Mr. Collins, we can wind up with a complex that can be an improvement over what we have now. This is going to take work. We need to try to maintain a positive attitude, and be prepared. Mr. Collins wants City Council approval, and recognizes that this can come from us.
We have another Wards Corner Now meeting in December with Mr. Collins. We, the civic leagues of Wards Corner and Talbot Park need to be prepared for this meeting with an ORGANIZED LIST of points that we want addressed, and that will render our approval. If we take his approach, it will demonstrate to our City Council our willingness to work with him, and give him something to work toward. He will not be able to say “these people are unorganized and unreasonable in their demands”.
If we do not present to him a reasonable, unified and organized effort, he may not feel compelled to keep us informed and involved in this process. We do not want him to resort to the closed door tactics that have gone on for years, and has become synonymous with city politics, and developers getting what they want. We could then wind up with a project that will not reflect what is important to our community needs. Worse, we could end up with a project that fails, and becomes a partially completed project that does become public housing.
Before the next Wards Corner Now meeting, the civic leagues need to meet and create a list of points. Then the leaderships of both need to meet and create the OGANIZED LIST. We need to present this list on December 18th, when we meet with Mr. Collins again. If the time line is too tight, at the very minimum we need to present these intentions and possibly present it to him on January 15th.