When Tim Baylor stares across the street from the McDonald's he owns in north Minneapolis, he says he sees a row of potential.
Across the busy stretch of W. Broadway sits an empty lot and small, brownstone retail buildings he wants to replace with more than 200 apartments, the majority of them market-rate. It's a revamped project that Baylor has pushed for the last five years but hasn't gotten off the ground.
There has been little market-rate apartment development in north Minneapolis while there has been a surge in rental construction elsewhere in the city.
"I looked at this and I wondered why not?" Baylor said. "Why aren't things happening here that are happening in other parts of the city?"
Baylor and his wife, Doris, who own several restaurants and have development experience in the Twin Cities, are advocating for the project "to bring higher-quality housing stock to an area where it is needed," they said.
"I think it's a beautiful neighborhood," said Doris Baylor. "I think it can be so much more."
The first phase of the "Satori" project, as it has been called, would encompass the 800 block of W. Broadway between Cub Foods and Bryant Avenue. With the retail buildings and some residential property behind them razed, a new six-story building would be constructed.
The building would have 112 apartments, 20% of the units dubbed affordable for renters who make 50% of the area median income. Rental rates for an apartment with an alcove for a bedroom would range from $850 to $1,000.
