Planned Hixson site
› Tract: 44.8 acres› Price: $5.5 million› Commercial: 160,000 square feet (128,000 square feet retail; 32,000 square feet office)› Apartments: 240› Single family homes: 16Source: The Raines Group
Site of 44-acre parcel in Hixson.A 44-acre parcel in Hixson is on the market for a potential new mixed-use planned community unlike any in Chattanooga, according to a real estate company.
Eight tracts held by different owners make up the site off Hixson Pike just past Valleybrook Golf and Country Club. It’s hitting the market for the first time with a $5.5 million price tag, said Bill Raines, president of The Raines Group.
“It’s hard to assemble that large of a tract” in the Hixson area, said Raines. “It would be one of the bigger developments.”
The concept for the property, which is now mostly vacant and lies between Cassandra Smith and Big Ridge roads with frontage on Hixson Pike, calls for apartments and single-family homes along with retail and office space.
The commercial space would go along Hixson Pike with apartments on the middle part of the tract and single-family homes in the rear, including on the ridge, Raines said.
“We’ve had a lot of interest from individual builders,” he said. “We’re looking for one to take the primary lead and work with others to put together a team to develop this site.”
Charles Davis, the real estate company’s vice president, said the planned community is modeled after another in Cumming, Ga., outside Atlanta known as Vickery Village.
Vickey’s website terms the Cumming development as a “live-work-play neighborhood” with shops, restaurants, club amenities and schools within walking distance.
“There’s nothing like it in Chattanooga,” Davis said. “You see it in a larger metro area. Chattanooga is ready for a community of this nature.”
Vickery has about 200,000 square feet of retail in front of the development. The Chattanooga site could hold about 160,000 square feet of retail and office, while the residential would go behind it, Davis said.
“Everything ties in together,” he said.
Raines said the Hixson Pike site is located near Hixson High and Middle schools and Big Ridge Elementary School.
He said the concept his company has developed could change with the number of apartments proposed for the site – 240 – increasing or falling, for example.
“In trying to sell a piece this big we went ahead and did a land-use development plan to help people visualize the opportunity,” Raines said.
He said the concept is consistent with the long-range master plan for the Hixson area. Other developments in the area have offered up different plans which met with resistance from planning agencies and residents, Raines said.
He said the concept his company has crafted is “consistent with that area. It’s a pretty usable plan.”
Raines said the plan has a traffic light on Hixson Pike and there would be entry and exit changes to the road.
Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 757-6318.