Bo Harris’ plan to revitalize East Lawrence is still on track, although the builder doesn’t want to say much about it yet.

“Generally speaking, there’s progress being made,” he said recently. “We continue to try to align our goals with those of the East Lawrence Neighborhood Assn., and we should have some more concrete progress to report soon. That’s really all I have to say at this time.”

Ardys Ramberg, a member of East Lawrence’s board, is ready to hear that progress report.

“We’re optimistic,” she said. “I know that he’s done an excellent job with buildings in the past, and I’m looking forward to him making our East Lawrence buildings look just as good as they can.”

In September, Harris, chief executive officer of Harris Construction, confirmed he’d signed contracts to purchase three buildings along or near Pennsylvania Street between Seventh and Ninth streets.

The purchases were the first part of a plan that Harris has to buy all the property between Seventh and Ninth Streets east of Pennsylvania Street and west of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway tracks.

The area largely contains turn-of-the century industrial buildings, scattered with a couple of automotive repair businesses and Quonset hut-style storage sheds. Harris said none of the buildings he was considering were used as residences.

‘Create some synergy’

Harris said at the time he planned to renovate nine of the older buildings and build an undetermined number of new buildings in the area and lease the space for loft-style apartments, offices, light-industrial uses and, eventually, retail.

“Our basic idea is to create some synergy between this area and the success of the downtown,” Harris said. “We want to create an exciting place to live, work and play.”

Harris said in September he had contracts to purchase the 43,000-square-foot former home of Classic Eagle Distributing, 801 E. Ninth St.; the former Polk Oil Co. building near Ninth and Pennsylvania streets; and the former Poehler Mercantile Co. building, 619 E. Eighth St. He said he likely would begin renovating that four-story, 60,000-square-foot building sometime this year.

The idea for renovating the buildings came to Harris as his company worked on restoring the Kansas Seed House Building, 805 N.H. That building, which formerly housed Quantrill’s Flea Market, was converted into office and restaurant space more than two years ago.

“I’ve really enjoyed the historical renovation work we’ve done,” Harris said. “We did the Seed House, and it was then that I realized there are quite a few companies that want to have an older, edgier type of office space.”

Harris said he also saw good potential for residential development in the area. Some of the buildings will contain a mix of offices and loft-style apartments, but other buildings may entirely be devoted to apartments finished in a brownstone style.

But Harris said he had not developed any specific plans showing how he would split the property between office and residential uses. He also said some buildings, such as the Classic Eagle facility, likely would continue to be used for light industrial purposes.

Appearance improvement

While he didn’t have any specific plans in September for retail space, he said he expected some retail uses would emerge as the residential and office uses began to grow in the area.

“Retail will probably follow,” Harris said. “It probably won’t be the first thing we do.”

In addition to renovating the buildings, Harris said he wanted to improve the overall appearance of the area.

“I think one of the keys to realizing our vision will be cleaning up the area. Making it very attractive visually, doing lots of nice landscaping,” Harris said. “If you go down there now, you can see weed patches, and it’s dark and it can be uninviting.

“We want to change that, but I don’t think we can do it unless we do it on a broad scale.”

Changes would include improving the area’s access to downtown along Seventh, Eighth and Ninth streets, Harris said. Plans call for improving lighting, narrowing intersections and creating raised crosswalks in an attempt to slow traffic and make the area more pedestrian-friendly.

Harris has met twice with board members of the East Lawrence Neighborhood Assn. Ed Tato, association president, said he thought neighborhood members were willing to listen to the ideas.

“For myself, I think it is a great opportunity,” Tato said in September. “The fact Bo is coming in here and saying ‘This is what I want to do’ and then asking how he can make it work with what we want is encouraging. That is how good development gets done.”

But Tato said concerns remain. He has heard from residents who worry that the development may increase rent rates in the area.

“One of the concerns I have is the type of housing,” Tato said. “This is a relatively low-income area, and we don’t want to do anything to push low-income residents out of here.”

Ramberg recently said she had enjoyed East Lawrence’s undeveloped feel.

“I do like that the area has a comfortable feel to it,” she said, “and I hope that can remain.”

Harris said he had no firm timeline on submitting plans for city officials to review. He said it was likely the area would need to have a change in zoning from its current use of light industrial to a mix of planned commercial, residential and office zoning.