McCord Square Apartments, made up of two four-story mixed-use buildings, will have 205 studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom units with space for retail on their first floors. Submitted image
McCord Square Apartments, made up of two four-story mixed-use buildings, will have 205 studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom units with space for retail on their first floors. Submitted image
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McCORDSVILLE — Officials have approved standards for a big piece of McCordsville’s town center project, and the developer plans to start soon on infrastructure and two mixed-use apartment buildings.

Fishers-based Rebar Development is pursuing McCord Square on about 50 acres of mostly farmland south of West Broadway, east of Mt. Comfort Road and north of County Road 750N. Plans call for residential and business uses along with outdoor amenities. It’s part of McCordsville’s larger town center vision spanning a total of about 130 acres.

McCord Square’s first phase consists of infrastructure for its entire site and developing two four-story, mixed-used apartment buildings. The buildings will have 205 studio, onebedroom and two-bedroom apartments with space for retail on their first floors. One of the buildings will have a rooftop patio, and the pet-friendly development will have a dog park as well.

Shelby Bowen, president of Rebar Development, told leaders at a McCordsville Town Council meeting earlier this month that there was a lot of freedom in determining what the buildings will look like due to the town not having much architectural precedent.

“We can really set a standard for our own that I think is a little more forward,” Bowen said, noting his firm and the town are creating a downtown rather than developing a project for an existing one that would need to blend in with its surroundings.

Rebar Development plans to start construction on the apartment buildings in February 2022. Pre-leasing activities are slated for December 2022.

McCordsville Town Council members unanimously approved rezoning the McCord Square site to a planned unit development, which set specific development standards town leaders and Rebar Development agreed to.

Council members expressed their desire to see the first floors of the mixed-use buildings maximized as much as possible for retail. Tom Strayer added he feels that’ll be especially important upon the completion of a planned nearby outdoor amenity.

“Eventually, when this gets totally built out and we have the green there, these are the areas that would beg for retail the most,” Strayer said.

The planned unit development atandards divide McCord Square into three districts. The Mixed-Use District, which includes the apartment buildings and several other to-be-determined lots, is the heart of the project and makes up the largest piece of the real estate. North of that is the Gateway District, which is planned to be more commercial and vehicular-oriented. On the south end of the project is the Village District, which will be predominately residential with townhomes.

Rebar Development’s economic development agreement with the town for McCord Square requires the town to process portions of plan review at an expedited time frame. To facilitate that, the town created a McCord Square Review Board to assume many aspects of plan review and approval. Town council president Barry Wood appointed Larry Longman as the board’s town council representative, Strayer as its plan commission representative and Alex Jordan as the representative from the McCordsville Redevelopment Commission. Town manager Tonya Galbraith and assistant town manager Ryan Crum will also serve on the board.
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