UK's Coldstream Research Campus is looking to redesign itself in a way that better fits the lifestyles of the growing number of professionals setting up shop there. The University of Kentucky has enlisted the landscape architecture and planning design firm EDAW Inc. to redraw the master plan for the 735-acre campus, taking into consideration issues such as mixed land use, walkability, density, eco-effectiveness and sociability. The final report is expected to include guidelines for sustainable architecture and landscape to help direct future growth on the campus.
The first stage of the process will be a full market analysis, said Coldstream's executive director Tina Carpenter, with feedback currently being gathered from community members, existing tenants, developers, local real estate professionals, and university faculty members, as well as some of those companies that have opted not to locate at Coldstream in the past.
"We're looking to essentially start as much with a clean slate as we can," Carpenter said. "We need to concentrate on a more contemporary approach to development, as opposed to a 1980s subdivision plan. Ö Big lots and single story buildings don't really get it anymore. We need some excitement and some energy, and we need some amenities."
Those amenities could include restaurants, delivery companies, daycare centers, fitness gyms, and other businesses targeted to meet the lifestyle demands of Coldstream's professional employee base. Currently, zoning on the campus requires a minimum parcel of five acres, Carpenter said, and that does not fit the bill for smaller, on-campus, service-based businesses. In addition, the large lot design also has created a very car-dependent Coldstream community, Carpenter said.
"There's not a lot of connectivity about what exists here, and that really doesn't quite foster the image that we're trying to portray," Carpenter said.
Coldstream has also developed a reputation for inflexibility as a site choice among developers and Realtors, a factor that the vision study is also expected to address, said Len Heller, UK vice president for commercialization and economic development.
"We are trying to Ö communicate with our own community the opportunities that are out at Coldstream," Heller said. "We've done some density studies, and you can put four downtown Lexingtons inside of Coldstream. People don't appreciate its size."
Currently, Coldstream is home to 600,000 square feet of occupied space, with an additional 160,000 square feet leased for future occupancy and 332,000 square feet under construction.
The first of two LexHold buildings on the campus is scheduled to be finished by the end of this year, Carpenter said. Six tenants, including the American Board of Family Medicine, Software Information Systems, The Regus Group, Wilbur Smith Associates, Artemetrx and Luxor Cafe, have pre-leased approximately 50 percent of the 166,000-square-foot building. The second building in the LexHold complex is projected to be finished in the fall of 2009.
Both of the LexHold buildings will be equipped with redundant fiber and redundant power, which offers a significant advantage to tenants, according to Heller. With a second power substation operating on Coldstream's Georgetown Road side, the campus has access to two separate sources of electrical power, allowing tenants to switch between them in the event of any potential disruption to service.
"It is a distinguishing point for Coldstream in the Midwest," Heller said.
At the same time, Coldstream Laboratories, formerly UK's Center for Pharmaceutical Science and Technology, became a private business in May 2007 as a subsidiary of UK's for-profit company Kentucky Technology Inc. and currently serves a client mix ranging from near-virtual, start-up enterprises to more established, second-tier pharmaceutical firms, said Joe Wyse, Coldstream Laboratories Inc. president and CEO. When the $17 million sterile manufacturing facility at Coldstream was dedicated in May 2006, its aim was to achieve $15 million in revenue with roughly 100 employees by 2012-2015, and despite the national downturn in the economy since then, Wyse said that goal is still within reach. Coldstream Laboratories currently has approximately 50 employees, and UK's Board of Trustees recently approved $5 million to be used primarily as working capital by the company, which aims to achieve a positive cash flow within the year.
On the whole, recent economic woes have not had a significant effect on Coldstream, which experienced an 11.4 percent increase in the number of companies and a 15.5 percent increase in employees located on the campus in the past year, Heller said. The number of employees at Coldstream now numbers more than 1,000.
"I don't think the economy has dampened the interest of folks toward Coldstream," Carpenter said. "I think it's just hurting them a little in trying to get the funding for the projects they want to do."
In addition to the nearing completion of Coldstream's first LexHold building, the city is scheduled to begin construction on its new Coldstream-based Public Safety Operations Center, at an estimated cost of more than $42 million, before the end of the year. The center will be located on a 16-acre parcel along Citation Boulevard. Also, the planned construction of a new $129 million Eastern State Hospital facility on the Coldstream campus is currently in the programming stages, Carpenter said.
While the recent and expected growth has amplified the need for a review of the master plan and the addition of more service-based amenities in the future, the overall mission of the campus has not changed, according to Carpenter.
"We're not an industrial park," Carpenter said. "We still are looking for high-level, quality-type businesses to come here, and that's what we hope for when we are looking at bringing in amenities. We're not looking for fast food restaurants. We want something that's different than what you would normally find in Lexington."
Initial findings and recommendations from the visioning project are expected by early 2009.