Tempe residents are pushing back against this controversial apartment project. Here’s why

Article originally posted on AZ Central on September 26, 2024

Tempe will soon decide the fate of a controversial apartment project that has been slammed by dozens of nearby residents over everything from its design, to its traffic impact and its height.

The complex would be called Cabana Kyrene. The plan is to build it on a roughly 8-acre lot at 515 West Guadalupe Road in southern Tempe, where that street intersects with South Kyrene Road. It would have 229 units, including 90 studios, 93 one-bedrooms units and 46 two-bedroom apartments.

Rent there would be between $1,400 and $1,600 per month, according to Manjula Vaz, a partner at development firm Gammage and Burnham. The target demographic is Tempe’s workforce, including young professionals who may struggle to afford the city’s market-rate units.

Tempe’s City Council has to change the site’s zoning from commercial-only to one that allows multi-family housing in order for the complex to move forward, however. Vaz made that request at the Sept.19 council meeting, and city leaders are expected to make a final decision Tuesday.

But residents of the nearby single-family neighborhoods are overwhelmingly against the project, with more than 200 signing a petition to oppose it. More than a dozen residents either spoke at the council meeting and or emailed the city urging officials not to greenlight the proposal.

Their complaints range from the complex’s three-story design that’s taller than nearby homes, what one speaker called its “motel-looking” square appearance that clashes with the Spanish-style houses around it, and the traffic that hundreds of new renters would create.

“We chose to purchase our home in this neighborhood because of its quiet charm and solid block construction, to keep it in our family for generations,” Liz and Mike de la Fuente wrote to the city. They live in the Tempe Royal Estates neighborhood that is right next to the project site.

The couple’s email added that the proposed development, “threatens to alter the character, safety, and overall quality of life that we, and our fellow residents, have cherished for years.”

Traffic was among the most common concerns expressed. The developer estimated that the apartment complex would add about 1,500 cars to the road each day, which concerned residents like William Gibson who said the nearby roadway was “already congested.”

Gibson pointed out that the nearby railroad crossing and Kiwani Recreation Complex already cause traffic jams, saying the Caban Kyrene developers had not taken that into account.

And he cited city data that shows there have been scores of accidents within a quarter mile of the Kyrene and Guadalupe intersection.

“This project will cause a major increase in traffic to an already congested intersection, said Gibson, who lives in the nearby Brittany Lane neighborhood.

“This is a dangerous intersection. According to the city of Tempe Crash Data report, over the past ten years there have been over 154 vehicle accidents within a quarter mile of this intersection of Kyrene and Guadalupe,” he added.

Vaz, the developer, argued that a commercial development on the property would put between 10,000 and 14,000 additional cars on that stretch of road each day, or at least seven times the amount of traffic generated by an apartment complex.

The city did not present traffic estimates to verify those figures. But Tempe Mayor Corey Woods agreed that keeping the property zoned for commercial uses would likely create more traffic than Cabana Kyrene would generate.

“In every study that I’ve seen over the past 12-and-a-half years … the biggest issues that we typically have when it comes to (traffic) is when we have commercial shopping centers,” he said. “Not when we have multi-family housing complexes.”

The look and size of the proposed apartment complex also irked residents.

It would be a grouping of square, box-like buildings that somewhat resemble mid-level hotels like Hampton Inns. The complex would be similar to others built by the developer, including Cabana on Hayden in Scottsdale and Cabana Washington in Phoenix.