Port of Kennewick The new water feature at Vista Field in Kennewick. | Courtesy PS Media for Port of Kennewick
Vista Field, Columbia Gardens ready for sale BY ROBIN WOJTANIK
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lmost a decade after closing Vista Field, the Port of Kennewick is poised to start selling land and to welcome new construction after challenges and delays brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. “Everything has to be talked about against the backdrop of where we’re still at in 2021,” said Tim Arntzen, the port’s chief executive officer. “We’re in a different world right now. Prior to Covid, we’d been foot on the gas, ready to roll things out.” The port is ready to offer up its desirable land – right in the heart of Kennewick and never previously available to private developers – now that the city of Kennewick has signed off on about $4 million in infrastructure work at the former municipal airport, described as “first cabin, no cutting corners.” This includes road work, sidewalks, utilities and landscaping to
prep the site for project proposals on shovel-ready land. “We’re ready to pop, in a real positive way,” Arntzen said. From here, the port will finalize design standards and set pricing before soliciting requests from developers interested in building there. A key feature of the infrastructure includes a chlorinated stream running from West Deschutes Avenue north toward West Rio Grande Avenue. The water feature in the middle of the former airport includes trees, waterfalls, rocks, bridges, fountains, benches and walking paths. “That stream is going to rival the lighthouse for an iconic feature in our community,” Arntzen said, referring to the port’s lighthouse on Clover Island. “There’s a lot of pride that we built something that’s drawing wildlife.” Unexpected pandemic-related chlorine shortages occasionally
have affected the clarity of the stream, but Arntzen is optimistic the shortage will pass.
‘Most coveted area’ Arntzen predicts “for sale” signs will be in the ground after the first of the year and the first land sale publicized by March 2022. “We’ve got a diamond in the rough, and it’s a big one. We are going to figure out a few paperwork things right now, but this is our diamond mine and we’ve got to find our diamond buyers,” he said. Buyers will be building on land Arntzen believes to be the “most coveted area in the Tri-Cities.” “I don’t care how you draw the map, if you put crosshairs at the center, it’s Vista Field, and we own it,” he said. Projects will need to align with a master plan for walkable streets offering a mix of commercial, retail and residential development across 103 acres. Focus | Construction + Real Estate
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