Riverfront Reality
by Judy Horan

One Magazine
December 2006

Residents of Riverfront Place are much like pioneers, as they become some of the first to live the long-sought dream of life on the river.

Dreams about living by the Omaha riverfront have been just that for decades - dreams. Greg Peterson, now retired from the city planning department, remembers discussions 35 years ago about building residences alongside the river.

That dream finally came true two years ago when the Riverfront Place project of luxury condominiums and townhomes was announced. And Peterson is once again involved - this time as project manager.

Riverfront Place welcomed its first residents in October. At this time, 51 of its 56 available units have been purchased. Prices range from the mid-$200,000s to about $1 million for a 5,300-square-foot tower penthouse, which has been sold.

Much like modern day pioneers, Riverfront Place residents Diane and Scott Stormberg are among the first to experience life on the river. Their reaction thus far? It was worth the wait.

From their townhome, the Stormbergs have breathtaking views of both the Missouri River and the city skyline. Since moving in, Diane Stormberg says she hasn’t looked at the city the same way.

“I sat in our third-floor room and could see the sun setting out one window,” she says. “The moon was coming up in the other window.”

For entertainment, the Stormbergs stroll to the Old Market several times a week for dinner, and Creighton basketball games draw them across the street to the Qwest Center Omaha. Their 17-year-old son, Kevin, finds it much easier to catch concerts at the Qwest Center now that he lives within walking distance.

Riverfront Place partner Ross Robb has been selling this lifestyle nonstop ever since he got off a plane in Omaha from Tempe a few years ago and decided, along with his partners - Kim McGuire in Park City, Utah; John Kinnear in Santa Barbara, Calif., and Omaha partner David Karnes - to embark on the project.

Originally, the partners were looking for a building in the Old Market to renovate. But then they learned that the City of Omaha was looking for proposals to develop the riverfront area.

The Riverfront Place Partners proposed the only condominium project. Other proposals were for offices and apartments.

“We presented to the mayor and the selection team some statistical information about the permanency of owner occupants and the sense of creating a neighborhood as opposed to apartments, which tend to be more transient,” Robb says. “We’re creating a neighborhood with a sense of ownership down on the river.”

The closer to Robb’s sales pitch was to take prospective buyers to the top of the complex’s 14-story condominium. Many buyers took only one look at the river and downtown and were hooked, Robb says. Floor-to-ceiling windows and ceilings taller than 9 feet make views easy to enjoy, says John Sova of RDG Planning and Design. He is the project’s lead architect.

Riverfront Place consists of 18 townhomes and a tower with 38 condominiums. Half of the tower residents have both a river and downtown skyline view, Robb says.

From that vantage point, residents enjoy the downtown holiday lights and, very soon, will see New Year’s Eve fireworks. They can also look forward to completion of the pedestrian bridge that will begin its trip across the Missouri River from outside their back door.

Residents also enjoy underground parking, a meeting room with a kitchen and a fitness facility. And, if they need help carrying groceries or a ride to the airport, they just ask the Riverfront Place concierge.

A homeowner’s association takes care of maintenance, including snow removal. That feature, Robb says, also appealed greatly to Riverfront Place’s primary buyers – empty nesters.

“These people want to downsize and have more free time,” Robb says. “I have little kids, but when they’re grown I would move into a place like this.”

The dream of luxury life on the riverfront is finally coming true more than three decades after it was originally envisioned.

Greg Peterson remembers discussions in 1971 when he was with the City Planning Department. The City released a plan for downtown Omaha that included a riverfront project called Marina City. However, the land indicated for the residences instead became the ConAgra Foods campus.

Riverfront Place is much like the Marina City proposal, but now on land north of where it was shown on the map 35 years ago.

Upon reflection, project architect John Sova says Omaha may not have been ready at the time. He says the city needed to grow and get more of a population base to bring people back to downtown living.

“When Omaha’s downtown died in the ‘60s and ‘70s, it took almost a full generation of people to go through a cycle of living in the suburbs,” says Sova, whose company worked for six months with Riverfront Partners to prepare a proposal.

Robb points out that American cities historically have used their riverfronts for industrial, only recently turning their attention to residential. Omaha’s cleanup of the river and attention to the area made the Riverfront Place project possible.

“One of the important components in continuing downtown is to have people living 24 hours a day, 365 days a year there,” Peterson adds “It takes time to get an environment where people feel comfortable about living there.”

Peterson has had great influence on Omaha’s riverfront rebirth. Before he retired in 2003 from his job with the city, he had worked on the Gene Leahy Mall, Qwest Center and Gallup University riverfront campus. He now runs a consulting firm and currently is on-site every day as project manager for the out-of-town Riverfront Place developers.

While Riverfront Place adds another impressive visual element to the riverfront, true appreciation for the project is in the details.

Every unit has at least one fireplace, Sova says, and only top-of-the-line products are used. His designer helped buyers through the selection process, including choosing from six types of carpeting and six types of tile.

The bamboo floor is available in two colors and four patterns. Bamboo is a renewable resource grown in China that is harder than oak.

“Bamboo floor is one of the new, hot flooring products that has come into the marketplace the last couple of years,” says Dan Biere, president of Construction Services Inc.

His company is the contractor for Riverfront Place construction, which started in June 2005.

Countertops are three-centimeter granite. Ceramic tile covers kitchen backsplashes, bath floors and shower walls. Cabinets in the kitchen and bath are custom-made, fabricated at a local mill workshop.

Soundproofing is a popular feature for those looking for quiet at home. Units are separated by double layers of dry wall and two layers of insulation. Sounds of people walking above are muffled by eight-inch-thick concrete floors.

“It’s also far enough from the traffic, you step out onto the balcony, and it is truly a quiet, serene type of atmosphere,” says Biere.

“Lively luxury” is what Biere calls the bright, sunny interiors. He notes that Riverfront Place provides a new product to the marketplace for downtown living that wasn’t available to buyers who prefer not to live in a renovated older building.

Sova says a trip to Vancouver to see projects helped in planning Riverfront Place. A consultant there, HBEW Architects, has done riverfront projects in other cities such as San Diego and Portland.

Robb says the Omaha building architecturally looks like what he saw in Vancouver: “Extensive use of glass, floor-toceiling windows, city and water views, tapering of the project so rather than a rectangular building, it’s tapered toward water so every unit has a balcony that faces the river.”

Plans now are underway for a second tower. Construction starts in the spring with completion by the end of 2008. Unit sizes will range from 1,000 square feet to 4,200 square feet with a 6,000-square-foot penthouse.

The second tower will differ in some ways from tower one. Tower two will be 16 stories, instead of 14, and contain 52 units instead of 39. A fitness room will be on the 15th level instead of the first level.

“It will literally be within 10 feet of the riverfront trail,” Sova says.

Sales start in February. The sales office is in an existing townhome at 523 Riverfront Plaza.

Phase 2 also will include a restaurant on space reserved just east of the existing tower. Phase 3, still being planned, will include some commercial space and a few residential units.

Robb says the Riverfront Place project has been successful because, “Omaha is a development and business-friendly community.”

Peterson can second that and takes particular pride in the project. To Peterson, Riverfront Place is a living testament to undying belief in a threedecade- old dream.

He remembers how skeptical people were about the Old Market and sees parallels on the riverfront.

“From the time I went to work for the city, people were saying you can spend all the money, but nothing will ever happen,” he says. “But there was a group of us who thought it would.

“I spent a career dedicated to making a difference for downtown. Now people believe.”

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