Tribecca Park envisions food hall, commercial and residential development on Grant Avenue Parkway 

Plans have evolved for property at the southwest corner of the intersection of Grant Avenue Parkway and Grand Street. 

In the spot where the Loose Goose coffee shop, bar and recreational venue had been planned, Tribecca Park is in the works. The new development is envisioned with a food hall and bar and other commercial opportunities on the ground floor, as well as multiple apartments. 

Asked how the project came together, Andrew Doolittle of development company GDL Enterprises LLC said that following the August 2022 City Council approval of rezoning for Loose Goose, GDL Enterprises had an opportunity to buy the former site of the Grant Avenue Pet Hospital at 1037 S. Grant Ave., plus three lots adjoining it. 

“That doubled the site size, so we went back to the drawing board and created something new,” he said. 

Doolittle said Tribecca Park plans maximize the site’s potential.  

A look at the site plan, provided to Springfield Business Journal by developers, shows two buildings – a larger, four-story Building A fronting Grand Street with a smaller, three-story Building B fronting the parkway. The food hall would be in Building A, with the plans showing an outdoor seating area on the corner, while Building B would be purely residential. 

Doolittle said Building A is envisioned with the eight-vendor food hall, a separate bar and about 5,000 square feet of commercial space, perhaps for a standalone restaurant or offices. The building will also serve as the physical location of a coffee shop, Casa Macondo, operated by Kelly Hayes. Hayes is currently selling coffee drinks and beans and traditional Colombian foods at Farmers Market of the Ozarks, according to past SBJ reporting. 

For the food hall, there will be lots of seating both inside and outside, Doolittle said, including seating that fronts the parkway. He added that the food hall will be operated by a local restaurateur, yet to be determined – “Someone with some experience,” he said. 

Behind the project are two development entities: GDL Enterprises, owned by Doolittle, Willie Grega and Cameron LaBarr, and Tribecca Park LLC, owned by Brian Hayes (husband of Kelly) and Tyler Hellweg. 

In the interview this morning, Doolittle said GDL sold the real estate to Tribecca, and the two entities entered into a partnership for the development. 

“We think it’s a great team for the project,” Doolittle said. 

Heading up design work is Arkifex Studios LLC, where Hellweg is a principal architect, and Own Inc. is serving as civil engineer. At this early point in development, other members of the professional team, including a general contractor or other engineers, are not yet on board, Doolittle said. 

The initial plans for the project call for 126 total residential units – a number that is subject to change, with 78 units on floors two through four of Building A and 48 units in Building B, which is designed to be entirely residential. 

Doolittle said a stormwater easement running through the property could require some changes to those calculations. 

Building A apartments will range from studio to two-bedroom and lofted units, and these are envisioned as somewhat upscale units, he said. Building B would be one-and two-bedroom units that are market rate. 

Asked about apartment amenities, Doolittle said the food hall is to be the primary amenity, with tenants to be offered memberships that most likely provide discounts on food, coffee and alcohol. 

“We’re trying to do a wine club for tenants and also for neighbors surrounding us,” he said. 

Missing from the plan are pickleball courts that generated some public enthusiasm in the Loose Goose plans. 

“We would have loved to have those included on-site somehow, but we didn’t have enough space,” Doolittle said. 

A rendering is not yet available, Doolittle said, but one is anticipated by the time the project goes before the city’s Planning & Zoning Commission with a planned development proposal, probably in February, he said. A neighborhood meeting was held Dec. 16. 

Dolittle said feedback from neighbors was generally supportive, with most questions concerning resident parking – an area the team intends to address further in its site plan submission. 

If all goes well, Doolittle said, construction will begin in late 2026. He added that it is too early to have a cost estimate for the project. 

Doolittle said both development companies sought to create an activity center for the Grant Avenue Parkway. 

“We want to be the neighborhood hub that everyone wants to see in Springfield,” he said, adding that the hub will serve the West Central and Fassnight neighborhoods and the parkway as a whole. “That’s really what we set out to do, and we landed on a food hall as being the best-case scenario for that purpose.”