The future of the Town & Country Shopping Center on MacArthur Boulevard is unclear after the aging strip mall failed to sell at auction this month, but the owner of the property says he remains hopeful it will be redeveloped.
“I’m always optimistic because as a real estate developer, you have to be optimistic,” David Bernstein, president of Miami-based Larkspur Properties, told Illinois Times.
Larkspur purchased the 260,000-square-foot shopping center in 2022. The investment firm, which specializes in distressed residential and commercial projects, was the top bidder at $5.77 million.
The retail area, built in 1961, was Springfield’s first outlying shopping center. At the time of the sale, it was 65% vacant.
Following the sale, then-Ward 7 Ald. Joe McMenamin told Illinois Times he had walked the site with Bernstein and was “very impressed” with his company’s plans for the property. Bernstein’s concept has called for building 40 to 50 apartments in a three-story complex that would be perpendicular to MacArthur Boulevard, creating more green space by leveling some storefronts and transforming the former Burlington Coat Factory store into climate-controlled units for indoor storage.
In November 2024, the Springfield Planning and Zoning Commission approved a conditional permitted use, which would allow apartments to be built on the site along with retail space.
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But Michael Higgins, president of the MacArthur Boulevard Association, said little has been heard from the developer since then. When the property went up for auction again recently, local officials expressed dismay.
Higgins cited the recent opening of Scheels Sports Park at Legacy Pointe and planned widening and extension of MacArthur Boulevard by the Illinois Department of Transportation as key parts of the revitalization of the business corridor.
“Town & Country (redevelopment) would be a major piece of a lot of pieces going together,” he said.
When he spoke with IT this month, Bernstein was mum about potential business partners or the strategy behind putting the shopping center on the auction block.
But McMenamin, who no longer serves on the city council but remains active in the MacArthur Boulevard Association, told IT in October when he spoke with Bernstein earlier this year the developer told him he was concerned inflation was raising the cost of the building supplies needed for redeveloping the site.
McMenamin added another MBA member spoke with Bernstein and was told a planned business partner dropped out, leaving him in the lurch.
Sometimes auctions are used by developers to identify potential co-investors in projects by setting the minimum selling price high and then contacting bidders in the wake of the unsuccessful sale.
“I can’t comment on that because there may be negotiations ongoing,” Bernstein said. “The answer is to be determined. It obviously just happened, so we don’t know the answer.”
The property previously was owned by an investor group that included Springfield developer Corky Joyner and former city attorney Jim Zerkle. Ownership later transferred from Joyner and Zerkle’s limited liability company to JPMorgan Chase before being sold to Larkspur Properties.