Site development started in recent months for Shire Walk, an 81-unit townhome project by Main Street Homes. (Jonathan Spiers photos)
The final piece in a decades-long effort to add residential density to a western Henrico crossroads is now underway.
Site work started in recent months on Shire Walk, an 81-unit townhome development by Main Street Homes that’s filling an 8-acre site at the convergence of John Rolfe Parkway and Pump and Church roads.
Previously called John Rolfe Mews, the renamed project will consist of 3- and 3½-story townhomes with covered rear decks and options for top-floor terraces for the taller units. The homes will range in size from 2,100 to 2,600 square feet and be priced from the upper $400,000s up to $600,000 depending on options selected.
The development also will include a roughly 7,000-square-foot commercial space and a plaza-style community amenity at the corner of Church and John Rolfe.
A past rendering of the townhomes and the plaza planned at Church Road and John Rolfe Parkway. (BizSense file)
Shire Walk will fill out a tract that’s remained vacant since the roads were realigned to create new intersections with Pump when Henrico extended John Rolfe to connect with West Broad Street. The redesign and associated rezonings were intended to encourage a mix of development that would result in a walkable, urban village-style community.
Main Street Homes purchased the tract from Rebkee Co., which had previously planned a denser development called The Shire that was proposed to have 225 apartments and 18,500 square feet of commercial space.
Rebkee scrapped that plan in 2020 due to opposition from area residents and a lack of political support from the county. Henrico’s future land use plan had called for commercial development for the site.
Working with Main Street Homes, Rebkee reworked the plan with the 81 townhomes and smaller commercial space. While the project was inconsistent with the land-use plan, county planners supported the townhomes as “a logical expansion” of similar developments that have risen around the site, such as Markel | Eagle’s Shire Place townhomes and John Rolfe Square condominiums.
After securing county approvals, Main Street purchased the property from Rebkee in 2022 for $6.1 million.
The development site is beside existing townhomes built by Ryan Homes.
Vernon McClure, president of Main Street Homes, said the townhomes at Shire Place will be similar to what the Midlothian-based firm has built at Randolph Pond in Midlothian, but with redesigned floorplans and updated exteriors he described as more modern in style.
He said the homes will front the roads with garages and alleys facing inward. The homes’ facades are required to be 50 percent brick, and all of the units will have two-car garages.
Terrace options will be available for the taller units, which will be centrally located in the development. Like Randolph Pond, the homes also will have rear decks, though McClure said Shire Walk’s will be covered.
Vernon McClure
“The decks are nice, but if it’s rainy or misty or if the sun’s too hot, then you don’t get as much use out of it, so I think the covered decks will be much more useful,” he said.
Since posting a sign on the site in recent weeks, McClure said about 30 people have signed up for Shire Walk’s VIP list to receive details when presales get underway.
“I think the interest is going to be pretty high,” McClure said. “It’s a phenomenal location. It’s two miles from Short Pump and it’s just central to everything, so I think it will do very well.”
In addition to the plaza, amenities are to include sidewalks, landscaping and a dog park. McClure said the commercial space would be suitable for a childcare company or other small business. He said a lease has not been signed for that space, which will be built along Church.
A site plan shows the taller units in the center of the development. (Image courtesy Main Street Homes)
McClure said development work is scheduled to wrap up in January, with construction on the homes to follow in February. He said the first units could be completed by mid-summer. Ovalle Construction is handling the site development.
McClure put the overall project cost at about $35 million.
Shire Walk adds to a heavy workload for Main Street Homes, which McClure said put about 500 new lots on the ground this year.
Among those, it recently sold the last of 235 townhomes it’s built at Cosby Village, a 68-acre development near Cosby High School in Chesterfield. It’s planning 400 more townhomes and a senior living facility at the former Oasis Sports Park property east of the school. And near Chester, it’s about to start sales for Boschen Woods, a 36-lot subdivision backing up to Pocahontas State Park.
While Shire Walk will wrap up development of the area southwest of Church and Pump, more homes are in the pipeline along John Rolfe north of the crossroads.
Last year, Legacy Land Development secured approval for 28 home lots on about a dozen acres straddling the parkway at its intersection with Pump. It has since sold that land to Henrico-based Bradford Custom Homes, which bought the site for $750,000 this March.
The post Work underway on 81 townhomes at long-vacant John Rolfe Parkway site appeared first on Richmond BizSense.