When attorney Brian Gingerich was looking for a place to expand his custom motorcycle business to include a hangout spot celebrating all things moto, he said the long-vacant shed on SW Industrial Way was perfect.

It was zoned for industrial use, which guaranteed he could continue doing custom builds and restoration, and the rent was affordable. “It was full of hypodermics and broken skateboard parts,” Gingerich said. He opened Spoken Moto at 310 SW Industrial Way in 2016 with his business partner, Steve Buettner, and it has become the gathering place he envisioned. People work on their laptops and sip lattes at the front of the house while he cranks a wrench near the back door.

Although it’s been less than three years since Spoken Moto cleaned up the building, General Manager Pete West said he fields inquiries on a daily basis about whether the shop will have to move to make way for redevelopment. That’s how quickly the neighborhood appears to be transforming. To the west, new tenants are filling out the Box Factory, which recently completed a renovation that added storefronts and patio seating along NW Arizona Avenue. Spoken Moto’s landlord, Box Factory owner Killian Pacific, and other landowners are poised to take advantage of infrastructure improvements that would allow them to build six-story or seven-story residential buildings.

“We keep telling ’em just to build around us like Stuart Little,” Gingerich said.

But Gingerich isn’t worried about losing his lease any time soon. For one, sewer capacity for the area is nearly maxed out, and the city has yet to put an upgrade on the drawing board. Redevelopment of the area between downtown and the Old Mill District could also require transportation improvements, such as at the entrance to U.S. Highway 97, City Engineer Ryan Oster said.

“Thinking of six-story buildings in Bend is difficult,” said Bill Smith, who developed the Old Mill District and owns property on Industrial Way. “Parking is a real issue.”

Smith thinks a lack of parking and other forces will delay transformation of the “KorPine” area, which the city tagged as an opportunity area for high-density redevelopment. The KorPine opportunity area includes Smith’s property at 200 SW Industrial Way, Killian Pacific’s 5 acres east of the Box Factory and the 21-acre former KorPine mill site at 175 SW Industrial Way. The former KorPine site is owned by McKenzie Creek Development LLC, an affiliate of Hooker Creek Cos.

The area reportedly encompasses smaller properties occupied by a self-storage business and Crux Fermentation Project, but a city staff member was not available to confirm the boundaries.

Killian Pacific wants to build six-story apartment buildings with retail or other commercial uses on the ground floor, but Smith said there’s not enough demand from retail tenants to populate the entire KorPine area.

Smith said he has no immediate plans to redevelop his Industrial Way parcel, which is home base for his landscaping operation.

“They should expand their time horizons,” Smith said of anyone who thinks the area will be made over in the foreseeable future.

Yet the city is working in a direction that favors redevelopment.

Oster said his department is studying various options for increasing sewer capacity.

Rebuilding the Drake lift station to increase capacity for the KorPine area could require improvements to the lines that cross downtown, an expensive and potentially disruptive scenario, he said. So the city is considering adding a smaller station to serve only KorPine-area developments and feed into the system east of U.S. Highway 97.

The Bend City Council voted in April to have staff study creating an urban renewal area, which would capture tax revenue from KorPine-area developments. That would help pay for infrastructure improvements, which Killian Pacific and others need to move forward.

“We would have already commenced with construction if we could,” Killian Pacific Vice President of Development Jeremy McPherson wrote in a letter of support for the urban renewal area. McPherson was traveling last week and could not be reached by phone.

Hooker Creek representative Scott Carlson said in March, “It’ll be sooner rather than later when that property gets developed.” He did not return a message last week. City of Bend planners have had one high-level discussion with representatives of the property, city spokeswoman Anne Aurand said.

While question marks linger over large parcels, small residential developers and business owners chisel out space for themselves around the edges. Sundog Mill LLC recently filed with the city a site plan for 31 condominiums with underground parking on Mill View Way.

Some of the condos would have views of the Deschutes River. Sundog owner Christopher Thelan thinks it will be multiple years before he breaks ground.

The Box Factory continues to remodel space for new tenants, one of which will be Bledsoe Family Winery.

Owner Drew Beldsoe said the tasting room will be similar to one in downtown Walla Walla, Washington, and serve wines that are more affordable than the exclusive products at Doubleback Winery, Bledoe’s Walla Walla Valley winery. He expects to occupy the 2,200 square-foot space early next year.

Bledsoe said he settled on the Box Factory after looking for a space downtown. “There’s so much going on there,” he said. “There’s also going to be significant continued development in that area. It’s going to be a really cool extension of downtown.”

—Reporter: 541-617-7860, kmclaughlin@bendbulletin.com