Eden Prairie City Council — Transcript
Monday, May 11, 2026
Story
Prairie Bluff Commons Residential Development Gains Unanimous Approval in Eden Prairie
Minnesota River Vista Overlook
Votes (1)
Prairie Bluff Commons Development Proposal
Dissent: None
Moved by Commissioner Piper [00:35:46] · Seconded by Commissioner Kirk [00:36:31]
The proposal by Lennar Minnesota involves redeveloping an existing vacant office site into a residential community. The project includes 166 townhomes and 16 villa units, requiring comprehensive plan amendments and a zone change from office to residential. Waivers were requested for lot area, width, and density (7 units/acre vs. 6.7 max). The applicant detailed home features, open space amenities (dog park, tot lot, gazebo), construction phasing, and sustainability efforts (EV ready, solar ready for villas). Staff highlighted that the project exceeds open space and landscaping requirements and meets housing goals. Public comments, primarily from Hennepin Village HOA, expressed concerns about increased traffic on Plum Stone Drive, buffering, conservation area protection, and the feasibility of projected low HOA fees. Staff and the city engineer addressed traffic concerns, explaining that the proposed intersection alignment is safer and residents are likely to choose main routes over Plum Stone Drive.
Notable Quotes (6)
Um we're excited to be here tonight uh with what is a what seems to be a rare opportunity for residential in Eden Prairie. So, um we're presenting uh Prairie Bluff Commons.
Um townhomes probably targeted towards um buyers in their 30s, 40s. They could be single people, uh young families. Um even we've we've seen some uh empty nesters or snowbirds uh purchasing our townhomes. The villas will be age-targeted uh to 50 and up.
Um we're close to the airport, so um our windows will be glazed for noise attenuation on the inside. Um we'll we'll be sure to meet city standard on that. Um residents will be required to sign a disclosure, which states that you are near an airport, there will be noise.
Staff reviewed the waivers and and kind of looking at our code in terms of what our goals are with the flexibility from a PUD perspective and we're looking for a project that enhances um or meets certain goals of the city in this situation. It exceeds our required open space requirements. Project also exceeds our landscaping and buffering requirements between different land uses. And this project also does meet certain housing goals in terms of not just the inclusionary and affordable housing, but just a housing style because we don't do a lot of town homes as as Josh had mentioned earlier.
I mean our our dues in our HOA are 525 a month and we do everything we can to keep the dues low there. So, I'm just I'm just not seeing any way that the math could work out to have low 200s dues dues there.
I think that the applicant um Wha- while they're certainly maximizing the uh density of the site opportunities in the zoning districts that they're changing it to um with the uh park and open space that they have scattered around uh at their areas and the street system which apparently uh serves this redevelopment concept quite well. Um In terms of handling the additional traffic um I'm in support of this.
Ordinances & Resolutions (7)
Proposed change in land use guidance for the development site.
Conceptual review of the overall development plan.
Detailed review of the development including specific requests for waivers from zoning code standards.
Proposed rezoning of the property to accommodate the new residential densities.
Subdivision plan for the new residential lots and associated common areas.
Review of the layout and design of the proposed development.
Official report from city staff recommending approval of the development.