Eastside Commons
Initialising…

Eastside
Commons

A 20-year commons master plan for the 73-acre city-owned Military Circle site — Norfolk, Virginia.

A place worth building — read the full argument →
73Acres, city-owned
$0Land cost (CLT holds it)
~3,200Homes · 25×125 · 5-over-1
~70/acGreenwich Village density

The city of Norfolk bought Military Circle Mall for $10. The land is ours — the Eastside's. A Community Land Trust holds it in perpetuity. The appreciation stays in the commons. No developer buys in, extracts for 50 years, and leaves.

This site plan derives all geometry from the actual GIS parcel data — 19 confirmed EDA-owned parcels, real coordinates, real ownership from the Norfolk FY26 assessment roll. District zones emerge from the parcels themselves as zones of influence: each district radiates from its anchor parcels, and boundaries form at local equilibria, not at drawn lines.

Eastside Commons · 73ac · Norfolk VA Initializing…
⬡ 3D ↗
Units—
Affordable—
Green—
Patterns—
⚙ Solver
16
0.008
10ft
0.20
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Legend
Edge types
Walkability
Run solver
Parcels
Run solver
Access
Run solver
Pro Forma — derived from plan geometry
Run the pipeline above to generate the financial report.

Community zine

Bifold pamphlet

11×8.5" · 4 panels · print-ready

Open →

Pitch — City Hall

Council & Economic Development

PD rezoning · deal structure · comparables

Open →

Pitch — Investors

5-over-1 · CLT land · market rate

Deal structure · NOI · cap rate · per-building

Open →

Pitch — Coalition

Community & Civic League

Ownership · escalation paths · the case

Open →

Wuhan Precedent

  • 389 sponge city projects, 38.5 km²
  • −10× flood frequency in pilot zone
  • −3°C urban heat island reduction
  • 725 tonnes CO₂ sequestered per year
  • 2× adjacent land value increase
  • Source: Frontiers in Water 2024; Wu, Clemson 2022

Sponge Park — Function Stack

  • ① Stormwater capture (70% annual runoff)
  • ② Public wetland park — trails, gathering
  • ③ Sea level research station — ODU/NSU/HRSD
  • ④ Community wealth fund via data licensing
  • Norfolk sinks 4–5 mm/yr. This site is the highest ground.

Parcel geometry: gisshare.norfolk.gov / OpenData / Parcels FeatureServer · Ownership + centroids: data.norfolk.gov FY26 Property Assessment + Address Information · 19 EDA-owned parcels confirmed · Ward 4 · Military Circle Civic League · Evac Zone C · Planning District 87 · Flood Zone X (low-moderate risk, FIRM 2017) · All overlay geometry derived by constraint satisfaction from parcel data — no hardcoded coordinates.