Spring Park condo project offers
open floor plans, wide lake views

Jim Buchta, Star Tribune
Published July 16, 2005

Here's your engineering quiz for the day: What's post-tension construction?

High-tension cables eliminate the need for some supporting columns by using thick wire cables strung through concrete slabs. These cables act as structural elements that give a building its strength and stability. They help prevent cracking and settling over time, but also create an opportunity to design open floor plans with large floor-to-ceiling windows.

Its a technique that most often is used for commercial buildings, but it's about to be used in a high visibility residential project. The Cornerstone Group, a Bloomington-based housing developer that specializes in unique in-fill multifamily projects, and Prudential Real Estate Investors recently broke ground for the Mist, a 120-unit condo project on the shores of Lake Minnetonka in Spring Park that will incorporate this technique.

Most low-rise condo buildings are stick-built because post-tension buildings tend to cost more. Cornerstone is using this technique so that units will have open floor plans, big windows and large cantilevered balconies with lake views. The units also will have hardwood floors, ceramic tile, upscale appliance packages, granite countertops and Lake Minnetonka dock access.

The project will include 12,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space, including a deck overlooking the lake.

Units range from 1,000 to 3,000 square feet and will be priced from the mid-$300,000s to $1.2 million.
 

-Jim Buchta