New plans for South Concord open door
for Hardman Triangle redevelopment

New plans for South Concord open door for Hardman Triangle
By Jake Spitzack | Staff Writer | July 2025

Transforming the 22-acre Hardman Triangle superblock into a striking community hub with high walkability and new housing and businesses is now largely contingent on the relocation of the Long Cheng slaughterhouse, which owns about a third of the property within the site. South St. Paul city staff say the business is seeking to relocate to expand and modernize its operation but cannot find an area in the Twin Cities metro that is properly zoned to accommodate its needs. As such, the city is looking to kill two birds with one stone.

In early June, the South St. Paul City Council adopted a small area plan for South Concord Street, creating a formal vision for the next decade of development along the thoroughfare south of I-494. Its creation was called for in the City’s 2040 comprehensive plan adopted in 2020, and a major recommendation within it is making zoning changes to allow livestock to be transported and kept in the area. The city council is expected to make that change official in the coming months, which will allow Long Cheng to build a new facility there and subsequently open the door for the dramatic redevelopment of the Hardman Triangle superblock, located at Grand Avenue East and Concord Street North, east of the historic Concord Exchange Building.

Long Cheng is a small-scale butcher shop where people can slaughter and butcher their own animals. The practice is culturally significant for various ethnic groups and Long Cheng has received funding from the Minnesota State Legislature for facility improvements so it can serve those demographics for years to come. South Concord is already home to Twin City Hide’s new state-of-the-art facility, and several other industrial businesses. Danner Inc., a trucking and road construction company, is also planning to expand its operations with new facilities there. That expansion could add 82 jobs. Likewise, the city is exploring building its new public works facility in the South Concord area.

Other recommendations in the South Concord Small Area Plan include creating a new public road connecting Verderosa Avenue and Hardman Avenue South, and identifying uses for vacant parcels in the area, whether for creating new industrial facilities or converting existing ones for commercial or mixed-use purposes. The city hired Swanson Haskamp Consulting to create the plan for $60,000 and a grant from the Dakota County Community Development Agency covered $25,000 of the cost. The same consultant was hired in 2021 to study the North Concord corridor and create a vision for that primarily light industrial area.

The South Concord area is in the Mississippi River floodplain and prone to flooding. Currently, it is mostly industrial but has some residential and mixed-use properties. The new plan calls for minor zoning changes to support more residential and mixed-use developments. It should be noted that the city created a South Concord Corridor Plan in 2012 to satisfy a goal in its 2030 comprehensive plan. However, much of that study revolved around addressing flooding by extending the levee. It concluded it wouldn’t be financially feasible to do so and therefore the plan was not adopted.

Work on the Hardman Triangle superblock began in 2019 and quickly gained steam last winter when the city entered into a preliminary development agreement with Zavi Development. To pave the way for redevelopment, the city has demolished the Twin City Pallet Company building, acquired several properties, completed engineering studies and parceled the site. It recently created a masterplan calling for at least 200 units of market-rate apartments, a restaurant, 3.5-acre park and at least one destination business such as an indoor pickleball center. Pre-development work for the destination and restaurant businesses is underway and construction could begin as soon as the end of the year. Site work for the first phase
residential building is anticipated to happen toward the end of the year or early next year after details about Long Cheng’s relocation are ironed out. There are two other parcels in the Hardman Triangle site that the city hopes to acquire to fully implement its vision.

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