By Cindy Schroeder
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Northern Kentucky women will have more high-end clothiers to shop by the 2005 holiday season.

Within 17 months, developers plan to transform the near-vacant Crestview Hills Mall into the $70 million Crestview Hills Town Center, complete with upscale women's fashions and sit-down restaurants. Crestview Hills City Council unanimously approved a final development plan Thursday from the same developer who created Rookwood Commons in Norwood, another outdoor, upscale "lifestyle'' center.

"We don't shun the teeny-boppers, but this center is designed for the better woman shopper,'' said Mark Fallon, director of real estate for the Cincinnati-based, Jeffrey R. Anderson Real Estate. "The Florence Mall and Newport on the Levee can have her kids, but I want the mom.''

Meanwhile, in nearby Crescent Springs, council OK'd plans Thursday for the $56 million Buttermilk Towne Center off Anderson Road that developer Bear Creek Capital of Montgomery has described as "an upscale community shopping center with quality sit-down restaurants and a high-end Remke Markets grocery.'' That developer plans to break ground by July 15.

"I think we've worked as a team with the city to come up with a world-class shopping center for Crescent Springs and its neighboring communities,'' said Matt Daniels, a Bear Creek principal.

Crescent Springs City Council approved a final development plan by a vote of 5-to-1, with Councilman Nick Berry dissenting. A separate development agreement was approved, 4-to-2, with Berry and Councilman Jim Collett voting no. The votes came after a 90-minute discussion and a protest by some of the 128 families who live in a mobile-home park that would be displaced to make way for the project. "This relocation plan is flawed, and it won't work,'' said Collett, who expressed concerns over its costs and timetable. "As a result, I can't vote for the development agreement as it stands today.''

Although the Crescent Springs development agreement calls for $8.9 million in road improvements, the fate of a previously planned railroad bridge that would extend from just behind the TANK park-and-ride lot to the project site is in doubt.

Steve Kelly, Bear Creek's director of development, said the developer is attempting to secure easement rights from TANK, and that group's board will consider the proposal next month. If the bridge is not built, the developer will have to give Crescent Springs the money it would have spent on the bridge for other improvements, city officials said.

Crescent Springs Councilman Tom Vergamini, who headed a task force that helped iron out project details, said he thinks the bridge will be built, but Collett was skeptical.

"Now that we've given (the developer) the option not to do a bridge, I don't think it's going to happen,'' Collett said.

Some of the better women's fashion stores that have committed to the Crestview Hills project are Coldwater Creek, Ann Taylor, White House Black Market, Chico's and Banana Republic, Fallon said. Talbots and several home goods-type stores also have expressed interest in the project. Sit-down restaurants will include Max and Erma's, Abuelo's, specializing in Mexican cuisine, and The Pub at Crestview Hills.

Fallon said Anderson's seventh lifestyle center will target women ages 25 to 55.

Anderson closed this week on a $50 million loan from Huntington Bank, and Dillard's department store, the only retailer left in the 23-year-old Crestview Hills Mall, agreed to put up an additional $20 million to build a new store at the site.

Monday, workers began preparing the mall's interior for demolition, Fallon said. Dillard's will stay open, while crews rebuild the anchor at the southern end of the site. The new Dillard's is scheduled to open in March 2005, and the rest of Crestview Hills Town Center, featuring about 60 stores and restaurants should open by Oct. 1, 2005.

E-mail cschroeder@enquirer.com