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By GREG JUNEK
Business Editor

In the past few years, mixed-use communities have been springing up along the Old Jacksonville Highway corridor. But the Sears Methodist Retirement System will offer mixed use with a new twist for the Tyler community.

SMRS owns 92 acres, on which it is constructing Meadow Lake, a $65 million senior living community off County Road 265 near its intersection with Old Jacksonville Highway. Officials said construction should be complete and the campus ready for residents by mid-2009.

However, do not expect the development to resemble a seniors' campus.

Kay Ferrier, director of marketing, said it will be a true neighborhood, with single-family houses and apartments and other sections for skilled care and memory care residents.

"This will be the largest continuing care retirement community, and the only continuing care retirement community in Tyler, when it's completed," Ms. Ferrier said.

Continuing care communities are "active adult living" communities, she said. At Meadow Lake, people age 55 and up can move in, regardless of whether they need care.

"It's not a community designed strategically for people who need care," Ms. Ferrier said. "It's designed for people who want to live active lives, who want to prepare for care in the future."

Meadow Lake provides residents entrance into the community, in a single-family home or an apartment, for the time they can still take care of themselves and the opportunity to move into other living facilities that provide increased levels of care.

"We will have 57 executive homes, 80 apartments, and we will also have assisted living, skilled nursing and memory care all on one campus," Ms. Ferrier said.

It will have 40 assisted living/memory care units and 30 nursing units.

Ms. Ferrier described Meadow Lake as a "neighborhood," not a campus.

Single-family homes will range in size from 1,600 square feet to 3,200 square feet.

Residents will have access to the common areas, restaurants - all operated by SMRS - a health and fitness center with physical therapists on duty and banking facilities. Ms. Ferrier described Meadow Lake as "like a little city."

None of the homes are for sale; all living facilities are fee-for-service. But Ms. Ferrier said SMRS has found success with this model.

"The main reason that we do it is because we find that people are choosing to make decisions earlier about retirement and about where they want to live," she said. "People who want to travel want to be able to have security, full-maintenance. People get tired of mowing the yard. We do everything. We change the light bulbs. We do A through Z inside and out."

Trails for walkers or golf carts will run throughout the community.

Although the community is private and will be gated, parts of it will be available for public use.

For example, Ms. Ferrier said, it will have a lakeside lodge that local organizations may use. The swimming pool will also be open to the public on a limited basis.

SMRS, the largest not-for-profit provider of senior housing and health care in the state, has been in business for more than 40 years. It serves more than 2,000 residents on 13 campuses in eight Texas cities. Members of the SMRS staff have been working with local people who have been involved with this project for the past 15 years.

Meadow Lake will be its 14th community.

Now, a model home has been constructed on the site and is available for touring by contacting the Meadow Lake office on South Broadway Avenue. By mid-2009, all areas of care, common areas and restaurants will be ready for use, and residents will move in over a few months, Ms. Ferrier said.

It will not be built and opened in phases.

Meadow Lake's beginnings can be traced back more than 15 years, when a group of Marvin United Methodist Church members saw a need for a senior living community in Tyler for people ages 55 and older. The church approached Methodist Retirement Communities about the project.

But after 15 years of inactivity, MRC returned the 92 acres back to the church. In 2005 the group offered the land to Sears Methodist Retirement System, which agreed to use it to develop Meadow Lake.

Ms. Ferrier said SMRS decided to build in Tyler because of the need it saw here. A feasibility study proved the need. Information on the population, its age and income fit the criteria that would ensure a community's success.

"Sears goes into communities; they don't go into the huge metroplex areas," she said. "They go into communities they think they feel they can serve. Even though we're building a large community, it's sized for Tyler."