Historic Mountain Brook church being demolished: What will replace it?

A historic Mountain Brook church is being demolished this week.

Shades Valley Presbyterian Church, 2305 Montevallo Road, was built in 1953 by a congregation founded in 1943.

“This is the ebb and flow of the life of the church, as much as we do love our old and historic buildings,” said the Rev. Sue Westfall, general presbyter for the Presbytery of Sheppards and Lapsley, a regional body of the Presbyterian Church (USA) which oversees 60 congregations with 8,000 members in North Alabama.

The congregation had dwindled to about 75 to 80 in weekly worship and was no longer able to keep up maintenance on the historic building, so the remaining members merged into Southminster Presbyterian Church in Vestavia Hills in March 2022.

“That building was a place of so many meaningful experiences of worship, gathering and fellowship, a very beloved place,” said the Rev. Leanne Pearce Reed, who was pastor of Shades Valley from 2017-2022 and is now co-pastor of Southminster. “While we grieve seeing the building go down, we’re excited about what is happening here at Southminster.”

The last service at Shades Valley Presbyterian was held at the church on May 29, 2022. Southminster Presbyterian has about 300 active members after the merger.

“It’s a vibrant church,” Westfall said. “The merger went really, really well.”

What’s going in its place?

The Shades Valley Presbyterian church campus was sold to Montevallo Partners LLC on July 25, 2022, for $7.15 million, according to Jefferson County tax records.

Montevallo Partners is owned by real estate developer John F. Chapman and Margie Ingram, owner of Ingram and Associates, which is selling 14 home sites on the former church campus.

The 14 lots are being sold for between $1.25 million and $1.5 million, with custom-built homes available on the sites for $2 million to $2.7 million or more, said Dorothy Tayloe, a broker for Ingram and Associates and sales representative for the new development, called Chester Court.

“When you say a church is being demolished, you say it with a little regret,” said Tayloe.

“You can’t help but have some regret,” she said. “That being said, what is being planned to go on that site will be an enhancement for the area. When you come across that (Hollywood Boulevard over U.S. 280) overpass and come into Mountain Brook, you’re going to see a nice-looking residential development.”

There will also be a condominium building with three townhomes built on the campus, she said.

“It will all be along Montevallo Road,” she said. “The lots will be behind the condominium building.”

Eight of the 14 lots have contracts on them, Tayloe said.

Brasfield & Gorrie is handling the demolition of the church.

“They’re busy doing the prep work to get the site ready to be built on,” she said. “It’s going pretty quickly.”

Grading work and preparation work on the lots should be construction-ready by the end of the year. Five builders are approved for construction, with architectural design by Nequette Architecture.

“I’ve definitely run into people who said, ‘I was confirmed in that church’ or ‘My parents went to that church or were married in that church,’” Tayloe said. “It’s sad to see any church where they don’t have a big enough congregation where they need to go move into another Presbyterian church.”

Presbyterian proceeds benefit charities

Southminster Presbyterian Church said more than $1 million from the proceeds from the sale of Shades Valley Presbyterian went to Presbyterian-supported ministries, including Stillman College, Firehouse Ministries, Greater Birmingham Ministries, Living River: A Retreat on the Cahaba, Presbyterian Home for Children, IMCK / Good Shepherd Hospital in Congo, and Habitat for Humanity.

The rest of the money went into an endowment at Southminster Presbyterian Church for future ministry.

The presbytery has shut down five churches in the Birmingham metro in the past five years, including the 182-year-old Five Mile Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, which closed in 2023. In addition to Shades Valley and Five Mile, other closures include Fairfield Highlands Presbyterian, Center Point Presbyterian and Second Presbyterian (which merged into Edgewood Presbyterian), Westfall said.

The Presbytery of South Alabama, a regional branch of the Presbyterian Church (USA) based in Mobile, recently downsized, selling its headquarters on the Eastern Shore Parkway in Daphne.