DETROIT | Development & Construction: Motown Lowdown

[animatedmartian]

Originally Posted by LMich

Speaking of old theaters in this neighborhood, I wonder what's going on with the United Artists Theatre? The Ilitches did some basic clean-up and mouthballing work on this thing years ago and I haven't heard anything about it sense. That was around the Super Bowl.

I suspect it won't see much action until Illitch gets his arena district up and going. Which also has seemed to be on the quiet side lately. I half at least expect when the date of construction (for anything) is going to be announced.

[hudkina]

OMG, the Book Tower absolutely needs to be washed. It would be a travesty to leave it dirty for the supposed "aesthetics" The Book-Cadillac and Broderick Tower both look infinitely better all spruced up. I can only imagine what the Book Tower would look like.

[LMich]

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

I suspect it won't see much action until Illitch gets his arena district up and going. Which also has seemed to be on the quiet side lately. I half at least expect when the date of construction (for anything) is going to be announced.

Well, this is the quiet time of a projects life, you know, the portion in between having been approved and then getting shovels in the ground. All the fine detail work is being done in this portion of the process. The good thing about this project, though, is that we know when the Joe is going to be shuttered, so at least we know a general time when they have to have the new arena up and running.

[animatedmartian]

But it seems like forevvvvvvvvver and I generally hate Illitch's secretiveness with not even any renderings or vision of what he'd want (even if it's not what's going to be built). Just to have something to look forward. /whine

Anyway, updated information on DuCharme Place. The changes in the rendering appear to be very subtle.

185-unit apartment development to begin construction this fall
MJ GALBRAITH | THURSDAY, JULY 17, 2014

What started as a community of town homes nearly ten years ago has morphed into a four-building, 185-unit apartment development on the edge of downtown. Keeping the original name DuCharme Place, architects McIntosh Poris Associates and long-time Detroit developer Walter Cohen have secured financing to start construction this fall. A late 2015 opening is expected.

....

[LMich]

Question, is the partial basement level parking? Because I don't see any surface lots.

It's really heartening this started off as more townhomes and was morphed into something more substantial. I even like the architecture for as simple as it is.

[animatedmartian]

Originally Posted by LMich

Question, is the partial basement level parking? Because I don't see any surface lots.

It's really heartening this started off as more townhomes and was morphed into something more substantial. I even like the architecture for as simple as it is.

Yep, the ground floor is mostly parking with everything else built over top of them.

I like the architecture, but maybe not the colors. Grey isn't exactly working for this development.

Actually, I just realized that the colors are meant to be reflective of the Lafayette Towers. But I can't help but think this development would benefit by having a few contrasting dark shades to accent the grey.

[user062789]

At least the colors are more muted than before.

[animatedmartian]

Finally, Freep is expected to reveal plans for the arena and district tomorrow.

http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/d..._arena_en.html

[Funkie]

From The Free Press

Detroit’s new arena and entertainment district planned by the Ilitch family for the northern edge of downtown promises to be the city’s boldest and most significant development since the Renaissance Center of the 1970s — creating as many as 2,000 new residential units, dozens of shops, walkable European-style streets and perhaps the nation’s most innovative multipurpose arena.

http://www.freep.com/article/2014072...-arena-Midtown

I am pleasantly surprised by the design of the whole project.

[animatedmartian]

I made a dedicated thread for it.

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

Detroit Rink City: Ilitches' grand plan to supersize the entertainment district

A gargantuan 3-year plan: 5 new neighborhoods, a $450 million hockey arena and an accelerated timeline to complete it all

A DRAMATIC TRANSFORMATION OF THE HEART OF DETROIT will begin in September, when the Ilitch family breaks ground on the construction of a $450 million Detroit Red Wings arena concurrently with another $200 million in apartments, restaurants, office buildings, parks and shops over 45 blocks. This is the city’s entertainment district, super-sized.
By Bill Shea. July 20, 2014



Planned is a gargantuan three-year construction project to create five new neighborhoods intended to stitch together the city where it’s divided by the trench-like Fisher Freeway underneath Woodward Avenue.

The 650,000-square-foot hockey and events center and the new neighborhoods — including hundreds of apartments to be built both outside Comerica Park and the new hockey arena — are scheduled to be ready by summer 2017.

A 2013 deal between the Ilitches, through their Olympia Development of Michigan, and the city’s Downtown Development Authority to build the arena at the largely vacant and blighted area of Woodward at I-75 obligated the family to spend at least $200 million in ancillary development within five years of the venue’s opening.

But the Ilitches are accelerating that timeline, and upping the ante.

The Ilitches, the Little Caesars pizza chain founders who have owned the hockey team since 1982, told Crain’s last week that their construction timeline has been radically moved forward so the investment can have a maximum catalytic impact for the city.

“We think the impact on our community will be exponential if it’s all done at once,” said Chris Ilitch, president and CEO of Ilitch Holdings and son of Red Wings owners Mike and Marian Ilitch. “This project takes on a much bigger scale. There is nothing like this going on in our country.”



Ilitch said cost isn’t the first consideration as the planning has evolved for a project with a very large vision for the whole entertainment district.

“This is more than a development; this is our passion,” he said.

Additionally, the Ilitches are now promising to spend “tens of millions” more for infrastructure improvements in the district, mainly around Cass Park west of the arena site to create mixed-use neighborhoods, Ilitch said, but he declined to specify a total.

“This is not part of our agreement with anyone. We’re just doing it,” he said, adding that Olympia has been in talks with the mayor’s office on the necessary approvals.

The additional spending will be used to fix roads, streetlights, landscaping and other aesthetic work within a 45-block area aimed at creating a clean, desirable slate from which to build five neighborhoods with unique identities.

“It frees the city up to spend its resources on other priorities,” Ilitch said.

DTE Energy Co. and other utilities will be asked to make any fixes or upgrades in the area while Olympia has the streets torn up, he said.

“This is an investor’s playground,” Ilitch said.

All together, the area stretches from Charlotte Street, the street north of Temple Street, south to Grand Circus Park, east to the existing stadiums and to a northwestern boundary abutting MotorCity Casino Hotel, owned by Marian Ilitch.

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...-entertainment

[hudkina]

This looks like it is facing the corner of Columbia and Witherell. That means they're finally filling in those lots.

[LMich]

Jaw Drop

This is way better than I expected. It even appears that they are going to add some space on the westside of the Woodward Avenue bridge over the Fisher for a new structure.

And, yep, that's Columbia and Witherell, and it's about damned time. lol In fact, it looks like they are finally going to implement what they sought to build on Columbia west of Woodward, too, in the planning of Comerica Park.

This thing looks like a literal beating heart for that area. I am honestly shocked by the layout of this at the very least. They did just about everything right. They hid the parking as best they could for a city without a mass transit system up to snuff, yet. They've literally integrated the arena into the surrounding neighborhood. They shied away from putting up more superblocks than they absolutely had to. They'll be upgrading the existing infrastructure of the area. Really, they went all out. This is so atypical of how things usually turn out in Detroit; we're talking a first class project, here, not some sloppy seconds or development that's "good...by Detroit standards."

[user062789]

This is beautiful, we just need the Piston to move down and share this arena now.

[LMich]

Olympia isn't couonting on the Pistons coming to this new arena, nore does it need the Pistons for it to work. As a multi-purpose venue, it will already get more use than the Joe, which does just fine. I'm actually a little confused as to why people are so hard up on the idea that the Pistons to set up shop, here. It'd be nice if they come back to the city, but the it's not some make-or-break proposition for downtown, anymore.

Anyway, the Freep put out an article, yesterday, on how this will help alleviate the housing crunch in the greater downtown area:

Red Wings arena project would add hundreds of new market-rate apartments downtown

By JC Reindl | Detroit Free Press

July 21, 2014

Apartment hunters could have as much reason to cheer as hockey fans when construction starts this fall on Detroit’s new arena project.

Included in plans for the $200-million entertainment district are hundreds of market-rate rental units in at least four new mid-rise buildings that are set to go up around the arena as well as near Comerica Park. The apartments are expected to be ready for tenants by summer 2017.

The precise number of units is still being determined and is anticipated to exceed 500. As the district attracts interest from other housing developers, the number of new units in the footprint could reach 2,000 within a decade, according to Christopher Ilitch, president and CEO of Ilitch Holdings.

That influx of units would help to ease a housing crunch that has gripped Detroit’s core for the past two years, frustrating those who desire to live in the increasingly trendy Midtown, Corktown and downtown areas, which have gained new coffee shops, restaurants, niche retailers and a busy Whole Foods market.

Strong demand for those downtown-area neighborhoods has resulted in leased-out buildings and long waiting lists. Developers have announced new developments to meet the demand, but those take time to finance and build. Meanwhile, landlords are raising rent prices.

“Today we don’t have enough capacity to meet demand for rentals in Detroit,” Ilitch said. “It’s 100% filled right now.”

...

[animatedmartian]

Historic Corktown hotel to re-open by summer 2015
MJ GALBRAITH | TUESDAY, JULY 22, 2014



Since purchasing the Roosevelt Hotel in 2010, Detroit real estate developer Dennis Kefallinos has offered little information on his plans for the historic and long-neglected Corktown hotel. It's now confirmed that the Roosevelt Hotel will once again operate as a hotel, opening somewhere within a year's time.

While details of amenities remain vague, Kefallinos's senior project manager Eric Novack says that construction crews are currently working on the building infrastructure. The hotel will have 76 rooms and feature commercial space on the ground floor.

Kefallinos owns and manages a number of buildings and businesses throughout the city, including the Lafayette Lofts and the Russell Industrial Center. Though the Roosevelt could have been redeveloped as an apartment building, Kefallinos has long-wanted to open a hotel and the Roosevelt's floor plans remain well-suited for that. Larger rooms lend themselves to extended stay customers, a situation the company sees happening often.

"This has been quite a while in the making," says Novack. "We haven't been resting on our laurels. We've been doing the work in the background like with the historic preservation people to get approval for new windows for the building."

Not wanting to suggest an opening date for fear of it being pushed back, Novack says that people will once again book rooms at the Roosevelt sometime in the next six to twelve months. It's infrastructure work in the meantime.

...

http://www.modeldmedia.com/devnews/R...velopment.aspx

The hotel as of last year.


Abandoned Roosevelt Hotel by Sean_Marshall, on Flickr

[hudkina]

I definitely won't hold my breath, but it would be great to see it come back to life. I can't remember if those two abandoned houses are still standing. I'm sure if they are they'll be torn down to make room for parking. I'm guessing he owns the brand new parking lot on the other side of the building, but you can never have too much parking in Detroit.

[Black Star]

Your new arena is gonna be a beast


Go Motown.......

[LMich]

I believe the remaining house is still standing. Last I checked, Imagination Station was still planning on trying to make their little art project work, there, but I can't even place when it was I last heard that. I'm glad to see the Roosevelt being reused as a hotel. There are so many neighborhoods in the city that could benefit from having a small hotel. I wonder what kind of price-point they are looking at, though? Are they talking about some exclusive boutique hotel or somethng more affordable?

I really think with all of the small businesses clustering around residential places in the city that Detroit could really benefit from some small budget hotels, maybe some extended-stay type of things given the transitory nature of a lot of these small, experimental business. My worry is that this concept has the potential to fall prey to acting as flophouses or seedy motels like in the past. But I think if you raise the price-point just high enough, you could deter that and still have nice rooms which simply wouldn't be chocked full of "amenities."

[animatedmartian]

Cobo to get 'new front porch'
By John Gallagher. July 23, 2014.



The Detroit Downtown Development Authority board approved the streetscape project known as Cobo Square today, which will create a new traffic pattern and decorative paving as part of Cobo’s remade Washington Boulevard frontage.

...

According to Cobo Hall's construction schedule, the 'front porch' is scheduled to be completed this December. The connection to Atwater Street will be removed.

Picture from July 17th.

Cobo Hall by KevinStandlee, on Flickr

[animatedmartian]

Also not really much new news, but more of a confirmation. And a rendering.

How Corktown came out on top in search for home for $148M manufacturing institute

July 23, 2014. Kirk Pinho.




The $148 million American Lightweight and Modern Metals Manufacturing Innovation Institute will locate this fall in a vacant 99,000-square-foot Corktown building instead of a Canton Township location that was previously pitched.

Crain’s reported last month that Corktown — and specifically the building at 1400 Rosa Parks Blvd. announced today — was the location the institute was considering after German 3-D printing company Voxeljet AG leased the space that the institute wanted in the Haggerty II Corporate Park near Haggerty Road and Michigan Avenue.

We also heard a month ago that Mayor Mike Duggan’s administration had been lobbying the institute to come to Detroit after learning that the Canton site fell through, real estate sources told me at the time.

“To win a competitive process for a project of national significance is a major win for the city,” Duggan said in a statement Wednesday. “Detroiters should expect to see us win a lot more in the future.”

....


(building currently)