DETROIT | Development & Construction: Motown Lowdown

[The North One]

I mean, that's not surprising. lol

[animatedmartian]

Originally Posted by skyscraperpage17

Detroit desperately needs that type of disruption.

The auto industry, with its sharp downturns and having matured long ago, has also been the very reason why Detroit remains stuck in neutral. It's hardly creating new jobs or making capital investments that would generate the type of population and economic growth that other cities are experiencing.

If you want Detroit to become like Denver, Minneapolis, Seattle, etc., landing Amazon *NEEDS* to happen. If you're OK with (metro) Detroit remaining the same way it's been since the 70s, then yeah, you probably wouldn't too much care about landing Amazon

I was thinking it'd be natural and homegrown change, not necessarily a shotgun blast with an already rapidly growing IT company. Even though Detroit has a lower relative COL, Amazon could bump it at such a rate that the backlash would be similar to the backlash in Seattle. But anyway, that's all even if Amazon considers Detroit at all let alone actually making the decision to locate here.

Besides that, why would Amazon build such a massive new base in a new city rather than creating smaller regional HQs in multiple cities? Most companies do that or just relocate the HQ entirely. It seems like an unusual process in order to achieve a less than obvious goal.

[subterranean]

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

Besides that, why would Amazon build such a massive new base in a new city rather than creating smaller regional HQs in multiple cities? Most companies do that or just relocate the HQ entirely. It seems like an unusual process in order to achieve a less than obvious goal.

The obvious goal is to maintain their Seattle presence while making the rest of the continent trip over themselves rolling out the tax-incentive welcome mats. A single, second location, with the enticement of the possibility of 50,000 employees, makes things relatively simple: show us all your cards.

[skyscraperpage17]

Reading through the NY Times comment section, there's a surprisingly significant number of people pulling for Detroit to land this.

[skyscraperpage17]

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

I was thinking it'd be natural and homegrown change, not necessarily a shotgun blast with an already rapidly growing IT company. Even though Detroit has a lower relative COL, Amazon could bump it at such a rate that the backlash would be similar to the backlash in Seattle. But anyway, that's all even if Amazon considers Detroit at all let alone actually making the decision to locate here.

Besides that, why would Amazon build such a massive new base in a new city rather than creating smaller regional HQs in multiple cities? Most companies do that or just relocate the HQ entirely. It seems like an unusual process in order to achieve a less than obvious goal.

Concerning COL, Detroit is so ridiculously cheap and has so many other fundamental issues it's dealing with on a greater scale than other cities that it would take quite a bit of time before it becomes expensive like Seattle (and thus "unattractive"). Heck, even Atlanta, Dallas and Houston are more expensive than Detroit these days and they're still growing like gangbusters.

As far as the 2nd paragraph, to be fair, Amazon isn't "most companies." What other company do you know owns a major newspaper, a major grocery store chain and builds its own electronic devices (never mind its "core" business)?

[LMich]

We get the first details of what Gilbert has planned for the Book Tower and Building because of his proposal to demolish another part of the complex for a future parking garage. Bedrock's reasoning is that the old two-story Book Tower commmunity center built in 1926 was building to support a 81-story tower that never panned out, so that it was always meant as a temporary structure. Bedrock is proposing a 500-spot, 12-story garage which I assume would have ground floor retail.

Tanya Moutzalias

Historic Book Tower attachment could be demolished for parking garage in Downtown Detroit

By Dana Afana | MLive.com

September 8, 2017

A long-vacant, two-story structure attached to the iconic Book Tower in Downtown Detroit could be demolished and replaced with a 12-story, 500-spot parking garage.

Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert's Bedrock real estate firm will submit a proposal on Sept. 13 to the Historic District Commission seeking to demolish the structure at 1209 Washington Blvd. with conditional review of future architecture for a parking garage.

Give that so much of the complex is being renovated, I'm not against this as I'd otherwise be. My only hope is that someone will push them to include the facade of the existing two-story building. I don't see why they couldn't do this.

As for the plans for the Book Tower & Building, itself:

Bedrock's plan for the entire Book structure involves 23 floors of residential units, a hotel, a few floors of office and event space and one or two stories of retail. The plan involves 100 residential units and 200 hotel rooms.

[skyscraperpage17]

I will admit I was a bit irritated to find out that both Ann Arbor and Oakland County are submitting their own separate bids. For all intents and purposes, being a part of Metro Detroit, they would be far better served if they poured their energy into a Detroit bid (as a stronger Detroit that's competitive with cities like Dallas or Atlanta will no doubt significantly benefit housing values in Oakland County and the University of Michigan).

I feel the same about Grand Rapids as well. Although it's slightly bigger and technically on the west side of the state, they don't even have the big city infrastructure Amazon desires.

IMO, it should be a combined statewide effort by all to get this in Detroit (who needs it more than any city), especially downtown Detroit. No ifs, ands or buts.

[LMich]

Some nice, little infill going on in Woodbridge.

Tanya Moutzalias

Developers, residents coact to build 27 homes in historic Detroit district

By Ben Solis | MLive.com

September 10, 2017

DETROIT - A New York-based development company in Detroit is seeking approval from the city's Historic District Commission to build 27 new homes on Trumbull Avenue and Lincoln Street in the historic Woodbridge Farms neighborhood.

The move is supported by the district's residents who are working on the designs with the developer, Procida-Diggs.

Procida-Diggs plans to present its project before the commission at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday.

If approved, developers hope to begin construction by the spring of 2018.

Details:

Procida-Diggs plans to erect 19 homes on Trumbull Avenue starting at the corner of Brainard Street, working its way north, said Mario Procida, a co-principal on the project.

Each home, complete with a basement and a private backyard, will include three bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms. Procida calls the homes "Lutyens-esque," referencing British architect Edwin Lutyens.

Lutyens operated between the late 1800s and into the 20th Century. He's responsible for crafting many idyllic country houses, public buildings and striking war monuments in the United Kingdom and Australia.

Procida told MLive that his homes have a "modernistic interpretation of historical references."

On Lincoln Street, Procida and co-principal Douglass Diggs want to build eight more homes with the same look and feel.

The developers say the city didn't want them building faux-historicism, which they hadn't planned to do, anyway, so they'll be building modern homes with historic proportions, massings.

More photos from Tonya Moutazlias of the neighborhood:

[Docta_Love]

Here's a very interesting article as Mathew Moroun says "if we decide to really push this" is the key and i'm not going to break out the champagne because of talk of turning the concourse into a mass transit hub, but none the less this would be the best possible outcome. However this could just be another PR ploy but i'm hearing what i want to hear so ill keep listening for now.

Moroun's vision for Detroit depot? Trains

September 11, 2017
Crain's Detroit Business
By CHAD LIVENGOOD



From mini-mall to car museum, Matthew Moroun has heard every idea imaginable for what to do with the expansive concourse of the long-vacant Michigan Central Station train depot in Detroit.

But he’s starting to settle on an ambitious, if not audacious, concept that he calls “the oldest idea for the depot.”

Trains.

Like the kind that carried passengers to and from the Detroit train station for nearly 75 years before Amtrak ceased service in 1988 and the abandoned depot began a long decline that mirrored the city’s descent.

“It’s crazy, right?” Moroun said in an exclusive interview with Crain’s. “The idea that we’re most focused on now, the one that seems to make sense, is in the name of the building and it’s what it used to be used for.”

The son of billionaire transportation mogul Manuel “Matty” Moroun seems serious about making the depot a mass transit hub again as he embarks on a mission to save an iconic symbol of Detroit’s 20th century rise and fall.

Matthew Moroun is floating the idea to transportation planners and government officials ahead of the Michigan Central Station playing host Wednesday night to former Detroiters at the kickoff dinner for the fourth annual Detroit Homecoming, produced by Crain’s Detroit Business.

“If we decide to really push this ... it’s not to start out trying to solicit politicians and governments or whatever for money. It’s to see if I can get folks to embrace it, that future vision,” Moroun told Crain’s. “We need to put the depot back on the map.”

Moroun envisions the depot having a straight-shot rail line to Detroit Metropolitan Airport and being a stop for Amtrak’s high-speed train routes to Chicago and a connection to Ontario’s VIA through the adjacent rail tunnel that dips below the Detroit River.

One of the biggest obstacles to redeveloping the train station is its location along Michigan Avenue on the outskirts of Corktown, nearly two miles west of Campus Martius in the central business district.

To overcome that barrier, Moroun said a second QLine streetcar line could be built along Michigan Avenue to connect downtown with the depot (like there used to be in the first half of the 20th century, as evidenced by old rails exposed along Michigan).

“All of that is big bucks. I get that,” Moroun said. “But all of those moves are moves that happen over a long period of time because of a mass transit plan.”

In pitching the idea, Moroun is essentially seeking public feedback — a noticeable departure from the often reclusive nature of his family’s business dealings in Detroit.

Two influential players in Detroit’s transportation planning circles are receptive to the idea of the old train station going back online.

“I’m excited that Matthew and his family are putting the energy into it that they are and that they’re evaluating these different ideas and I think it should be on the table,” said Matt Cullen, CEO of M-1 Rail, the private nonprofit that runs the QLine.

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...t-depot-trains

[LMich]

This has been my wish forever that they make it Detroit's main train station, again, if only as a side usage. And, particularly if they hope to have international routes, again. It only makes sense. The rest of the development could subsidize using a small portion of it as a train station.

BTW, I'm really tired hearing about it's "out-of-the-way" location when the current station is even further from downtown. I'm glad it has a streetcar connection, now, but it's not like that tiny site actually works that well for Amtrak customers. It was an after-though. In any other city, it's location would basically be considered downtown. Not only is the station close enough downtown, but it has the space for parking. They could build a small garage over or under the platforms or place a garage over at the Roosevelt Warehouse across the street.

[rlw777]

Capitol Park renderings from CBS detroit





Interesting that they put the 1201 Griswold building from Capitol Park Partnership into the first rendering.

[The North One]

Love it

[LMich]

What a waste of money for them to have just torn this up and redid it just a few years back, though.

[subterranean]

Originally Posted by LMich

This has been my wish forever that they make it Detroit's main train station, again, if only as a side usage.

Same. How badass would it be to have the proposed Via Rail HSR pull right into Detroit?

[LMich]

Originally Posted by subterranean

Same. How badass would it be to have the proposed Via Rail HSR pull right into Detroit?

Or Amtrak's higher-speed service, which is actually more likely given all of the work on the Michigan Line?

Honestly, refurbishing it as a train station just makes too much sense. I mean, put whatever else you want in the tower and the station building; I don't care. Just give me a stop behind the station.

[subterranean]

British Columbia and Washington have both just chipped in for a feasibility study for true HSR between Portland and Vancouver, BC. I would love to see something similar happen between Ontario and Michigan someday.

At any rate, I remain very skeptical of Matty despite my high hopes for this to become a reality. I could die happy seeing that thing renovated and used for its intended purpose...

[Docta_Love]

Originally Posted by LMich

This has been my wish forever that they make it Detroit's main train station, again, if only as a side usage. And, particularly if they hope to have international routes, again. It only makes sense. The rest of the development could subsidize using a small portion of it as a train station.

BTW, I'm really tired hearing about it's "out-of-the-way" location when the current station is even further from downtown. I'm glad it has a streetcar connection, now, but it's not like that tiny site actually works that well for Amtrak customers. It was an after-though. In any other city, it's location would basically be considered downtown. Not only is the station close enough downtown, but it has the space for parking. They could build a small garage over or under the platforms or place a garage over at the Roosevelt Warehouse across the street.

I agree it is a bit silly not to consider the area part of the greater downtown originally the station was built to encourage downtown to spread down along Michigan and the west riverfront. The after the auto boom took really off the much grander concept of New Center was conceived and development was focused on the Woodward corridor, but it really is fair to look at downtown as an upside-down T.

What makes me interested in this move by the Moroun's is that it's driven by economics which makes me take them more seriously. Apparently the first floor concourse is a really hard space to reuse in a way that doesn't ruin the finances of the development. The article is actually very long its 4 parts so for those who haven't used up their free views for the month i recommend reading. According to the younger Moroun they had "nearly inked" with a tenet that would occupy 60% of the tower but they economics of the concourse sunk the plan even with that big of an anchor tenet.

Separating the development into a public and private part seems to be how it will work, the other issue is that MDOT has just started planning to upgrade the New Center Amtrack station into an intermodel transit center. However Matt Cullen who was also interviewed seems to think that the city can easily handle two new intermodel transit centers successfully.

Edit; Here's the renderings for the Woodbridge project

Developers target historic Detroit district for $6 million housing development
Procida Diggs Development Group is also behind Midtown West project

By KURT NAGL
Crain's Detroit Business
September 12, 2017



About $6 million of new housing development is set for the Woodbridge Farms Historic District in Midtown Detroit if all goes according to plan for the Procida Diggs Development Group.

The developers — a duo made up of Mario Procida, who is based in New York, and Douglass Diggs, of Detroit — are looking to build 18 or 19 new homes on property they own off Trumbull Avenue between Selden and Brainard streets.

The have also put in an application with the Detroit Land Bank Authority to purchase six lots at the corner of Lincoln and Selden streets, on which they would build an additional eight houses, Procida said.

"Twenty-seven houses is the goal," he said. "We are in full control with 19 of them."

However, because the property is in a historic district, they must have approval from Detroit's Historic District Commission before breaking ground. They are to present their plan to the commission Wednesday.

"We are hopeful they will OK it," Procida said. "From a procedural standpoint, it's a step-by-step process."

The Woodbridge Farms neighborhood was originally an enclave for merchants, industrialists and widows, according to the Detroit Historical society's website. The architecture ranges from Second Empire style homes of the 1870s to 1920s apartment buildings.

Procida said he has already presented the redevelopment plan to the city and community, which he said have embraced it.

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...illion-housing

After 10 years, Westin Book Cadillac Detroit to get facelift

By TYLER CLIFFORD
Crain's Detroit Business
September 12, 2017



As it approaches a decade in operation, the Westin Book Cadillac Detroit is set to get a multimillion dollar rehab next year.

The three-phase project will include remodeling the historic hotel's 453 rooms, guest floor corridors, restaurants and 39,000 square feet of meeting rooms and public spaces.

Bethesda, Md.-based Marriott International Inc. will manage the renewal project for the 93-year-old building, which is owned by Cleveland-based The Ferchill Group. Ferchill bought the Neo-Renaissance building in 2006, which had been vacant for more than two decades, and invested $200 million to renovate it and open the hotel in 2008.

The 33-story hotel, commissioned by the Book brothers and designed by Louis Kamper in 1924, was once the tallest hotel in the world.

Next month, Seattle-based Starbucks Corp. will open its Starbucks Reserve premium brand at the hotel to kick off the first phase. The project is expected to be completed in early 2019.

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...o-get-facelift

[The North One]

A Starbucks reserve? So they're opening a space like the one in Chicago and Seattle? Or are they just offering the product to guests? I'm confused.

Can't believe it's almost been ten years since the renovation.

[Innsertnamehere]

Ontario is actively planning a full High Speed Rail line between Toronto and Windsor right now, which will presumably terminate right before the tunnel. Essentially all you would need to bring that service to Detroit would be a renovated station on the other side and likely a larger tunnel to deal with the increased traffic. You could even locate border services in the station, allowing people to transfer from Via HSR onto Amtrak trains heading further west after clearing customs. I could see Detroit - Toronto being done in just over 2 hours.

[animatedmartian]

So there's a design exhibit for currently planned/proposed projects in Detroit. Quite a handful of renderings I'm pretty sure haven't been posted before.

Danish Brotherhood - LAAVU





Chroma - The Platform





Brush Park: Form-based zoning (pdf file)
This particular image shows currently planned developments (mainly City Modern + Brewster Projects) plus the possible density of future infill development.



These next couple are considered experimental housing typologies so they're more hypothetical than actually planned, I think. Detroit City Planning Department had partnered with the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture & Urban Planning's Masters of Architecture program to explore these experiments.

Dequindere Courts




D Tow(n)er (looks like somewhere near the DMC, but really can't tell) The location is actually the northwest corner of Lasher and Grand River in Old Redford. The tower would be 305 feet tall. The idea is that the apartments in this building are setup like rowhomes but vertically. Public community space would exist at different floors of the building, which is what those big blocky parts of the tower are. Neat idea, I think, but being out in Old Redford I wonder how successful it could actually be.




All designs are being exibited at Detroit Design 139.