That's what struck me instantly about this, how far back the structure and housing will sit. Unless they make a conscious effort to connect via inviting sidewalks to the main complex, it (mainly the housing) seems destined to be ill-suited and ill-used. I was also a bit disheartened to hear reading the article about how the theater owner considers parking "sacred." Eastwood would be better served by finding a traffic solution that begins to include more mass transit into it instead of planning for every customer and resident to arrive by car.
I thought the garage was suppose to replace existing parking, not add it and more surface lots to the complex, most of the space which is already surface lots, at least that's the way it appears form the air. In fact, I was hoping that a few well-placed garages would eventually allow some of the surface lots to be developed onto transform it into a legitimate, new urbanist development.
The more I'm thinking about the housing, the more I'm wondering who's going to want to plop down the rents they'll be asking for for what's already been deemed as "upscale" housing when it's quite literally surrounded by surface parking lots for a good few blocks away from the mall on three sides (three blocks just to reach the theater, and a few more to reach the actual mall), and open fields to the north?
Am I seeing it correctly? The development will be on the north side of "Showtime Drive?" The parking ramp has over a thousand parking spaces... who is going to park there? Those things are expensive- If I was the owner of the Theater, I would want it next door, not 2 blocks away.
Or, If you look at the google map (which I don't know how to embed), is it in the somewhat grassy area south of "Showtime Drive?" That would make a bit more sense because it looks like the main entrance to the ramp is on the ramp's north side.
The development is on the north side of Showtime Dr, the grassy area to the south will become more parking. I would have liked to see this new development closer to the rest of Eastwood, but that would of created a whole array of new headaches with parking and congestion. It seems to me that the Township is interested in pushing development further north, where they can do things how they want to. I imagine that over time the area around this new development fill be infilled with more mixed use buildings and may even become the main part of Eastwood. Also, in one of the articles, someone with the Township was quoted saying that they want to provide incentives for employees to park in the ramp, freeing up surface parking for customers.
Another rendering from the LSJ article (the caption says there is also supposed to be a site plan, but I don't see it.)
I think it is a shame that the township and DTN are so focused on automobile and northward-expansion. For this and many other projects to succeed and increase the quality of living, they will need to incorporate proper busing and non-motorized transportation options.
Each road in Eastwood should have bike lanes, bike parking spaces should be equal to around 1/3 of the parking spaces, and there should be a covered area for people waiting for the bus. After they get these done (all of which are pretty cheap compared to installing a new surface parking lot), then the next step should be to add a safe way for pedestrians to cross the Lake Lansing/US-127 overpass.
I live in Lansing Township (southeastern Groesbeck), and this project, especially coming at this time, seems ill-conceived and not in sync with the environment as a living,
vibrant community. Although the mixed-use concept is a good one, this project creates an isolated, unnatural urban space in a suburban setting, where population density
and availability of alternatives makes this at best a risky project, and places the entire risk for the project on taxpayers, while developers reap the rewards (the incremental
rewards to the community of one more project are suspect, especially in the current economic climate, which has kept private investors and developers from risking their own funds).
My impression of the current area business and residential real-estate market is that many spaces are going wanting, and that this project has too high a risk-to-reward
ratio, and that township residents should not be subjected to the risk without their express consent, via the ballot box.
Here is an article from today's LSJ. The only new news regards the specified businesses and the timetable. There is also a new street-level rendering. The parking garage is currently being built (and going up pretty quickly), and its ground floor retail is up for bidding. I think the apartment building will be a funding nightmare- but I'm sure it will be attractive to twenty somethings (and also, maybe, students- better to live there than Chandler's). Two new restaurants/ bars are scheduled to open in the second building- and I think Verizon will also have a store in that building (yawn). The outside of that building looks to be almost done.
I like the architecture a lot- and, as I watch the parking garage go up, I am surprised by how tall this thing might be. I am also impressed by the info I have seen from the 2 restaurants. No freezers means fresh ingredients. Bar30 has a Facebook page. And, no, I'm not affiliated with the restaurants; I just like to eat...
Well until public transportation at Eastwood gets better, I can't imagine that many MSU students who will want to live there. It is very hard to take a bus or ride a bike from Eastwood to Michigan State.
For these new developments to succeed, they really need to do a better job at incorporating multiple modes of transportation.
Wow, I was just coming to say that while I'm happy to see almost any development, I thought the architecture was pretty bad. It doesn't fit with the rest of the mall, and it looks very cheap, but that's kind of to be expected when a local government is acting as a developer, and has to really watch costs. The mall itself was never much of an architectural wonder, but they did at least try with the facade details. The retail surrounding the parking garage and the garage itself uses a lot of blank/falt, painted concrete surfaces.
Honestly, not sure how anyone could call that good architecture, and this is only marginally better, and in all honestly, the WalMart in the background looks more concerned with its aesthetics:
Greg Deruiter/Lansing State Journal
It all looks like something you'd find at some non-descript shopping center along South Cedar and I-96, or the stuff across from the Lansing Mall. It's not going to age well, I can tell you that much. I mean, it already looks dated. Hopefully, the adjoining apartment building will turn out better.
Anyone know who the township retained as the architects of these buildings?
Haha. Ok. Actually, Eastwood somewhat blurs the distinction between mall and strip-mall. It's concentrated, like a mall- but also has drive up parking. The main building in question is different than that, yes... It has a parking garage (a good thing) and is mixed use (also a good thing). I am impressed with the glass facade that extends the square footage on the first floor of the parking garage and will dominate the view at street level. Also, the garage looks like it uses a similar mesh material to the one built by Accident Fund (which looks nice but shouldn't be on the river).
The Township Master Plan calls for this section of the development to be more densely developed than Eastwood, a sort of planned urbanism. It is a simulated urban environment in a sub-urban area. This architecture seems pretty consistent with that style of planning, for better or worse. I am not always a fan of this style of planning- but it's happening- and I do think it will attract visitors to the area.
When comparing the head-on elevation released before and the side elevation released yesterday, I would say that it is a vast improvement over the existing Eastwood style and incomparable to anything south of 496. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. However, I think if you look at some of the other work put out by the architects of the smaller building, you'll see that they really do have an eye for detail- and they have experience with many different types of projects:
http://www.built-form.net/
Maybe you feel like it's not their best work. Maybe you don't like their style. That's cool.
Looks like the parking deck is a project of the Lansing-Melborne group:
http://www.lansingmelbourne.com/projects.shtml
Here's a document that I haven't seen before. It sheds some new light on the master plan and also the architectural style desired:
http://www.lansingmelbournegroup.com/documents/Eastwood%20Project%20Book_051310.pdf
I see that they use Madison and Ann Arbor as comparable markets in their study. I think that's both ambitious and accurate. However, I believe that both of those regions have emphasized multiple transportation modes- particularly public transportation, pedestrian, and bike traffic. That absolutely does need to be emphasized here. I know we've discussed it before- but I would like to see some connection for pedestrian/ bike traffic with the offices and hotels on the east side of 127. I would also like to see a corridor to Old Town and the Frandor/ Mich Ave area for future development. These area are all within 2 1/2 miles and should be considered easily reachable on a bike.
BTW, I'm looking at the "project book" you linked to, and did they change the entire plan? I know they downsized the project, but it looks like they've totally altered the site plan.
Comments
I thought the garage was suppose to replace existing parking, not add it and more surface lots to the complex, most of the space which is already surface lots, at least that's the way it appears form the air. In fact, I was hoping that a few well-placed garages would eventually allow some of the surface lots to be developed onto transform it into a legitimate, new urbanist development.
The more I'm thinking about the housing, the more I'm wondering who's going to want to plop down the rents they'll be asking for for what's already been deemed as "upscale" housing when it's quite literally surrounded by surface parking lots for a good few blocks away from the mall on three sides (three blocks just to reach the theater, and a few more to reach the actual mall), and open fields to the north?
Or, If you look at the google map (which I don't know how to embed), is it in the somewhat grassy area south of "Showtime Drive?" That would make a bit more sense because it looks like the main entrance to the ramp is on the ramp's north side.
Another rendering from the LSJ article (the caption says there is also supposed to be a site plan, but I don't see it.)
Each road in Eastwood should have bike lanes, bike parking spaces should be equal to around 1/3 of the parking spaces, and there should be a covered area for people waiting for the bus. After they get these done (all of which are pretty cheap compared to installing a new surface parking lot), then the next step should be to add a safe way for pedestrians to cross the Lake Lansing/US-127 overpass.
vibrant community. Although the mixed-use concept is a good one, this project creates an isolated, unnatural urban space in a suburban setting, where population density
and availability of alternatives makes this at best a risky project, and places the entire risk for the project on taxpayers, while developers reap the rewards (the incremental
rewards to the community of one more project are suspect, especially in the current economic climate, which has kept private investors and developers from risking their own funds).
My impression of the current area business and residential real-estate market is that many spaces are going wanting, and that this project has too high a risk-to-reward
ratio, and that township residents should not be subjected to the risk without their express consent, via the ballot box.
http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20111220/BUSINESS02/112200317/Expansion-near-Eastwood-Towne-Center-moves-along
I like the architecture a lot- and, as I watch the parking garage go up, I am surprised by how tall this thing might be. I am also impressed by the info I have seen from the 2 restaurants. No freezers means fresh ingredients. Bar30 has a Facebook page. And, no, I'm not affiliated with the restaurants; I just like to eat...
For these new developments to succeed, they really need to do a better job at incorporating multiple modes of transportation.
Honestly, not sure how anyone could call that good architecture, and this is only marginally better, and in all honestly, the WalMart in the background looks more concerned with its aesthetics:
Greg Deruiter/Lansing State Journal
It all looks like something you'd find at some non-descript shopping center along South Cedar and I-96, or the stuff across from the Lansing Mall. It's not going to age well, I can tell you that much. I mean, it already looks dated. Hopefully, the adjoining apartment building will turn out better.
Anyone know who the township retained as the architects of these buildings?
The Township Master Plan calls for this section of the development to be more densely developed than Eastwood, a sort of planned urbanism. It is a simulated urban environment in a sub-urban area. This architecture seems pretty consistent with that style of planning, for better or worse. I am not always a fan of this style of planning- but it's happening- and I do think it will attract visitors to the area.
When comparing the head-on elevation released before and the side elevation released yesterday, I would say that it is a vast improvement over the existing Eastwood style and incomparable to anything south of 496. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. However, I think if you look at some of the other work put out by the architects of the smaller building, you'll see that they really do have an eye for detail- and they have experience with many different types of projects:
http://www.built-form.net/
Maybe you feel like it's not their best work. Maybe you don't like their style. That's cool.
Looks like the parking deck is a project of the Lansing-Melborne group:
http://www.lansingmelbourne.com/projects.shtml
Here's a document that I haven't seen before. It sheds some new light on the master plan and also the architectural style desired:
http://www.lansingmelbournegroup.com/documents/Eastwood%20Project%20Book_051310.pdf
I see that they use Madison and Ann Arbor as comparable markets in their study. I think that's both ambitious and accurate. However, I believe that both of those regions have emphasized multiple transportation modes- particularly public transportation, pedestrian, and bike traffic. That absolutely does need to be emphasized here. I know we've discussed it before- but I would like to see some connection for pedestrian/ bike traffic with the offices and hotels on the east side of 127. I would also like to see a corridor to Old Town and the Frandor/ Mich Ave area for future development. These area are all within 2 1/2 miles and should be considered easily reachable on a bike.
BTW, I'm looking at the "project book" you linked to, and did they change the entire plan? I know they downsized the project, but it looks like they've totally altered the site plan.