Going down bumpy old Baker Street yesterday I noticed a large excavation going on in the REOtown industrial park on the northeast side near the RR tracks. This is the first time I have seen any new activity in that area, I know that some sewer and drain? projects are going on around the neighborhood but this is a big dig going on over there. In more grow house news I read where an entrepreneur is converting the John Bean building to a grow house. Soon I think one might get a contact high just from driving around this area. The old Speed Wagon store on Barnes and S Washington has been finally renovated and there is a new liquor/convenience store open there now. The new owners really fixed up the place and they have a wicked cold beer cave! I like my LaBatts cold! There are a lot of party stores in this area now, the Louis's Liquor store on S Washington and Mt. Hope has also gone under some renovation with a nice mural painted at the street side, with the one that opened last year on S Cedar we have lots of choices for booze around here. Over at Walter French, some new murals have been put up over the windows, they are nice but I would rather see some renovation going on in that building. At Moores Park a community group is adding to the list of renovations going on, they are clearing out and fixing up the old stone staircases that had become overgrown and neglected. I remember those big stone steps when I was a kid they were fun to play on. I also saw on the River Trail's page that they are building an extension of the trail along Moores River Drive to Frances Park which I hope includes repaving the street. The community groups have also been taking good care of the roundabouts this summer the circles are all nicely planted and maintained.
I do not know where to look for such information [some of you do] so I have been wondering about the construction site near Baker and Cedar, it is a large site is being excavated there on the north side of the REO industrial park area.
The re-hab on the small office building on S. Washington at Elm is looking good. Nothing too exciting but they have replaced the old pebble stone-faced panels with dark green colored plaster panels in the window columns. They look good and go well with the brick facade. I believe the tiled area at the front door is also going to be replaced. Looks like they are keeping the windows as they are. Maybe some Dems. are moving in there as there are Biden signs all over the property. The repairs on the Moores Park River Trail bridge have started and that part of the trail is closed. The new Lake Trust building is kind of busy but fun to look at, I finally got the pine poles they are supposed to evoke the lake up in the woods! Right? The giant grow house on E Hazel is rolling along, The entire first floor has been re-enforced with re-bar and cement, and they have begun bricking up the higher story of windows. I guess it is too much to hope for that they might keep the big bank of windows on the north side. As I have said before they sure are putting a lot of money into this facility it looks like a fortress. I hope they grow some high-quality cannabis there, they will have to, in order to pay for that place.
MERIDIAN TWP. – Ellison Brewery and Spirits' second Lansing-area location is still in the works. Owner Aaron Hanson hopes to open the REO Town location next spring. The new location originally was expected to open in late 2018. It's been delayed for a "myriad of reasons," Hanson said, among them the COVID-19 pandemic. "I would love to have it open, but I also have to do what's right for the business," Hanson said last week in an interview at the brewery's original location off East Grand River Avenue. That isn't to say the brewery hasn't made progress on the space. In fact, Hanson said, they're mostly down to the finishing touches. "Most of the hard work at REO is done," he said.
This is good news. Even during the current situation, there has still been a lot of sidewalk traffic here, so I would think that they will be successful in that location as folks already in the habit of coming to REOtown for food and fun.
Pretty stoked that this is finally coming to fruition. I generally avoid EL and haven't been out to Ellison in years. It will be nice to not have to go out that way to enjoy their product.
I am not sure what was happening at the corner lot of S. Washington and Garden Street [where the Fabulous Acres sign is] there were large earthmovers there but they seemed to be spreading topsoil not excavating. Perhaps it is a neighborhood improvement of the lot there into a park? Fabulous Park!
Not project filed for this lot as of yet. The owner of the lot owns the lot next door. Might be a staging area for some kind of street construction/utility work, or maybe the owners are finally planning to do something with it. It's been vacant for at least as long as I've been here (early '90s). I've always wondered why after the Little Caesers went under they never did anything with such a visible sight with lots of traffic.
Stateside talked to two long-time residents, Dottie Canty-Armstrong and Marcus Brown, about what makes the neighborhood so special, starting with its unique name.
Armstrong told us the name Fabulous Acres is a tribute to the neighborhood’s first community policing officer, Bill Fabiancyk.
She said he came into the neighborhood at a time when there was a lot of distrust of the police, but he soon became an integral part of the community. The residents of Fabulous Acres wanted to name their neighborhood “Fabiancyk,” but Bill vetoed that.
“And we were like, well what about Fabulous?” said Armstrong. The name stuck.
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https://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/local/2020/10/20/ellison-brewer-spirits-reo-town-spring-2021/5935139002/
BTW, there is a nice little city children's park at the end of Garden, the Barb Dean Tot Lot. Also, here's a nice story a few years back on the neighborhood and the origin of its name: https://stateofopportunity.michiganradio.org/post/it-takes-village-lansing-neighborhood
Imagine 'Fabiancyk Acres." lol