3600 Dunckel
The redevelopment of the property on the southwest corner of Collins & Dunckel is going to be a little bigger than I imagined. It'll be 629k sq ft spread between 6 four floor apartment buildings (453 units), a 90 room three floor hotel and a one floor retail building. It's also worth noting that it looks like every building in the development (except the retail building) will have underground parking. The development will still leave a sizable parcel at the corner open for future development. No renderings yet, but there is a site plan.
More info can be found on pages 6-20 of the 10/27/2016 Planning Commission agenda.
More info can be found on pages 6-20 of the 10/27/2016 Planning Commission agenda.
Comments
The only thing I could find outside of social media on the "Branoff" in "Branoff-Randle" was this Capital Gains article on the ENSO restaurant he was part owner of. The article gives this rundown on his credentials: "Branoff grew up in Flint, has lived in East Lansing since 1975, partnered on two Planet Hollywoods — one in D.C. and one in Hawaii — and owned Weight Watchers in Indiana, Italy, Greece and Sypris."
The "Randle" seems to be Will Randle, who is also Vice President of Westpac. Though I thought Westpac was owner and/or property manager of many East Lansing properties (they may still be), the only things I can find on them are an article about them selling The Rocks and another article about their "Abbot Manor" apartment building being condemned.
The architect noted on the site plan, Zehran and Associates, looks like like they do some really nice stuff. They seem to be almost entirely focused on a sort of mountain/ski lodge architecture, being as there's nothing like that around here it could make for an interesting addition to the area. Their portfolio is definitely worth checking out.
The 10/27 Planning Commission agenda marked this project as being open for public discussion at the 12/12 City Council meeting. All I can find in the 12/12 City Council meeting minutes is that this item was referred to the Planning Commission again. Any reason why this would be bounced back? They don't have any media of the meeting online so there's no way for me to watch what was talked about.
It doesn't appear that it had anything to specifically do with the project, because the Fluid Chiller (company on the northside, I think) expansion was also referred back to committee. Might has just been that it was the last meeting of the year, and maybe they typically do this so as not to restrain a new council president in the new year.
And, maybe it was even more simple than that. Could be that they were rushing. I've noticed that the council doesn't like to do significant development approvals at the end of the year.