If I had control (and the money!) to determine what happened next with the Walter Neller property, I'd probably build something midsize (4-6) stories there. Mixed use with office and residential on the upper floors and retail on the ground floor. Although a 20-story building would be amazing, I don't think there is enough demand in downtown to get enough occupancy for the building. The abundance of surface parking lots is a symptom of this.
Lansing Area Capital Gains is reporting that Travelers Club International Restaurant and Tuba Museum, the quirky long-time Okemos restaurant and museum, is looking at a location in Old Town. It's kind of amazing it hasn't been there, all along, as this would be a perfect fit for this eclectic business. It's kind of a long-shot, because financing for the physical relocation would be crowd-sourced, essentially, but he's looking at the old Mustang Bar property at 1215 Turner.
"Good news!" (said in voice of Futurama's Dr. Farnsworth)
The City Pulse this week inadvertently reported about the Walter Neller Building on the recent city council meeting by way of their Eyesore of the Week feature. It seems that quite a few groups have come together to oppose turning the site into a surface parking lot even with the Granger's are dangling long-term future marketing of the site for something else. Apparently, the city planning commission has sought the denial of the special land use permit, and the downtown neighborhood association. But most important, it seems that the council also seems to be against against the demolition, which is why the decision was made to remove the permit from last Monday's agenda.
I totally get why investors like Granger would want to demolish this building, and even for a surface lot. An empty building is a cost, both in upkeep and taxes, that a parking lot is not (and a parking lot makes money). But, this is exactly the kind of stance I want to see. It sends a message not to purchase vacant buildings unless you have something ready and productive for the site. Don't think you're going to come into this downtown - a resurging downtown - and turn it into a parking lot. These property owners need to be made to be more proactive and creative in their thinking about their properties, because their natural position is always the past of least resistence, and guess what that is?
A surface parking lot EVERY time. I'm glad Lansing doesn't just have to take anything fed to it, anymore. If you want to level downtown for parking lots out of laziness, you should have to work for it. It's funny that this really non-descript old property is where the city has chosen to stand its ground, but it's not even about the Walter Neller, anymore.
The city of Lansing is seekingng to sell off Grand Woods Park to Delta Township, who manages the park. I consider myself pretty knowledgable about the area, but had no idea Lansing owned Grand Woods. I knew the city owned Michigan Avenue Park and Waverly Golf Course in Lansing Township, but had no idea they owned other parkland outside the city. The city had been leasing the parking to Delta Township for $1 a year the past thirty years. And, for the first five years, the city actually managed the park.
I've been trying to figure out exactly what they're doing at the top of the Stevens T. Mason Building as part of the renovation. It appears that they've either scooped out a lot of the prominent, two-story penthouse, and/or have added onto it. It looks like they are going to put extra office space in there. I've been trying to find some documents on the state website about what's going on, but have only seen old bids from last year and the year previous that aren't that detailed beyond some some about facade work.
Surprised this didn't get more news, but the City Pulse had a blurb, last week, about Zoobie's in Old Town expansing. It'll expand into the former Poppa Leo's, next door, at Larch and Grand River, more than doubling its size. The two buildings will be connected by a new construction, and the unused building will become The Cosmos Wood-fired Pizza. There will be an out-door beer garden around the back.
It was funny, I was just driving by this place the other night, and noticed how packed the Poppa Leo's old parking lot, was. The new Zoobies has really gotten popular, apparently. I do hope within five or ten years we'll finally see Old Town and Northtown connected in what has been fits and starts of failed projects trying to connect to the two for many years now.
I'm glad to hear that Zoobies is doing well. I had some doubts about how they'd do in that block. Hopefully this will mean better things for the eastern edge of Old Town, especially the old Temple Club.
Is it just me or does it seem that Lansing has reached a tipping point? I know we were close back before the recession, but as it becomes easier to finance it seems as though much of that previous momentum has remained. If this continues like it should Lansing's next ten years may be reminiscent of Grand Rapids' last ten, even if slightly scaled down.
The LSJ had a story on the Sycamore and Ram Trail in Delhi Township and the South Lansing Pathway that's to start very soon in Lansing. Anyway, they had a picture. This is of the Sycamore Trail (which will connect to the River Trail) just east of Aurelius over the Sycamore Creek where the land gets really hilly:
Greg DeRuiter | LSJ
I don't know why I didn't realize this was going to be an extensive boardwalk being that it's in the creek's floodplain. The Sycamore Trail and South Lansing Pathway will connect with the Lansing River Trail. The Ram Trail will not.
Okay, you guys are going to have to bear with me, here, becausee this is a general observation from a general drive around town, recently, but...
I haven't had any reason to be on the southside for some years, now. Not that I haven't been, but it's been mostly by night, and rarely past Holmes, so I haven't been exploring like I once was. Anyway, I had something to do in Holt early Saturday morning, so I ended up driving Cedar on the way down and MLK on the way back up. Boy, are the southsides major retail thoroughfares looking rough. Part of this had to do with it being early in the morning, so most things were closed or empty making it easier to concentrate on the physical condition of the corridors. Part of it was it just being the start of spring, so there weren't any leaves or bushes to hide the condition of the buildings like last in the year. But, there are some fairly noticeable changes over, say, a decade.
On Cedar, my particular areas of concern are in between Greenlawn and Holmes, particularly between Hamilton/Hodge Avenues and Holmes, and then basically anything between Jolly and Miller. The first section is the most concerning as you have high vacancies, empty lots, and just a general deteriorating of the properties. You have some dirt driveways, even that make it feel like something out of the country, particularly around the Brookland intersection. The old mini-mall between Crest and Holmes on the westside of the street (I'd gotten my hair cut a few times, there) is just plain busted. The entirety of the retail corridor along South MLK needs work.
Now, Lansing was steadily declining even before the recession, so it's not a surprise to see the commercial strips go with it. But, Lansing never fell off the cliff like areas on the eastside of the state. The major problem is that the concept of "neighborhood retail" is dead in these areas. If you go off on the side streets, particularly along Cedar, you still have some relatively well kept up residential areas. This makes it clear, then, that it's not there isn't enough wealth in these neighborhoods to support decent businesses along a place like Cedar, rather that these folks simply don't do their shopping in the neighborhood.
Aside from figuring out how to resurrect the idea of neighborhood retail, I have a few other ideas of how you bring these areas back up to an acceptable level.
- I'd upzone a lot of these areas to allow for less on-site parking. You could make outlay districts along these corridors to do that. Outlay districts have lower on-site parking requirements. To make up for the loss of parking right next to business, you'd intersperse a few large surface lots along the corridor. This would ultimately make these areas easier for pedestrians to navigate and make these the corridors more visually attractive, which would help make areas along the corridor destinations.
- Another huge things are the physical streetcapes and making them more uniform. These corridors are down-right ugly at times. There is no rhyme or reason to designs, building placement, etc...on one property, you can have a building built all the way at the back of the lot and then next door have something built right up to the street. You can have street trees on one side of the street, and then a totally barren streetcape on the other half. There needs to be more uniformity. I'd like to see more ornamental street trees, and the switching out of over-head streetlights to something more like what you have along Washington Avenue or Michigan Avenue along Cedar (MLK can keep the overhead lamps).
- This is a little more controversial and a little more of a dream, but you really could take out a traffic lane in either direction on BOTH of these corridors (particularly MLK) and create a busway on both sides of the road. You'd have one traffic lane in each direction and keep the center turn-lane the entire route. This wouldn't even have to be along the entire corridor, though, you could do it. The streets are (and were) just really overbuilt, particularly for today's traffic.
- Or, you could do something far more simple and designate a BID (business improvement district) or TIFA along the corridors, or maybe just even put together a business association/organization to address concerns along the corridor and unify them.
I just hope these areas don't continue to be forgotten about as we work heavily on the corridors north of the river, and I say that as someone who grew up north of the river. It's was just really depressing to travel these two streets, as they are entrances into the city and run for a long way.
Comments
The City Pulse this week inadvertently reported about the Walter Neller Building on the recent city council meeting by way of their Eyesore of the Week feature. It seems that quite a few groups have come together to oppose turning the site into a surface parking lot even with the Granger's are dangling long-term future marketing of the site for something else. Apparently, the city planning commission has sought the denial of the special land use permit, and the downtown neighborhood association. But most important, it seems that the council also seems to be against against the demolition, which is why the decision was made to remove the permit from last Monday's agenda.
I totally get why investors like Granger would want to demolish this building, and even for a surface lot. An empty building is a cost, both in upkeep and taxes, that a parking lot is not (and a parking lot makes money). But, this is exactly the kind of stance I want to see. It sends a message not to purchase vacant buildings unless you have something ready and productive for the site. Don't think you're going to come into this downtown - a resurging downtown - and turn it into a parking lot. These property owners need to be made to be more proactive and creative in their thinking about their properties, because their natural position is always the past of least resistence, and guess what that is?
A surface parking lot EVERY time. I'm glad Lansing doesn't just have to take anything fed to it, anymore. If you want to level downtown for parking lots out of laziness, you should have to work for it. It's funny that this really non-descript old property is where the city has chosen to stand its ground, but it's not even about the Walter Neller, anymore.
[/rant] lol
It was funny, I was just driving by this place the other night, and noticed how packed the Poppa Leo's old parking lot, was. The new Zoobies has really gotten popular, apparently. I do hope within five or ten years we'll finally see Old Town and Northtown connected in what has been fits and starts of failed projects trying to connect to the two for many years now.
Is it just me or does it seem that Lansing has reached a tipping point? I know we were close back before the recession, but as it becomes easier to finance it seems as though much of that previous momentum has remained. If this continues like it should Lansing's next ten years may be reminiscent of Grand Rapids' last ten, even if slightly scaled down.
Greg DeRuiter | LSJ
I don't know why I didn't realize this was going to be an extensive boardwalk being that it's in the creek's floodplain. The Sycamore Trail and South Lansing Pathway will connect with the Lansing River Trail. The Ram Trail will not.
I haven't had any reason to be on the southside for some years, now. Not that I haven't been, but it's been mostly by night, and rarely past Holmes, so I haven't been exploring like I once was. Anyway, I had something to do in Holt early Saturday morning, so I ended up driving Cedar on the way down and MLK on the way back up. Boy, are the southsides major retail thoroughfares looking rough. Part of this had to do with it being early in the morning, so most things were closed or empty making it easier to concentrate on the physical condition of the corridors. Part of it was it just being the start of spring, so there weren't any leaves or bushes to hide the condition of the buildings like last in the year. But, there are some fairly noticeable changes over, say, a decade.
On Cedar, my particular areas of concern are in between Greenlawn and Holmes, particularly between Hamilton/Hodge Avenues and Holmes, and then basically anything between Jolly and Miller. The first section is the most concerning as you have high vacancies, empty lots, and just a general deteriorating of the properties. You have some dirt driveways, even that make it feel like something out of the country, particularly around the Brookland intersection. The old mini-mall between Crest and Holmes on the westside of the street (I'd gotten my hair cut a few times, there) is just plain busted. The entirety of the retail corridor along South MLK needs work.
Now, Lansing was steadily declining even before the recession, so it's not a surprise to see the commercial strips go with it. But, Lansing never fell off the cliff like areas on the eastside of the state. The major problem is that the concept of "neighborhood retail" is dead in these areas. If you go off on the side streets, particularly along Cedar, you still have some relatively well kept up residential areas. This makes it clear, then, that it's not there isn't enough wealth in these neighborhoods to support decent businesses along a place like Cedar, rather that these folks simply don't do their shopping in the neighborhood.
Aside from figuring out how to resurrect the idea of neighborhood retail, I have a few other ideas of how you bring these areas back up to an acceptable level.
- I'd upzone a lot of these areas to allow for less on-site parking. You could make outlay districts along these corridors to do that. Outlay districts have lower on-site parking requirements. To make up for the loss of parking right next to business, you'd intersperse a few large surface lots along the corridor. This would ultimately make these areas easier for pedestrians to navigate and make these the corridors more visually attractive, which would help make areas along the corridor destinations.
- Another huge things are the physical streetcapes and making them more uniform. These corridors are down-right ugly at times. There is no rhyme or reason to designs, building placement, etc...on one property, you can have a building built all the way at the back of the lot and then next door have something built right up to the street. You can have street trees on one side of the street, and then a totally barren streetcape on the other half. There needs to be more uniformity. I'd like to see more ornamental street trees, and the switching out of over-head streetlights to something more like what you have along Washington Avenue or Michigan Avenue along Cedar (MLK can keep the overhead lamps).
- This is a little more controversial and a little more of a dream, but you really could take out a traffic lane in either direction on BOTH of these corridors (particularly MLK) and create a busway on both sides of the road. You'd have one traffic lane in each direction and keep the center turn-lane the entire route. This wouldn't even have to be along the entire corridor, though, you could do it. The streets are (and were) just really overbuilt, particularly for today's traffic.
- Or, you could do something far more simple and designate a BID (business improvement district) or TIFA along the corridors, or maybe just even put together a business association/organization to address concerns along the corridor and unify them.
I just hope these areas don't continue to be forgotten about as we work heavily on the corridors north of the river, and I say that as someone who grew up north of the river. It's was just really depressing to travel these two streets, as they are entrances into the city and run for a long way.