It seems odd to me that the Senate would accept sharing a building with a private tenant, I'd imagine they'd really like to have the whole building and probably plan on it sooner rather than later. What original plan did the House fail to move on?
A new construction on the site of the current Constitution Hall parking lot, at the corner of Allegan and Walnut. The Sam Eyde project of a Class A, LEED certified building would have been completed April 2016. It would have included a glass fa'ade with 32 identical size suites. This was the most expensive project, however, at $24.50 to $25.50 per square foot.
- Renovating the 57-year-old Lansing City Hall at 124 W. Michigan through The Christman Company and Paul Gentilozzi. This $17-per-square-foot plan offered more parking spots than the others and had the state moving into a building next door to the House Office Building by September 2016. But the plan would have required Lansing City Council approval and would have given the Senate more space than it needed. The corner of the property is also a public square with deed restrictions and easements.
- Renovating the Farnum at 125 Allegan at a cost of between $19.95 and $21.95 per square foot. However, there were historic constraints that sank this proposal with Viventi's committee. Also, it would have required the Senate to be temporarily lodged at Prudden Center, about a mile away, for a year, which would be inconvenient for public meetings and would have meant Senators being shuttled back and forth to the Capitol.
Wish I could see renderings of the all-glass building. Anyway, they'll only be sharing the building with the owners of the building. The Department of Community Health and the law firm in the building will find other space owned by the Bojis.
Some items from the December 8th City Council packet:
-Rezoning of Walter French to F-1 commercial for the purpose of converting "the building at 1900 S.
Cedar Street into a mix of commercial, office and multiple family residential uses..." It goes on to say that the plan calls for 91 residential units and 75k sq ft of office, recreational and commercial space.
-Rezoning of Oliver towers to G-1 business district with no information on any specific plans.
-Rezoning for Sparrows cancer addition and parking ramp. I posted the site plan in the Sparrow projects forum.
G-1 "Business District" is what the highest density parts of downtown are zoned. This is about as "free" a zoning as you get in Lansing, and by that I mean there are no height limits, setback requirements, or parking requirements. The towers are currently zoned CUP (Community Unit Plan), which is a very specific zoning, but one that isn't listed in the definitions and one that I can't remember what exactly it means off hand. Either way, I guess this shows that whatever they eventually want to put up here is something fairly major (i.e. not some townhomes or some two-story "mixed use" crap).
LANSING – Lansing Community College officials say they want to create a forest on campus.
The LCC Board of Trustees recently approved a plan to add another 200 trees to its current 300 trees on campus in 2015 in a plan to make the campus greener and beautify its 32-acre downtown street scape.
The new trees will be indigenous to the area and will be selected based on suitability and 100-year life span. When finished, there will be a cluster in the core of campus and then treescapes will link outward toward the surrounding streets.
The LSJ is reporting that Cooley has completely moved out of the Temple Building having consolidated all of their operations at the Cooley Center across the block, and have put the Temple Building up for sale. It's a rather unusual building as described in the article with massive meeting rooms on each floor (it was originally a Masonic Temple, after all) with the sixth floor building two floors tall. The building is apparently in good shape from their constant renovations on it, but it's going to be a very unique space to try and fill.
I've never been in there, but it sounds like the interior is unique throughout the building. I hope that someone can make use of it as is, I can't imagine who would though. Maybe a large law firm?
I was thinking it could be a good fit for some other educational institution, or state government, or maybe something like scientific/laboratory space. It would be difficult, however, with the very tall floors to make this work as a conventional office or apartment/condo buildings or hotel, which is what has me worried. I mean, Lansing is good as reusing unconventional space (Ottawa Street Station, Knapps Center, Prudden Motor Wheels factory, etc...) so if any small city can find something to do with it, it would be Lansing. But, nothing pops right into my head, right off, as an obvious tenant. You'd hope that it literally being steps from the capitol that it won't be allowed to deteriorate. Maybe, they could make it into a small conference center? It's my understanding that's what it was mostly being used for after the classrooms were moved to the Cooley Center, anyway.
As difficult as a might be to reuse, I have a feeling it won't be empty for too long. Seeing who ends up reusing it and how should be interesting though.
If I under stand correctly there is an auditorium with balcony on top two floors. Possibly it could be a theatre/venue. I also agree that this won't be vacant for long. I tried to look for pics of inside/auditorium, no luck.
Comments
Wish I could see renderings of the all-glass building. Anyway, they'll only be sharing the building with the owners of the building. The Department of Community Health and the law firm in the building will find other space owned by the Bojis.
-Rezoning of Walter French to F-1 commercial for the purpose of converting "the building at 1900 S.
Cedar Street into a mix of commercial, office and multiple family residential uses..." It goes on to say that the plan calls for 91 residential units and 75k sq ft of office, recreational and commercial space.
-Rezoning of Oliver towers to G-1 business district with no information on any specific plans.
-Rezoning for Sparrows cancer addition and parking ramp. I posted the site plan in the Sparrow projects forum.
This is from a story about LCC planting 200 trees on campus, next year.