I noticed a new house going up on Elm Street in REOtown! It looks like a larger version of the "tiny house" craze that you see on TV. I wonder if it is the land bank building the house. They built a new house over in my old neighborhood on Park Ave., and I was wondering if maybe they were doing the same here.
Their website isn't showing anything on Elm Street, so it's probably a private build, which is a really good sign for the neighborhood.
Driving down Michigan I'm starting to notice the new traffic signal equipment I believe is used to coordinate the lights on the avenue from City Hall. The equipment is placed on regular streetlight poles at each traffic signal, and it really got me thinking about something everyone from out of town says when I post pictures. They always complain about Lansing still using simple lines to hang traffic signals instead of the more metal arms. It's funny because I'm so used to the set-up that I always forget that this isn't that normal for a city this size.
Has this ever occurred to anyone else here? It seems like it'd be a relatively simple thing to erect as we upgrade our traffic signals.
BTW, I'm looking at the street project maps for this year and some things that stick out are the expansion of the bike lanes on Kalamazoo west of Larch all the way to Washington Square. Another is the resurfacing of Pine Street between Shiawassee and Lapeer (they could really just do the extra block to Saginaw), which has been horrible. They are also doing preventative maintenance on the Elm Street Bridge over the Grand. There are tons of traffic signal upgrades along Jolly, Dunckel, and Auerlius on the southside.
The biggest one is a "street reconfiguration" of Grand River all the way from North Street near the Turner-Dodge all the way east to Cleveland Street on the eastside. I wonder exactly how they are going to "reconfigure" Grand River? Anyone know? Is it simply some bike lanes or something?
I don't think traffic lights hanging from wires is that uncommon. Besides, I don't really have a problem with lights hung on wires in areas where there are already overhead wires anyways. However, as I've said before, I do want to see utilities buried and part of that would be putting traffic lights on poles.
I have no idea what that street reconfiguration on Grand River would be, but it has me curious as well.
I have not thought about the signal lights being on over head wires, except when I see them swinging in the wind. It seems like Delta Twsp. agrees and they have mounted the lights on huge steel poles. It is interesting to me that out of town people would note this as being kind of out of date. I agree that the whole over head wire systems needs to be put underground, for safety,cost, and aesthetic reasons. It could be combined with an overall street and sidewalk reconstruction that is needed through out the the city.
I often use Kalamazoo to get over to E.L. and have thought it would be the best place for a direct urban bike route from downtown to East Lansing. It would be really great if they make a true separated lane, I think there would be enough room on that street.
The new house on Elm street is interesting, a very simple design that they have put up very quickly. The house sits on piers and looks very different from the neighbors, I like it, it's just really different and is being built in a really unexpected place.
Say - are the rents for restaurant space downtown just too high? Was just thinking there are places on the Washington Square strip that I'm pretty sure have been vacant the entire 5.5 years I've worked at LCC. There's no need for that - there IS demand downtown, the place is quite busy at lunchtime at least and has some customers at other times. Yet places come and go regularly - and, as I said, these long-term vacancies that are hard to understand. Is it really better for a landlord to sit on a property for years than to offer it for a bit less?
Which storefronts in particular are you talking about (i.e. the long-term ones)? The turnover of the occupied storefronts is rather normal. Restaurants are notoriously hard to make money off of. Sometimes, there are times when more fail at around the same time than usual, but generally, I think this is pretty normal for what Washington Square is, now. My perspective might be different, though, having grown up here and remember just to even just a bit before a decade ago when Washington Square was practically abandoned.
I think what would remedy a lot of this is more housing directly off the square. It seems that once the city filled up all the upstairs apartments over the storefronts, all residential development attention shifted across the river. For a good decade, now, there has been very little change or focus on Washington Square.
I can't think of too many storefronts on Washington Sq that have been vacant that long, I know the old Michigania at the SW corner of Washington & Michigan has, the Hallmark store may have been closed that long also. Any others?
I've been very disappointed with the city's lack of attention to the areas west of the river, it really seems that they've ignored the core part of downtown. There definitely needs to be more residential on and around Washington in order for it to succeed, I also think that there really need to be more storefronts on Grand, Capital and the east-west cross streets in between in order for downtown to ever feel complete. How can the capitol city of the state with a metro of around half a million people have what is essentially a one-street downtown? The core of downtown Lansing has two contiguous, double-sided blocks of retail: the 100 and 200 blocks of S Washington. That's just embarrassing for a city of our size and no matter how successful the Michigan Ave corridor becomes it can never rival a thriving downtown with however many square blocks of retail packed into a tight area.
For comparison: The area bounded by Capitol/Grand and Shiawassee/Lenawee contains about three miles of street frontage, about equal to Michigan Ave from Grand Ave to where it joins with Grand River Ave. I wish the city would understand the importance of getting more storefronts downtown that aren't facing South Washington.
We have a real "Town Center" downtown, unlike Eastwood, they charge to park downtown. As for shopping that was the problem for many people as far back as the 60's. Free parking for shoppers and visitors could help. There are very few storefront type buildings on any side street, Grand Ave [which is in terrible shape] is mainly parking lots and ramps from Kalamazoo to Saginaw. There are areas where an apartment building could be built. Just because we built a parking ramp in 1970 something does that mean we can never knock it down. Parking ramps and lots have the best addresses in the whole city.
Think of downtown as an urban village, a place where people live, work and shop. Develop what I call doing your neighbors laundry economy. I pay you to do my laundry, you use that money to go to lunch and tip your waiter, he uses that money to buy groceries and a beer at the pub and so on. I think that is one thing that is missing from the downtown economy. You can sort of see that kind of thing in Old Town, people in place spending their time and money in their neighborhood. If a business is able to add hours in the evenings and on weekends they have to employ people and that in turn creates business for the neighborhood.
They could also take better care of the trees and landscaping. Like at LCC, more green more trees and more flowers. The trees on S. Washington are in need of pruning the many dead branches. Fill the streets with flowers, and flags and banners. Create the feeling that there is something happening and it changes every week. Upgrade the side walk cafe seating areas to make a real feeling of an outdoor room, not just some tables and chairs on the sidewalk. In winter cover outdoor seating something like winter "cabins" to keep the sidewalks full of people. Re-brick the flatten the street. Open store fronts and apartments on the back streets or alleys. The backs of many buildings offer an authentic urban scene, and have been less remodeled over the years.
Comments
I sent in my "ideas" I had to download it print, scan,then e-mail. I should have just taken it over next door!
I noticed a new house going up on Elm Street in REOtown! It looks like a larger version of the "tiny house" craze that you see on TV. I wonder if it is the land bank building the house. They built a new house over in my old neighborhood on Park Ave., and I was wondering if maybe they were doing the same here.
Their website isn't showing anything on Elm Street, so it's probably a private build, which is a really good sign for the neighborhood.
Driving down Michigan I'm starting to notice the new traffic signal equipment I believe is used to coordinate the lights on the avenue from City Hall. The equipment is placed on regular streetlight poles at each traffic signal, and it really got me thinking about something everyone from out of town says when I post pictures. They always complain about Lansing still using simple lines to hang traffic signals instead of the more metal arms. It's funny because I'm so used to the set-up that I always forget that this isn't that normal for a city this size.
Has this ever occurred to anyone else here? It seems like it'd be a relatively simple thing to erect as we upgrade our traffic signals.
BTW, I'm looking at the street project maps for this year and some things that stick out are the expansion of the bike lanes on Kalamazoo west of Larch all the way to Washington Square. Another is the resurfacing of Pine Street between Shiawassee and Lapeer (they could really just do the extra block to Saginaw), which has been horrible. They are also doing preventative maintenance on the Elm Street Bridge over the Grand. There are tons of traffic signal upgrades along Jolly, Dunckel, and Auerlius on the southside.
The biggest one is a "street reconfiguration" of Grand River all the way from North Street near the Turner-Dodge all the way east to Cleveland Street on the eastside. I wonder exactly how they are going to "reconfigure" Grand River? Anyone know? Is it simply some bike lanes or something?
I don't think traffic lights hanging from wires is that uncommon. Besides, I don't really have a problem with lights hung on wires in areas where there are already overhead wires anyways. However, as I've said before, I do want to see utilities buried and part of that would be putting traffic lights on poles.
I have no idea what that street reconfiguration on Grand River would be, but it has me curious as well.
I have not thought about the signal lights being on over head wires, except when I see them swinging in the wind. It seems like Delta Twsp. agrees and they have mounted the lights on huge steel poles. It is interesting to me that out of town people would note this as being kind of out of date. I agree that the whole over head wire systems needs to be put underground, for safety,cost, and aesthetic reasons. It could be combined with an overall street and sidewalk reconstruction that is needed through out the the city.
I often use Kalamazoo to get over to E.L. and have thought it would be the best place for a direct urban bike route from downtown to East Lansing. It would be really great if they make a true separated lane, I think there would be enough room on that street.
The new house on Elm street is interesting, a very simple design that they have put up very quickly. The house sits on piers and looks very different from the neighbors, I like it, it's just really different and is being built in a really unexpected place.
Say - are the rents for restaurant space downtown just too high? Was just thinking there are places on the Washington Square strip that I'm pretty sure have been vacant the entire 5.5 years I've worked at LCC. There's no need for that - there IS demand downtown, the place is quite busy at lunchtime at least and has some customers at other times. Yet places come and go regularly - and, as I said, these long-term vacancies that are hard to understand. Is it really better for a landlord to sit on a property for years than to offer it for a bit less?
Which storefronts in particular are you talking about (i.e. the long-term ones)? The turnover of the occupied storefronts is rather normal. Restaurants are notoriously hard to make money off of. Sometimes, there are times when more fail at around the same time than usual, but generally, I think this is pretty normal for what Washington Square is, now. My perspective might be different, though, having grown up here and remember just to even just a bit before a decade ago when Washington Square was practically abandoned.
I think what would remedy a lot of this is more housing directly off the square. It seems that once the city filled up all the upstairs apartments over the storefronts, all residential development attention shifted across the river. For a good decade, now, there has been very little change or focus on Washington Square.
I can't think of too many storefronts on Washington Sq that have been vacant that long, I know the old Michigania at the SW corner of Washington & Michigan has, the Hallmark store may have been closed that long also. Any others?
I've been very disappointed with the city's lack of attention to the areas west of the river, it really seems that they've ignored the core part of downtown. There definitely needs to be more residential on and around Washington in order for it to succeed, I also think that there really need to be more storefronts on Grand, Capital and the east-west cross streets in between in order for downtown to ever feel complete. How can the capitol city of the state with a metro of around half a million people have what is essentially a one-street downtown? The core of downtown Lansing has two contiguous, double-sided blocks of retail: the 100 and 200 blocks of S Washington. That's just embarrassing for a city of our size and no matter how successful the Michigan Ave corridor becomes it can never rival a thriving downtown with however many square blocks of retail packed into a tight area.
For comparison: The area bounded by Capitol/Grand and Shiawassee/Lenawee contains about three miles of street frontage, about equal to Michigan Ave from Grand Ave to where it joins with Grand River Ave. I wish the city would understand the importance of getting more storefronts downtown that aren't facing South Washington.
We have a real "Town Center" downtown, unlike Eastwood, they charge to park downtown. As for shopping that was the problem for many people as far back as the 60's. Free parking for shoppers and visitors could help. There are very few storefront type buildings on any side street, Grand Ave [which is in terrible shape] is mainly parking lots and ramps from Kalamazoo to Saginaw. There are areas where an apartment building could be built. Just because we built a parking ramp in 1970 something does that mean we can never knock it down. Parking ramps and lots have the best addresses in the whole city.
Think of downtown as an urban village, a place where people live, work and shop. Develop what I call doing your neighbors laundry economy. I pay you to do my laundry, you use that money to go to lunch and tip your waiter, he uses that money to buy groceries and a beer at the pub and so on. I think that is one thing that is missing from the downtown economy. You can sort of see that kind of thing in Old Town, people in place spending their time and money in their neighborhood. If a business is able to add hours in the evenings and on weekends they have to employ people and that in turn creates business for the neighborhood.
They could also take better care of the trees and landscaping. Like at LCC, more green more trees and more flowers. The trees on S. Washington are in need of pruning the many dead branches. Fill the streets with flowers, and flags and banners. Create the feeling that there is something happening and it changes every week. Upgrade the side walk cafe seating areas to make a real feeling of an outdoor room, not just some tables and chairs on the sidewalk. In winter cover outdoor seating something like winter "cabins" to keep the sidewalks full of people. Re-brick the flatten the street. Open store fronts and apartments on the back streets or alleys. The backs of many buildings offer an authentic urban scene, and have been less remodeled over the years.