Jared - My guess would be that they don't want students congregating in large numbers anywhere in the downtown area. My hope in the long run is for EL to convert Albert to busses, bikes and emergency/delivery vehicles only at some point in the future. That would make it a lot easier to push temporary outdoor dining onto sections of the road in the summer, and make the whole downtown area more pedestrian friendly, IMO.
@ratchetwrench yeah that is probably why they removed them, maybe with some nudging from the county health department. Ideally we could put in smaller standup tables as a way to help support the downtown restaurants with takeout business.
It's not surprising but I'm glad to see this moving forward, it's a nice looking building and adding office workers to downtown EL is no small deal. It'll certainly give that block of Albert an interesting feel, the street is quite narrow there and all the buildings will be right up to the sidewalk.
MSUFCU has lowered the height of their building downtown by 1 story (from 8 to 7) due to the work-from-home movement. This was a floor that they were planning to lease out to other businesses but many employers are now looking to shrink their office space as it may be a few years before offices are back to full capacity. This was mentioned in one of the notes on https://eastlansinginfo.news/explore-vacant-commercial-properties-in-downtown-east-lansing/
Wow that's awesome, thank you for sharing it here. I used to work at TechSmith years ago. I would love it if they were a tenant in the new MSUFCU building or Mariott. Having more office workers downtown will grow the lunch crowd and other retail activity greatly.
From my experience working there, they seemed to prefer being close to freeways so they could be looking at something near West Road though that seems like a lateral move from where they are today. Their original location in East Lansing wasn't downtown but near West Rd at 3001 Coolidge Rd.
Yes it was very lucky they didn't move to the research park. It was right before the great recession tanked at it's worst and would have probably caused major damage to the company. We had a hiring freeze and other things put on hold for the next 1-2 years. Hopefully we are not on the cusp of another crash.
Their plan is to build on part of the Spartan Village land. This is not surprising since it fits their culture of being a freeway exit/friendly for commuter business.
It's also such a big let down. This is just a lateral move from one freeway exit to another. It's not going to help attract enough software engineer talent because after prospective employees take the tour of the building they will walk outside and see the large surface parking lot and the at-minimum 5 minute walk to Trowbridge for the strip shopping center. Pedestrian access around Trowbridge is still very confusing and not conducive to casual lunch access.
They would have a lot less risk if they were to continue to lease and join either the Marriott or the new MSUFCU building.
I'll echo the disappointment here on seeing TechSmith choose such an uninspiring location. I do not support giving tax incentives to suburban office developments. Tax incentives are, in part, supposed to be a tool to encourage more desirable developments in areas that will see the most benefit from them.
@MichMatters I'm not sure what's going on in Spartan Village, it's pretty sparsely populated these days but there are more than a few people still living there scattered around.
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In other news, David Krause has passed away. He was one of the main developers over the years in downtown East Lansing. ELi did a lengthy write-up on him and his contributions, https://eastlansinginfo.news/east-lansing-loses-a-giant-of-redevelopment-david-krause/
From my experience working there, they seemed to prefer being close to freeways so they could be looking at something near West Road though that seems like a lateral move from where they are today. Their original location in East Lansing wasn't downtown but near West Rd at 3001 Coolidge Rd.
https://eastlansinginfo.news/council-asked-to-consider-tax-exemption-for-techsmith/
It's also such a big let down. This is just a lateral move from one freeway exit to another. It's not going to help attract enough software engineer talent because after prospective employees take the tour of the building they will walk outside and see the large surface parking lot and the at-minimum 5 minute walk to Trowbridge for the strip shopping center. Pedestrian access around Trowbridge is still very confusing and not conducive to casual lunch access.
They would have a lot less risk if they were to continue to lease and join either the Marriott or the new MSUFCU building.
@MichMatters I'm not sure what's going on in Spartan Village, it's pretty sparsely populated these days but there are more than a few people still living there scattered around.