I believe there were plans many years ago to convert the Howard Johnson to student apartments but the funding fell through due to the recession. Maybe the rumor of the demolition will be related to tearing it down and building student apartments in its place, though I haven't seen anything in the East Lansing Planning Commission agendas or minutes for this.
The City of East Lansing is looking at spending $6 million to fix up the parking garage underneath the Marriott Hotel. In December they contemplated selling the garage to the hotel but later decided to keep the garage and run it themselves. The project won't add any space to the garage but will fix up some of the falling concrete that have closed a portion of the bottom level.
I think that fixing the parking garage makes sense. The city cannot just keep dedicating land to parking. I would eliminate the Albert lot (lose some revenue) and convert it into a downtown park, which pays off in the long run by attracting more people. There are enough parking options near downtown EL.
Also, there was a public notice in the City Pulse about the rezoning of several properties at the south east corner of Durand and Short streets in EL to City Center multi-family, which could mean something interesting. Public Notice - City Pulse
Can't tell if this would happen, but as someone who used to live up that way I would 100% approve of removing the high rock fence toward the NE corner of the property. Made it so there was zero visibility between cars leaving the station and anyone on the Saginaw sidewalk until the people on the sidewalk actually stepped into the driveway. I have this dream that someday planning commissions will actually think about such safety threats.
PS - why not build up to the corner? I'm not sure they can mind you, because I think that land was reserved by the city to (possibly some day) add wide yield lanes between Saginaw and Abbot. But it seems increasingly unlikely that will ever happen (especially as it would totally disfigure the Medical Society property) so... why keep reserving the land for it?
The Abbot Road frontage was improved for pedestrians in this redesign. There are now less interruptions in the sidewalk, but there is still a three lane path that needs to be crossed. It would be nice to put a pedestrian island between the right-turning (northbound) land and the bidirectional lanes.
On the Saginaw side the blind spots will still exist, as you can see there will be trees and some kind of decorative wall or plantings that surround the Saginaw entrance. Placing those decorations further from the sidewalk would be a simple fix, or building them in a tapered fashion so that it doesn't block the views could also work.
1. Images of Proposed New Building Made Available; Parking Plan Unclear: http://eastlansinginfo.org/content/images-proposed-new-building-made-available-parking-plan-unclear
2. EL Going Green” Crowdfunding Campaign Launch Event to Take Place Thursday, Sept. 1: http://www.cityofeastlansing.com/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=430
"The “EL Going Green” Crowdfunding Campaign, hosted through the Michigan-based crowdfunding platform Patronicity, seeks to raise $30,000 in community funds by Sept. 30 to support the installation of at least 20 new sets of public refuse/recycling containers and 40 new bike parking locations in downtown East Lansing."
hood, I found out about the site either on the BRT thread or on a recent thread on Spartan Tailgate (http://michiganstate.247sports.com/Board/93/Contents/New-Development-East-Lansing-will-it-happen-this-time-46792686). Spartan Tailgate is an MSU athletics-oriented site but, I assume, that, given the high profile of that project in EL, some one decided to talk a little about it.
Comments
http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/local/2016/08/15/east-lansing-eyes-6m-parking-garage-project/88763750/
PDF with elevations (rough sketches)
8/26/2016 Planning Commission Agenda (see item7b)
Also, there was a public notice in the City Pulse about the rezoning of several properties at the south east corner of Durand and Short streets in EL to City Center multi-family, which could mean something interesting.
Public Notice - City Pulse
On the Saginaw side the blind spots will still exist, as you can see there will be trees and some kind of decorative wall or plantings that surround the Saginaw entrance. Placing those decorations further from the sidewalk would be a simple fix, or building them in a tapered fashion so that it doesn't block the views could also work.
2. EL Going Green” Crowdfunding Campaign Launch Event to Take Place Thursday, Sept. 1: http://www.cityofeastlansing.com/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=430
"The “EL Going Green” Crowdfunding Campaign, hosted through the Michigan-based crowdfunding platform Patronicity, seeks to raise $30,000 in community funds by Sept. 30 to support the installation of at least 20 new sets of public refuse/recycling containers and 40 new bike parking locations in downtown East Lansing."
That "eastlansinginfo.com" site appears to be regularly updated with well-written articles, how did you come across it?