If you would like to take in an unusual sight on campus, take a look at Spartan Stadium. They have removed most of the scoreboards that ringed the north side of the stadium except for the frames which gives a good view of the original curved wall of the stadium. I don't know if they are going to use the framing. Maybe there will be holographic images projected over the field!:}
The upcoming MSU BoT meeting has an authorization to proceed for the new Olympic sports arena and surrounding development, this project is moving much faster than I anticipated. I attached a pdf with renderings and more info. Fairly impressive.
Had not even heard of this one. Wow. Pretty nice siting. I'm not sure I understand the ground lease and all of that. Would that be for the whole site or part of it? I don't understand why they wouldn't just be co-developer with whoever they partner with in the private-sector.
It says that the developer (who apparently has already been selected), is responsible for financing the hotel, market rate housing, retail/office, and parking. So in the site plan that'd be the buildings labeled "Hotel", "Residential + Retail", "Office + Retail", and "Parking Garage". MSU will finance the $150 million area. I have no idea the logic behind this particular land lease agreement. I'm not surprised that MSU doesn't want direct involvement in the two mixed use buildings, I'm a little surprised that they're not going to own the hotel. I wonder if they'll operate it?
The arena is slated for a late 2027 completion, the hotel and parking garage in 2028, the two office/retail/residential buildings in 2030, and the rest TBD. I'd expect to see arena construction start this year.
I'm so glad to see them reuse this space on campus. I'd worried they were going to leave this area "greenspace" and sprawl their development, so I'm pleasantly surprised. It looks like they really want to bring up the Harrison corridor as another axis, which only makes sense. You've got the train station basically across the street from here, and since it sits on two different rail lines, they can actually add a line service to Grand Rapids - Detroit if the state ever gets its act together on transit.
This project is very impressive. If I could wish, I'd wish this was being planned for downtown Lansing. This is the kind of big project we need downtown; however, I am sure it will benefit the whole Lansing community. This weekend there were several events happening on campus and there were tons of people downtown EL shopping and dining [a line outside of Cain's] with this development I could see Greater Lansing/MSU hosting major events like they have in Indianapolis that would bring people here filling all the hotels.
IMO this is kinda something you'd see in a suburb vs what I'd label an appealing gateway into campus. I think these are just initial renderings and not final, but right now they're adding 600+ parking spaces and two of the lots are surface parking. I personally hate those parking lots they put right in front of buildings like they did w/ 1855. This rendering also shows a completely new road added, along with extending Birch road into Trowbridge Road. this doesn't look like it aligns w/ the Master plan and hopefully they reign in the surface parking a bit.
Certainly, I can always do with less surface parking. But it fits in with the surrounding neighborhood, which is suburban. You're not going to build a new "downtown" off of Trowbridge; you wouldn't want to. This is far more dense than anything I expected them to propose down this way, and certainly more urban-minded than the Trowbridge Plaza across the street.
Comments
https://spartanfund.net/ways-to-give/facility-projects/
https://trustees.msu.edu/meetings/documents/2025/BF2-PROCEED - Spartan Gateway District.pdf
The arena is slated for a late 2027 completion, the hotel and parking garage in 2028, the two office/retail/residential buildings in 2030, and the rest TBD. I'd expect to see arena construction start this year.