372 replies to this topic

[qwertycc]

http://www.bizjourna...tml?jst=b_ln_hl

It's good to see that things are still moving on for One Beale even with the Vue's problems.  Hopefully this project will start soon.  And now a 30-story separate tower for the hotel!  Great news.  I hope to see new renderings soon.

Edited by qwertycc, 08 August 2006 - 01:32 PM.

[pjj4000]

oh hell yeah.

that's about all that can be said.  i hope this comes together.

[Fellowmann20]

Awesome! Sounds like One Beale is serious!

[gaushell]

Fellowmann20, on Aug 8 2006, 02:50 PM, said:

Awesome! Sounds like One Beale is serious!

A basic website goes live tonight

www.1beale.com - right now it just has a stand in logo page.

Look for site around 6pm

Edited by gaushell, 08 August 2006 - 02:52 PM.

[bluff2085]

I am really excited about seeing these new renderings.  Are you saying they will be on the website tonight?

[gaushell]

bluff2085, on Aug 8 2006, 03:35 PM, said:

I am really excited about seeing these new renderings.  Are you saying they will be on the website tonight?

No renderings yet. Just the registration website.

Edited by gaushell, 08 August 2006 - 02:50 PM.

[Clobber]

Not only is it going forward, but it's going to be bigger than earlier announced?!!  Not just in height, but number?!!

30 story hotel?!!  27 story condo?!!  Sorry about all the ?!!'s. (?!!)  That's better than I hoped.

Ref to excerpt:
The revised plan calls for designated separate towers for the luxury hotel and condominium units. In the new plan, a 30-story hotel tower gives way to a slightly smaller 27-story condo tower on the south side of the property. In addition, a 435-space underground parking garage will be constructed on the site at Beale and Front.

!!

Edit:  Previously, Maki (of the CA) said the north Main church tower (27 stories) would be the tallest since Morgan Keegan.  With 30/27 stories here, that's not going to be true.  And could the 30 get a crown?  Can't wait for the renderings.

Edited by Clobber, 08 August 2006 - 03:10 PM.

[Bears]

It's not really the height of the buildings I'm excited about, its the tie in with Beale Street Landing. This will be a great addition to the waterfront, especially with the trolley going right by the area. A 30 story hotel will be just what we need to attract more international conventions. Now if we could only redevelop the Sterick into another luxury hotel...

[Psalm 91]

Bears, on Aug 8 2006, 04:25 PM, said:

Now if we could only redevelop the Sterick into another luxury hotel...

Quite true.  I know you're not keen on the height of the buildings, but, I like the quote from Sanford:
"It is a skyline altering project."

[AmandaHugginkiss]

Good news for Memphis. Wasn't the original height under 100 meters tall? I, too, think that the project ties to the Beale Landing project very well.

[gaushell]

Looks like website will be delayed until the morning. I'll let you know when it is up.

[cdarr]

Wow!  I'm excited about downtown again after the Vue letdown.  With the "church tower" on the north and these two towers on the south, our skyline would look dramatically different.  Plus we'll have the two Horizon condos further south by the old bridges.

[pjj4000]

cdarr, on Aug 8 2006, 10:52 PM, said:

Wow!  I'm excited about downtown again after the Vue letdown.  With the "church tower" on the north and these two towers on the south, our skyline would look dramatically different.  Plus we'll have the two Horizon condos further south by the old bridges.

Man, how about a rendering of all of that... wow... that would be something.

[bluff2085]

3 new high rises now, none of them office.  If we could just get one nice, new office tower.  Many posters have commented on DT's high vacancy rates, which do not justify new office towers.  I agree that the future of office buildings in Memphis is much brighter in the Poplar corridor where low vacancies make taller office towers the reasonable next step in office development.  At the same time, I have read (maybe from another post?) how Class A office space is more desirable when it is new.  What new office space has entered the DT market since Peabody Place? I'm really speculating here but it seems like a 'scraper in DT w/ some brand new Class A space might actually attract some major tenants.

These two Beale st. high rises on the south side of the DT skyline will also allow the old Vue site to become well positioned for a new tallest.  That's if the RFP's from the CCC can attract a developer interested enough in building something that tall (35-40 stories).  A mixed use tower with equally large office and residential/hotel portions could achieve that pretty easily.  I think with a little more momentum it's possible.

Edited by bluff2085, 08 August 2006 - 10:59 PM.

[Clobber]

bluff2085, on Aug 8 2006, 11:56 PM, said:

3 new high rises now, none of them office.  If we could just get one nice, new office tower.  Many posters have commented on DT's high vacancy rates, which do not justify new office towers.  I agree that the future of office buildings in Memphis is much brighter in the Poplar corridor where low vacancies make taller office towers the reasonable next step in office development.  At the same time, I have read (maybe from another post?) how Class A office space is more desirable when it is new.  What new office space has entered the DT market since Peabody Place? I'm really speculating here but it seems like a 'scraper in DT w/ some brand new Class A space might actually attract some major tenants.

These two Beale st. high rises on the south side of the DT skyline will also allow the old Vue site to become well positioned for a new tallest.  That's if the RFP's from the CCC can attract a developer interested enough in building something that tall (35-40 stories).  A mixed use tower with equally large office and residential/hotel portions could achieve that pretty easily.  I think with a little more momentum it's possible.

On top of an 8 or so story garage, how about 10-15 stories each of office/retail, residential, and hotel?

[gaushell]

Website is now live. Still adjusting the intro video playback.

[jmduke]

It's good to see a project apparently going forward and expanding in the process, but some recent events and statements by downtown-oriented officials cause concern about the long-term success of this project as well as seeing other future projects come to fruition.

The attraction to living in a downtown condo or a single-family home on Mud Island (in my case) is the close proximity to work, dining, and entertainment.  We don't have to spend an additional hundreds or even thousands of hours per year in our cars because most of what we need is within a few miles of where we live.

Lately, SunTrust stated they might move significant portions of their Commerce Square operations out east.  Other relocations have passed on downtown in favor of East Memphis or other areas, and there's no great push for additional Class A office space downtown.  While the amount of small business growth downtown has been great the past 15 years, don't you think it will take the addition of one or more large corporate employers downtown to help continue the downtown residential growth?  Would downtown growth have been as swift as it was in the late 1990s had AutoZone not relocated to Front Street?

In essence, if the CCC decides to cede the new office/corporate-type jobs to East Memphis, they may hinder the downtown residential growth as the morning 30+ minute eastbound commutes on Union/Poplar/Sam Cooper aren't as attractive as 5 minutes up South Main (or walking or taking the trolley) to downtown.

The same goes for the luxury hotel.  That kind of hotel is designed for the well-to-do business treveler, and the downtown market will be saturated with upscale hotels soon when this project opens, and these properties are nowhere near FedEx, International Paper, Harrah's, and the other large corporate employers out east.  Some have mentioned the One Beale hotel project might help lure larger conventions.  It and the Westin will help boost available downtown rooms and might make Memphis more attractive for an NBA All-Star game down the road, but large conventions will need 200-300,000 more square feet than the Cook Convention Center currently has plus an additional 2 or 3 Hyatt/Sheraton/Renaissance-type hotels in the 500+ room range nearby for ease of handling all the convention-goers.  One large Marriott with other hotels farther away do not lure conventions that normally go to places like Dallas, Atlanta, and Indianapolis.

I don't want to sound down on this project because I am not.  I think it's great, it looks great, and I hope it goes forward and even gets expanded more.  But, there are some small concerns that the powers-that-be may not be willing to continue the heavy lifting to make large downtown projects such as these successful in the long run.

[Bears]

^True. But Downtown shouldn't simply cede to East Memphis. Competion is a good thing. And I would think that the last expansion the Convention Center had still stings since it went way over budget. Come to think of it, there isn't even much room left to expand so a new convention center is kinda out of the question. As for the strategy to fill in hotel space, the Reasearch Park in the Med District should take care of that. It might even attract medical instrument companies to locate downtown. We could also go after Nike, since 90% of their products go through the Port of Memphis. Service Master will probably move to East Memphis though. Another question I posed in the Beale St. Landing thread was the justification of the cost of building the dock. There are only a few cruises a year so a ferry to Tunica-Memphis-Wolf River (if its not to shallow) could bring alot more people to the dock, plus the high rolling tourists who don't want to stay in Tunica. Tunica's hotel occupancy was around 90% before Katrina, so its probably around 95% now. Add in Bass Pro and in the end, we might have a hotel shortage    

Another question the CCC should ask themselves is "What can downtown offer that East Memphis can't?" The CCC helps with site selection but big corparations usually figure it out for themselves. Downtown has better infrastructure (light rail, 2 airports, nice resturants and hotels within walking distance, etc.). Another thing the CCC should focus on is making their entire coverage area a Wi-fi zone.

Here's an exceprt from the Smart City blog:

Wi-Fi

Dozens of governments are developing broadband networks, but Memphis isn’t one of them. New York’s Central Park is becoming wireless. Philadelphia, Portland and Milwaukee have launched programs to become citywide “hot spots” in the next 18 months. Suffolk County, New York, has kicked off a wireless system over an area larger than Shelby County – more than 900 square miles.

In Atlanta, Mayor Shirley Franklin has introduced the “Atlanta Dashboard.” Based on corporate dashboards, it keeps city government managers focused on goals and indicators of success. Most of all, it opens a window for citizens to judge how city operations are performing.

In Boston, Mayor Thomas Menino is equipping all city vehicles to be “digital street assessment tools,” so they can measure vibrations created by rough roads and potholes and send the data to a computer that maps locations using GPS. Shanghai, China, is doing much the same thing, but the perpetually updated map is also used by private companies who pay so they know which routes are best for their deliveries on a given day.

Wireless Cities

In an Intel survey of wireless cities, Memphis ranked 68th, behind Nashville, Knoxville, Little Rock, Omaha and Tulsa; University of Memphis didn’t make the top 100 wireless college campuses; Memphis International Airport isn’t listed in the top 25 wireless airports; and unsurprisingly, neither local government ever makes the annual winners’ lists for digital cities or counties.

This about much more than bragging rights. It’s about better government -- e-government.

At its most basic, it applies technology to improve administrative functions and a greater sharing of information within government. More to the point, it’s about transforming the relationship between government and the people it serves.

It’s about creating government that’s open for business when we need it, 24/7/365. It’s about citizen-centric government that flattens the public bureaucracy, and it’s about increasing government efficiency and productivity, promoting transparency and accountability, and inviting the public into discussions and decisions.

And all it takes is for the mayors to order it to be done. There are few things they can do that can have more impact on our attitude and power as taxpayers.
http://smartcitymemp...iority-for.html

Wireless internet is the infrastructure of the future and Oakland County, MI (suburban Detroit) is investing in coating the entire county with Wi-Fi.

Edit- Here's an example of one company that formed possibly because of St. Jude http://www.memphisda.../...x?&id=93858
Oh yea, St. Jude's expansion might also fill in a couple more of those hotel rooms  

Edited by Bears, 09 August 2006 - 10:35 AM.

[memphica]

Guys, Would someone please post the Biz Jounal article on here so i can read it.  I have tried to pull it up several times and my computer keeps locking up when i go there.  I have no idea why it is doing this i'm surfing everywhere else but as soon as I click on that it locks up.  I would really appreciate it.  Also I am sooo exctied about the new 2 tower plan, the video on sight is awesome wish it showed both of them side by side still. Thanks in advance

[Bears]

memphica, on Aug 9 2006, 12:59 PM, said:

bears, I really do appreciate that!  Good read and I'm exited to see anything going up in memphis with glass lol.  There are three things i like reading about... NEW Skyscrapers, The idea of crowns on existing buildings at least NBC / Suntrust and light it up memphis.  I'm a proud Memphian who LOVES downtown.  Thanks again bears i've been trying to read that all morning.

No problem. Welcome to the forum. Hope ya bring some great ideas here.

Edited by Bears, 09 August 2006 - 11:01 AM.