Project Roosevelt - Southwest Side

[organsnyder]

Interesting:

http://therapidian.org/habitat-humanity-kent-county-announces-20-million-plaza-roosevelt-redevelopment-project

[RegalTDP]

A press conference announcing this project scheduled for Monday at 10:00am: http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2016/11/major_development_announcement.html#incart_river_home

Lots of partners on this - will be interesting to see what they're planning.

Quote

 The proposed Plaza Roosevelt Development would be a mix of education, healthcare, affordable housing, and other projects that eight community partners are to discuss as a "cutting-edge new agreement to begin site planning work," according to an advisory.

The proposed Plaza Roosevelt Development will be on two city blocks on the east side of Grandville Avenue between Graham Street on the north and Franklin Street on the south. Rumsey Street separates the two blocks of the project area.

Edited November 19, 2016 by RegalTDP

[joeDowntown]

Seems like former Site:Lab sites always end up getting redeveloped into great spaces. 

Joe

[GRDadof3]

This Habitat mixed use project was always a part of the Site:Lab Rumsey Street area. The additional partners are a welcome surprise but actually not really that surprising. 

I thought it was supposed to kick off last year so I was surprised that Site:Lab was there again at AP this year. 

[GRDadof3]

More details. Project will include a GRPS Spanish Immersion School, which already has 200 students on a waiting list apparently. I know the Forest Hills Spanish Immersion program/school is very popular. It will also include an expanded Metro Health facility, and residential/retail. 

http://woodtv.com/2016/11/21/inside-the-plans-for-grand-rapids-plaza-roosevelt/

 

 

 

[RegalTDP]

2 hours ago, GRDadof3 said:

More details. Project will include a GRPS Spanish Immersion School, which already has 200 students on a waiting list apparently. I know the Forest Hills Spanish Immersion program/school is very popular. It will also include an expanded Metro Health facility, and residential/retail. 

http://woodtv.com/2016/11/21/inside-the-plans-for-grand-rapids-plaza-roosevelt/

Mercy Health, not Metro.

This is terrific.  A real boost to neighborhood identity for Roosevelt Park.

[GRDadof3]

Plaza Roosevelt is coming together. 

 

[GR_Urbanist]

Hey now! This is pretty good!

 

Buildings at the street. Parking in the back! And a plaza that is placed by someone that actually knows what the definition of the word is.

[GR8scott]

Like the layout just wish there was a little more height than all 2 and 3 story buildings. 

[GRDadof3]

20 hours ago, GR8scott said:

Like the layout just wish there was a little more height than all 2 and 3 story buildings. 

I disagree. Right across the street is all single family homes along there. Anything taller than 2 and 3 stories would have been out-of-scale and looked weird. 

[GVSUChris]

Here's a pretty comprehensive packet of renderings for the new GRPS high school. 

https://media.woodtv.com/nxs-woodtv-media-us-east-1/document_dev/2019/01/08/grand rapids southwest community campus high school renderings_1546978969173_66874802_ver1.0.pdf

[GRDadof3]

1 hour ago, GVSUChris said:

Here's a pretty comprehensive packet of renderings for the new GRPS high school. 

https://media.woodtv.com/nxs-woodtv-media-us-east-1/document_dev/2019/01/08/grand rapids southwest community campus high school renderings_1546978969173_66874802_ver1.0.pdf

Great project, terrible design. Looks like a detention center IMO.

[organsnyder]

22 minutes ago, GRDadof3 said:

Great project, terrible design. Looks like a detention center IMO.

Maybe it's a nod to historical prisonesque GRPS designs?

 

[GR_Urbanist]

39 minutes ago, GRDadof3 said:

Great project, terrible design. Looks like a detention center IMO.

Same thing that happened to courthouse design between the mid 90s and 2002 (like ours).

 

Security takes the front seat in the design above all else. Interior looks nice at least.

[GRDadof3]

Work is progressing on Project Roosevelt. You can clearly see it all going on from 131 around Century Ave.

A really interesting feature they included is a bike-track that goes down to Century, and now Century also has a bike-track that leads to downtown. I do like separated bike infrastructure if there's room and the budget for it. Ahem, Ada...

 

 

 

 

 

[joeDowntown]

The bike path on century is nice, however, I drive century every day and have never once seen someone on a bike. So either people still need to find it, or the if you build it, they will come approach isn’t working. 

Joe

[JoeSchmo]

I was looking at a heat map for biking the other day (by Strava) and noticed for whatever reason the heat map is relatively dark on much of the SW side.

https://www.strava.com/heatmap#13.12/-85.68638/42.93998/hot/all

Kinda interesting map either way.

 

 

[GRDadof3]

12 hours ago, JoeSchmo said:

I was looking at a heat map for biking the other day (by Strava) and noticed for whatever reason the heat map is relatively dark on much of the SW side.

https://www.strava.com/heatmap#13.12/-85.68638/42.93998/hot/all

Kinda interesting map either way.

 

 

Yes because Strava is the go-to app for your average low-income Hispanic cyclist. lol

[JoeSchmo]

1 hour ago, GRDadof3 said:

Yes because Strava is the go-to app for your average low-income Hispanic cyclist. lol

Either way, its the darkest area in the city.  Other areas of GR with matched income and population densities are not as dark.

I was just adding it because I thought it was interesting and relevant.   And I would probably argue further that the demographic of low income Hispanics are not going to bike very much and if they do ...they aren't going to use bike trails like the one on Century either.

[GRDadof3]

15 hours ago, JoeSchmo said:

Either way, its the darkest area in the city.  Other areas of GR with matched income and population densities are not as dark.

I was just adding it because I thought it was interesting and relevant.   And I would probably argue further that the demographic of low income Hispanics are not going to bike very much and if they do ...they aren't going to use bike trails like the one on Century either.

That is pretty true. Although maybe they're thinking with all of the residential and a 500 student high school that easy bike access to the Rapid would be good.

[joeDowntown]

The school may still end up having a bit of a brutalist design, but I think the concrete panels look a lot better than the renderings showed. 

 

[andrew.w]

I honestly think the school's design was very much disserviced by it's renderings, and I think the overall result is going to be positive. The worst part of design is the look of the gymnasium and it's relation to the street. The part facing the plaza is pretty glassy, playfully colorful, and the window pattern and scale should relate pretty well to a residential neighborhood.

[joeDowntown]

Some updated photos. They have a big Erickson crane out there working on the school. The Habitat homes across the street look pretty nice, and I'm really impressed by the row houses. 

 

Oh, and Kerkstra is out there delivering some pretty massive pre-cast concrete walls (you can see one being installed by the crane in the last photo).

[Chester Cheeto]

Don't think construction will be slowing on this site anytime soon, drawings just came out for these two buildings (sorry don't have any renderings to pass along):