Legacy Union (former Charlotte Observer redevelopment)

[Blue_Devil]

With Honeywell reaching completion, the Bank of America tower fully leased and the Deloitte tower about 70% leased, will we hear anything about tower 4 in the next year? Will it be luxury apartments, a new condo tower, or Spec office space. 

[Hushpuppy321]

On 3/17/2021 at 7:57 AM, Blue_Devil said:

With Honeywell reaching completion, the Bank of America tower fully leased and the Deloitte tower about 70% leased, will we hear anything about tower 4 in the next year? Will it be luxury apartments, a new condo tower, or Spec office space. 

All True but there is still so much uncertainty in the economy right now.   Office is slow and people are still working from home largely but if I had to guess I would say that another Office Building here (LU4) is still more likely than either Apartments or Hotel.  Hotel industry has been savaged and may need several years of recovering occupancy and occupancy rates before anything major is started.  Apartments are more likely than Hotel but less likely than Office because of the glut coming online from LMC (1st Ward) & NWR (Graham St), add to that the fact that NWR will break ground this year on a Midtown High Rise Apartment building.

Uptown is still an Office Meca while the close-in neighborhoods explode with residential growth.  LU4 if I had to guess probably would be announced late 2021\early 2022 but not started until late 2022.  South End Office construction is putting pressure on Uptown starts in this slow environment, especially once the East-West Tower starts construction later this year.

I hope i am wrong and see everything explode\take off with groundbreakings later this year but we will see....

Edited March 18, 2021 by Hushpuppy321

[DMann]

I think that if another bank, USBank, or one of the major NY banks decide to increase Charlotte presence, it will be downtown, no where else.

[KJHburg]

I believe the next tower at Legacy will be office as well but ONLY if an anchor tenant is found and I think it will be the size approx. of Deloitte tower.  Uptown apartment market needs to absorb the inventory it has and eventually a hotel and residential will be built at Legacy.  The office market is still all up in the air right now and we do have a lot of inventory and vacant space uptown now with BofA Plaza or whatever it is called,  400 South Tryon will be basically almost empty once Duke moves out etc.   Plus there is a bunch of new office space coming online in Southend which is a competitor for uptown for many tenants. 

[Mgelbach]

[KJHburg]

still like these buildings.  Hope more join them soon.  Legacy 2 home on Deloitte and now Robinhood.  

Today. 

[vrek]

 

why do people do this? Is it kinda like pissing on a bush? 

and why does my phone upload sideways pics? 

Edited May 5, 2021 by vrek

[tarhoosier]

Welcome VREK and join the fray. Sideways photo, dunno.

[michaelef]

I'm sure since this on the Legacy building it will be cleaned up in no time but you can always report graffiti 

https://servicerequest.charlottenc.gov/service/GRAFFITI

[SpiritOf76]

[CLTNative]

20 hours ago, SpiritOf76 said:

Aw. The little Westin that could...

Edited May 10, 2021 by CLTNative

[a2theb]

On my morning run this AM and noticed that the brick sidewalk along Church on the BOAT side is not holding up very well. A lot of spots in rough shape.

[DMann]

Anyone else ready for the next Legacy Union building?

[Blue_Devil]

1 hour ago, DMann said:

Anyone else ready for the next Legacy Union building?

I think we will get an Apartment Highrise in the next year here. Maybe a spec office announcement since the Deloitte building is almost fully leased. 

[CharlotteWkndBuzz]

6 minutes ago, Blue_Devil said:

I think we will get an Apartment Highrise in the next year here. Maybe a spec office announcement since the Deloitte building is almost fully leased. 

I hope so...LU needs some 24/7 foot traffic walking around that area.  Or a hotel or combo of both.  The last plots there are all along Stonewall too, I expect plenty of retail.  LH needs to take a page out of Crescent's book and look across the street at Ally (limited lobby vs more retail).  LU can easily fit 3-4 more towers...lets just hope there's no more standalone parking decks in the future.  

Edited June 7, 2021 by CharlotteWkndBuzz

[norm21499]

4 minutes ago, CharlotteWkndBuzz said:

I hope so...LU needs some 24/7 foot traffic walking around that area.  Or a hotel or combo of both.  The last plots there are all along Stonewall too, I expect plenty of retail.  LH needs to take a page out of Crescent's book and look across the street at Ally (limited lobby vs more retail).  LU can easily fit 3-4 more towers...lets just hope there's no more standalone parking decks in the future.  

I'm going to be a pessimist and say. I don't expect much retail.

 

[RANYC]

4 hours ago, DMann said:

Anyone else ready for the next Legacy Union building?

Another bldg will do nothing to enliven the pedestrian experience on this block unless there's major design and configuration changes.

[atlrvr]

6 hours ago, DMann said:

Anyone else ready for the next Legacy Union building?

Go on...

[j-man]

7 hours ago, RANYC said:

Another bldg will do nothing to enliven the pedestrian experience on this block unless there's major design and configuration changes.

I disagree. If most of the save left goes to hotel/apartments, with its close location to the stadium. I think this could be a very lively area for pedestrians so lots of retail sounds like it would work. Just imagine a huge hotel to support all that new office space and fans at the stadium. 

[uptownliving]

Has anyone else noticed the strong wind tunnel effect on this block of Tryon between Hill St and Stonewall?  As a pedestrian and cyclist it is very noticeable. None of the restaurants along this block will be able to have outdoor seating on Tryon.

The wind tunnel effect is much stronger on this block than any other block in the Uptown area.

I know there was a rezoning for the Deloitte building to bring it closer to the street than was normally allowed and thinking this has amplified the wind tunnel effect on this block.

Until this wind tunnel effect is solved I expect the pedestrian experience to be very limited on this block.

[KJHburg]

I think the next building at the Legacy site will be a residential tower but on the 2nd block closer to the stadium. (heard some rumors thereof)   Office will depend on whether they can get some interest from an anchor tenant the building would be similar in size to the Legacy 2 tower Deloitte tower.  (and it will be on the corner of Tryon and Stonewall) 

[tozmervo]

5 hours ago, uptownliving said:

Has anyone else noticed the strong wind tunnel effect on this block of Tryon between Hill St and Stonewall?  As a pedestrian and cyclist it is very noticeable. None of the restaurants along this block will be able to have outdoor seating on Tryon.

The wind tunnel effect is much stronger on this block than any other block in the Uptown area.

I know there was a rezoning for the Deloitte building to bring it closer to the street than was normally allowed and thinking this has amplified the wind tunnel effect on this block.

Until this wind tunnel effect is solved I expect the pedestrian experience to be very limited on this block.

I can recall pretty bad wind tunnel effects just after DEC was built. I dunno if it's just because you're at the edge of a kind of abyss where there's nothing to dampen the wind? 

[RANYC]

16 hours ago, j-man said:

I disagree. If most of the save left goes to hotel/apartments, with its close location to the stadium. I think this could be a very lively area for pedestrians so lots of retail sounds like it would work. Just imagine a huge hotel to support all that new office space and fans at the stadium. 

I disagree.  It all starts with design.  We have mid and high-rise residential buildings in Charlotte, even proximal to gathering places, and the areas around them are dead as doorknobs, bereft of a density of pedestrians and of street-level vitality.  Build a huge high-rise bldg with no ground-level retail, then yes it will be nice having additional bodies living in Uptown, but the bldg's presence won't mean you've got a vibrant district.  Thankfully, Crescent's own additions may be compelling enough to spill over to whatever LU does, but again, we have plenty of examples in Charlotte where stacking bodies doesn't mean a vibrant streetscape.

[Blue_Devil]

1 hour ago, RANYC said:

I disagree.  It all starts with design.  We have mid and high-rise residential buildings in Charlotte, even proximal to gathering places, and the areas around them are dead as doorknobs, bereft of a density of pedestrians and of street-level vitality.  Build a huge high-rise bldg with no ground-level retail, then yes it will be nice having additional bodies living in Uptown, but the bldg's presence won't mean you've got a vibrant district.  Thankfully, Crescent's own additions may be compelling enough to spill over to whatever LU does, but again, we have plenty of examples in Charlotte where stacking bodies doesn't mean a vibrant streetscape.

I mean, Uptown doesn't have enough people living in it to support that. If another 5000 units are built in uptown, and another 10,000 directly around in SouthEnd, MoreHead, Midtown, etc. then you are going to have a city that feels a lot less dead in the off hours. Walk around Chicago, there are a lot of older areas with no street level retail, and the city still feels plenty alive due to the amount of people actually living in the area. Uptown is missing that. 

There are a lot of areas with lines of empty storefronts. They are empty because there isn't enough of a population actually living there to make use of them. SouthEnd doesn't have this problem with al of the apartments. The retail thrives. If you build a bunch of 800 unit apartment towers on Stonewall (2 on the Legacy site, and more in 2nd Ward) there is going to be a much more active walking population and street feel. 

[RANYC]

23 minutes ago, Blue_Devil said:

I mean, Uptown doesn't have enough people living in it to support that. If another 5000 units are built in uptown, and another 10,000 directly around in SouthEnd, MoreHead, Midtown, etc. then you are going to have a city that feels a lot less dead in the off hours. Walk around Chicago, there are a lot of older areas with no street level retail, and the city still feels plenty alive due to the amount of people actually living in the area. Uptown is missing that. 

There are a lot of areas with lines of empty storefronts. They are empty because there isn't enough of a population actually living there to make use of them. SouthEnd doesn't have this problem with al of the apartments. The retail thrives. If you build a bunch of 800 unit apartment towers on Stonewall (2 on the Legacy site, and more in 2nd Ward) there is going to be a much more active walking population and street feel. 

I've been on the Main Streets of tiny american towns with more street level vibrancy than many parts of uptown.  They've a fraction of the nearby residences that we have in uptown Charlotte and South-End, and yet pull off quite a bit of street-level vitality.  Have seen the same in town after town and hamlet after hamlet in Europe.  Not big populations, but vibrant and walkable commercial corridors, almost like small-scale pedestrian malls, contributing to small-town bustle.  This is about an inviting streetscape that makes people tread paths and linger awhile - yes, a downtown streetscape design and set of ground-level interactions that make people want to linger awhile.  If that's the design focus, rather than stacking bodies or hotel rooms or offices, then you'll get the activity you want.

I'm optimistic about what's happening at 101 Independence.  There's a prime example of street-level activation of what was once a very dense office building - but irrespective of that vertical population density, the streetscape was largely barren and certainly not "Linger-worthy."  Now with the changes being made, I'm more optimistic about the vibrancy potential of that block - of course now they'll need to get the space leased up again.  My simple point is that no matter how tall the building and no matter how full of uses, if the ground-level isn't engaging, you can still end up with a dead block.  And vice versa, you can have a low-rise or single story building in uptown, and end up with a block that's engaging as hell. 

Edited June 8, 2021 by RANYC