New projects in Monroe North

[Chester Cheeto]

There was a crew taking soil samples at the new Icon on Bond site this afternoon.

[GRDadof3]

On 11/15/2015 at 9:40 AM, GRDadof3 said:

More drawings of 601 Bond. This goes before the ZBA on November 19th at Noon, Development Center.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even yet new drawings of 601 Bond. This time they've beefed up the parking levels and show comparisons to the JW Marriott parking garage, for their parking levels. 

 

 

It certainly has more continuity but no balconies? That's odd..

Maybe because they had to pump more money into the parking levels they value-engineered the balconies out? And replaced them with the rooftop common balcony?

 

[joeDowntown]

Hmm. Not the prettiest looking building. I actually liked the use of materials on the other rendering better. Are you sure there were ever balconies in the first rendering? It's hard to tell. Nice to see they are actively working on the project. I notice that it says "Option 3" in the rendering. Can we take a public vote on options 1 - 3? haha.

Joe

[GR_Urbanist]

It's fairly standard-issue infill. It's putting bodies in the area, and not devoting any land to a surface parking lot.  Guess you really cant ask for much more as it gets the job done, which is what this part of town needs.

Edited February 3, 2016 by GR_Urbanist

[GRDadof3]

It does appear to be "actual" masonry, like Icon I. That's good. Ground floor retail, the upper portion blends with the lower. That whole block to the East and to the South will be eventually filled in so you'll most likely only see the upper floors from Monroe and the riverfront. I'll give it a 3.5 out 5.0.  I'd give it a 4.0 if it had some variation in brick color. 

4 minutes ago, GR_Urbanist said:

It's fairly standard-issue infill. it's putting bodies in the area, and not devoting any land to a surface parking lot.  guess you really cant ask for much more as it gets the job done, which is what this part of town needs.

 

[joeDowntown]

I guess I liked the variation in materials in the first Rendering. This feels like a giant warehouse renovation. Fine with something "fitting in" with the existing buildings, but this reminds me of a tall version of 100 Grandville. 

Joe

[getemngo]

If this does get approved at the full 16 stories/172 feet, it would become the 12th tallest building in Grand Rapids, slotting between Gallery on Fulton and the Campau Square Plaza Building. Stub City indeed.

The 13 story version would be a hair shorter than the Pantlind.

[ant33]

agreed, but i'll take whatever we can get.

[ironyisadeadscene]

7 hours ago, getemngo said:

If this does get approved at the full 16 stories/172 feet, it would become the 12th tallest building in Grand Rapids, slotting between Gallery on Fulton and the Campau Square Plaza Building. Stub City indeed.

The 13 story version would be a hair shorter than the Pantlind.

Stub city, yes. But still at the 120th tallest building, that's an accomplishment on it's own and I'll take it

[GRDadof3]

9 hours ago, ironyisadeadscene said:

Stub city, yes. But still at the 120th tallest building, that's an accomplishment on it's own and I'll take it

12th tallest, not 120th. 

[ant33]

Didn't know what category to put this under, but here we go..

http://www.mlive.com/business/west-michigan/index.ssf/2016/02/3_projects_with_552_apartments.html#incart_river_mobile_home

[ironyisadeadscene]

1 hour ago, GRDadof3 said:

12th tallest, not 120th. 

Typo. I hate my phone.

[egrguy]

Tax breaks were approved for 601 Bond. 

[elcelc]

Any dirt on 800 Bond?  Cool little spot that's been up for sale for a while and seems like its going to get dwarfed soon.  I wonder if it's stuck in a "historical preservation" quagmire.  Not in a bad way (put down your pitchforks!), but a time consuming way.

[GRDadof3]

42 minutes ago, elcelc said:

Any dirt on 800 Bond?  Cool little spot that's been up for sale for a while and seems like its going to get dwarfed soon.  I wonder if it's stuck in a "historical preservation" quagmire.  Not in a bad way (put down your pitchforks!), but a time consuming way.

He wants too much for it, IMO, and it'd be a complicated mixed use project. There's no parking attached to the building, which if you did a restaurant or brewery you'd have to get a variance and provide valet? On-street in that area is a mixed bag. I haven't looked at it in over a year so perhaps 820 Monroe would let you lease spaces in their lot? 

It's really cool on the first floor though and has a lot of character from when it was a small power plant (used to power the streetcar system). Very high ceilings. It's not an historic site nor in an historic district so you have a lot of flexibility to add up if you wanted to. 

The upstairs has a whole section with really low ceilings and huge structural beams. You'd have to get pretty creative (like add on to the top floor). 

http://grbondstreet.blogspot.com/

 

 

[elcelc]

I understand 800 Bond is eligible for the Federal Historic Preservation Tax Incentives program which I only have Google knowledge of.  I though I saw $1.25M somewhere sometime.  That made me wonder if there was more to it than location location location.  You're right, no parking, no elevator...  Cool little oddity though.

[GRDadof3]

13 hours ago, elcelc said:

I understand 800 Bond is eligible for the Federal Historic Preservation Tax Incentives program which I only have Google knowledge of.  I though I saw $1.25M somewhere sometime.  That made me wonder if there was more to it than location location location.  You're right, no parking, no elevator...  Cool little oddity though.

Yeah, it's listed at $1.25 Million, or $132 a square foot according to their calculations.

http://mls.carwm.com/listing/29841971/800-BOND-AVE-NW-Grand-Rapids-MI-49503

There are a number of tax credits that are "available" but you'd have to get the building designated an historic site before you could get the historic preservation tax credits. That's a long arduous process. And once you do that you greatly limit what you can do with the building. And yes, no elevator either.

The other thing that I wondered about was the square footage being marketed is 9400 sf and the city records only show it at 7291 square feet. Until you had an engineer or architect go in and actually measure it for the discrepancy, that seems like a big difference in numbers (22%). If it truly is 7291 square feet of usable space, then they're asking $171/square foot. That shouldn't even be the ending point on a rehab, not less the starting point. 

There was a better deal that sold about a block North for about $300,000 and you got almost a quarter acre of land with it. 

Even the Keeler Building was only listed at $60/sf ($10 Million for 167,000 sf) and was still on the market for about a decade. 

End rant. 

[GRDadof3]

Something's going on at the Icon II site.

 

[GRDadof3]

Gray Skies Distillery. The big round table is interesting. Group tastings? Masons? 

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2016/03/gray_skies_distillery_launches.html

[GRDadof3]

On 11/8/2015 at 4:18 PM, GRDadof3 said:

The Rivers Edge project has been amended a bit to put restaurant seating on the river side of the building (they're seeking a variance). The restaurant has a name, "Shell - A Raw Bar", which I can't imagine they have a restaurant tenant already??

 

 

 

 

This project, 1001 Monroe, goes to the Brownfield Redevelopment Authority for review this week. It's actually relatively small, at 32 units, so I think it may take off this summer. 

[Guest]

1001 Monroe was approved by the Brownfield Authority this morning.    Apartment leasing rates will be very high.   

[GRDadof3]

601 Bond, Icon II, is into the city for permits. (Pioneer Construction)

[joeDowntown]

1 hour ago, GRDadof3 said:

601 Bond, Icon II, is into the city for permits. (Pioneer Construction)

That's exciting. Hope we see final renderings soon. 

[GRDadof3]

57 minutes ago, joeDowntown said:

That's exciting. Hope we see final renderings soon. 

We'll probably see it on the marketing sign when it goes up on the site. 

[joeDowntown]

How long does the process of getting city permits -> seeing a project start to move dirt? Anyone want to make an educated (or uneducated) guess on when we might hear/see something on this project?

Joe