FNB Tower 401 S Graham St (29 floors - 365 feet)

[TGIBridays]

9 hours ago, navigator319 said:

Why would any company looking for office space rent over here in no mans land. Good luck with those five floors. Carry it for 10/15 years and when the duke garage and the residence inn are gone and the stadium is converted for Charlottes MLB team then this will be money. Until then bad ROI.

It's very close to the planned gateway district which when completed will be the transportation hub in uptown, so once that is all built out it'll be very much in the thick of it.  Though like you said, it will probably take 10-15 years for that to materialize.

[CLT @❤️]

From my visit yesterday, the location is up and coming, the views from the building are phenomenal, even from the parking deck. They should have zero trouble leasing the space. 

[RANYC]

19 hours ago, navigator319 said:

Why would any company looking for office space rent over here in no mans land. Good luck with those five floors. Carry it for 10/15 years and when the duke garage and the residence inn are gone and the stadium is converted for Charlottes MLB team then this will be money. Until then bad ROI.

No man's land? - across the street from the baseball park and up the road from the football stadium, two of the largest spots for mass assembly in all of uptown?  It's also currently the closest office space to the new Gateway station.  I think "no man's land" is exaggeratively harsh.

[atlrvr]

https://rebusinessonline.com/dominion-realty-new-york-life-open-29-story-fnb-tower-in-uptown-charlotte/

FNB will occupy more than 40,000 square feet of office space in the building, with additional options to expand in the future, in addition to having a retail bank branch on the ground floor. The building will house the bank’s regional leadership, as well as other departments, such as commercial banking, retail and mortgage banking, wealth management, private banking and insurance.

Foundry Commercial will lead the leasing efforts for the remaining vacant office space in the office component, and RangeWater will lease and manage the apartments, which are already 31 percent preleased.

[navigator319]

13 hours ago, RANYC said:

No man's land? - across the street from the baseball park and up the road from the football stadium, two of the largest spots for mass assembly in all of uptown?  It's also currently the closest office space to the new Gateway station.  I think "no man's land" is exaggeratively harsh.

Both of those are empty 310+ days a year and don't do nothing for activation and livelihood during the time office workers are using the space and location.  Gateway does not exist.  The building is surrounded by blank dead walls all around in all directions.  My point was though, with all the empty space uptown available there are so many better locations that give your employees access to food/drinks/services/coffee and would also provide a nice view.  Why would any employer choose here over 100 Independence,  300 S. Tryon, Grant Thorton, First Citizens and others.  

[a2theb]

52 minutes ago, navigator319 said:

Both of those are empty 310+ days a year and don't do nothing for activation and livelihood during the time office workers are using the space and location.  Gateway does not exist.  The building is surrounded by blank dead walls all around in all directions.  My point was though, with all the empty space uptown available there are so many better locations that give your employees access to food/drinks/services/coffee and would also provide a nice view.  Why would any employer choose here over 100 Independence,  300 S. Tryon, Grant Thorton, First Citizens and others.  

I think the developer made a speculative play building this tower which is great and I hope that side of town continues to grow. With that said, unless FNB got a killer deal (they probably did getting their name on the building with only 2 floors) I have no earthly idea why they decided on this building for the points noted above. There is nothing except for graham st. pub

[KJHburg]

Same could have been said about when the NASCAR Plaza building was built as there was nothing around it either in terms of retail.  This building will lease fine it has on site parking and it is brand new with great views.   There are only 2 other brand new office spaces in uptown the  BOAT and Legacy 2 tower.   It is one/two blocks to retail and restaurants by Romare Bearden Park. And I think it is long term play.  That sprawling low rise parking deck owned by Duke Energy may not be long for the world.  The Gateway center is under way and planning for a huge multi tower  mixed use project there.  Plus some kind of plans for the old training fields of the Panthers.  Actually in a few years it will be in the middle of a thriving district.  The people who make the most money in real estate have always had vision where others see nothing.   

Here is the marketing brochures and the lowest level of office space has quite a view.

RenderingsBook_FNB-Tower-Charlotte_Foundry_20210719_spreads.pdf (foundrycommercial.com)

Edited July 23, 2021 by KJHburg

[CLT @❤️]

https://rebusinessonline.com/dominion-realty-new-york-life-open-29-story-fnb-tower-in-uptown-charlotte/

[navigator319]

[jthomas]

5 minutes ago, navigator319 said:

This picture illustrates well what I dislike about buildings with parking podiums. In my experience, as a pedestrian you only really perceive the bottom 4-5 floors of a building - standing next to a 30-story building doesn't feel much different than standing next to a 5-story building. In this and other podium buildings, those crucial bottom stories are devoid of human activity. This street elevation is a particularly bad example. The ground floor consists of a giant carhole, a lobby entrance, and a bank branch. But even that poor ground level would be somewhat redeemed if there were 4 floors of apartments with balconies above. Instead, this corner looks dead and cold, despite the expensive new development. And it's a shame, because the building is nice otherwise. This is the price we pay when cities prioritize cars over people.

[JRCLT]

This picture illustrates well what I dislike about buildings with parking podiums. In my experience, as a pedestrian you only really perceive the bottom 4-5 floors of a building - standing next to a 30-story building doesn't feel much different than standing next to a 5-story building. In this and other podium buildings, those crucial bottom stories are devoid of human activity. This street elevation is a particularly bad example. The ground floor consists of a giant carhole, a lobby entrance, and a bank branch. But even that poor ground level would be somewhat redeemed if there were 4 floors of apartments with balconies above. Instead, this corner looks dead and cold, despite the expensive new development. And it's a shame, because the building is nice otherwise. This is the price we pay when cities prioritize cars over people.

I mean this not as though I disagree with you, in fact to some extent I do agree. I think at the pedestrian level the only floor that a pedestrian would have any direct interaction with is the first floor and that’s why retail is located and there and that is why it is an important part of a building. Retail on the first floor rather than just more parking is light years better than none at all. The idea of the first few stories being important isn’t entirely true considering the rest of the floors above would have zero interaction with pedestrian except maybe the occasional glance up on the building which doesn’t really affect pedestrian population along the stretch of a building.

I get that it isn’t the most appealing use of space but sadly we are still highly dependent on cars and workers/residents need to park their cars somewhere convenient and a cheaper way to do that in a restricted space is a parking podium.

The quantity of retail is a big factor. More retail obviously means more pedestrian interaction. I recently visited Wilmington’s historic downtown area and all the shops really help make the area a walkable and interesting place to explore. On weekday there was still a reasonable amount of pedestrians.

The problem is how spread out a lot retail is in Charlotte. Malls like SouthPark, Concord Mills, North Lake, Premium Outlets, etc. are very isolated and are not that walkable. Majority of the shopping occurs in these malls versus if they were centralized in a section of uptown or adjacent to a walkable area. South Park area is changing and developing into an core center in Charlotte.

The issue is just deeply routed in the shopping centers and malls set up by car culture that a lot of cities struggle with in maintaining pedestrian levels in its CBD’s (such as uptown) and honestly nothings more of an eyesore then a shopping center surrounded by a sea of parking lot. Even worst than a podium-based building. One other problem would be urban living…the more people in a given area the more it can support its surrounding retail.

Apologies for the tangent, but this issue of pedestrian level interaction and activation goes beyond just the levels 2-5 on a building and honestly have minimal effect on the pedestrian experience and attraction in my opinion. To be fair when I am walking through an urban area or downtown in my experience I tend to only and almost exclusively focus on the 1st floors of a building aside from my curiosity in the architecture of a building and then I’d look up past the first.

Those are my two cents on the matter.

[CLT @❤️]

The QC sure got the best of all the FNB towers, and while I would certainly prefer it to be another 10 floors or so, (since I wish this for all of our towers), and contributed more at street level, the Raleigh FNB is 22 floors, the Charlotte tower will ultimately add more to its neighborhood than the Raleigh building, which is actually located right in the heart of d’town Raleigh, right on Raleigh’s equivalent of Tryon Street, and to me leaves so much to be desired on every level, including street level. 

 

https://fnbtower.com

[RANYC]

30 minutes ago, CLT @ said:

The QC sure got the best of all the FNB towers, and while I would certainly prefer it to be another 10 floors or so, (since I wish this for all of our towers), and contributed more at street level, the Raleigh FNB is 22 floors, the Charlotte tower will ultimately add more to its neighborhood than the Raleigh building, which is actually located right in the heart of d’town Raleigh, right on Raleigh’s equivalent of Tryon Street, and to me leaves so much to be desired on every level, including street level. 

 

https://fnbtower.com

I love our insistence on street trees, even for core uptown high-rises.  Does Raleigh have the same street tree requirement?  If every major avenue in Uptown winds up looking like Tryon...like an urban emerald forest juxtaposed with big, dense structures...I'll be thrilled.

[KJHburg]

FNB in Raleigh is one what is called City Plaza big open space with a street running through it (Fayetteville St) but it is closed frequently for special events.   Overall Raleigh has even more trees than Charlotte and a very strict tree ordinance.  It is more pines and oaks.  I like our tree ordinance here and if you compare Charlotte to a Nashville you will see a big difference.  Lot more tree plantings required here. 

[TheOneRJ]

The Raleigh tower is also one of their signature towers while ours is really just infill. 

[kermit]

Apologies if the angle has already been done, dull game…

 

[KJHburg]

this is one of my favorite angles where you cant see the open parking deck because of the Duke deck.  Today. 

[atlrvr]

1-0

[KJHburg]

wonder how the apartment leasing and office leasing is going at FNB?  I really like that tower even with its exposed area on side.  Those apartments have great views because of the way it is oriented. 

[UptownGottie]

1 hour ago, KJHburg said:

wonder how the apartment leasing and office leasing is going at FNB?  I really like that tower even with its exposed area on side.  Those apartments have great views because of the way it is oriented. 

I'm sure it would be better if they had balconies.

[QCxpat]

4 hours ago, KJHburg said:

wonder how the apartment leasing and office leasing is going at FNB?  I really like that tower even with its exposed area on side.  Those apartments have great views because of the way it is oriented. 

At dusk, you can see furniture and lights in approx. 30% of  the 196 luxury residential units on the top 12 floors of the 29-story tower.  

Image - Wikimedia Commons / City Dweller 2

Links:  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:FNB_Tower_Charlotte_Completed.jpg

https://www.thereedcharlotte.com/   (The Reed Apartments in Charlotte)

Edited September 13, 2021 by QCxpat

[videtur quam contuor]

This appears to be as close to the rendering as one could imagine. Glass tower, podium, so not much to fool with, but still a solid addition to a neglected sapce. I miss the tree that was in this lot.

[SydneyCarton]

This looks really nice in person.  I like it.

[rancenc]

Yeah it's a marketing presentation, but nice views of this new tower!

 

[go_vertical]

Not a single shot from the sidewalk in that video. They must not be very proud of the building's street level interaction.