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Proposed Downtown Amphitheater


joeDowntown

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On 6/5/2022 at 11:10 AM, Cookin_peacocks said:

I know Kara, and I've already been in her ear. LOL. 

Im telling her to hire me, I have lots of good ideas. 

 

Yep, I know her too. I just saw her at an event a few months ago actually and we chatted a bit. 

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A few additional pieces of the state budget. $11M to the GR public museum to improve the riverfront, $10M to Mary Free Bed in what seems like an undiscussed new hospital concept? And the $30M for the amphitheater project. 

https://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/local/new-hospital-amphitheater-headline-big-additions-to-grand-rapids-from-approved-state-budget/69-53cf5b34-2567-407c-adee-65303f3fc074

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On 4/11/2022 at 12:54 PM, joeDowntown said:

In addition to the areas GRDad highlighted that are part of 201 Market + the Charley's Crab/ Market/Fulton Surface lot, there are also a lot of smaller parcels that I could see being developed with infill as this project takes place (shown in green). I'd be interested to see if any of this property has been changing hands recently.

 

marketmap.jpg

When GR Forward came out I noticed these “remnant” triangles that are, unfortunately, very difficult to develop.  Market Avenue’s  diagonal slice also divides the Founders/Custers/Intersection/etc. neighborhood from the new riverside neighborhood.  It would have been nice if Market could have been realigned as  a ‘riverside drive’ and the existing street grid revised to create proper blocks out of the difficult triangles.  The service traffic currently on Market could move to internal  “B” streets and “A” streets could have been developed along the river and connecting to Founders, etc.  

I did a little ‘wondering’ about the idea a few years ago.  Too late to realign roads - but future river development should intentionally integrate the existing neighborhood with the new.  



 

D0C381AA-A714-438A-814E-B809A70DBF26.jpeg

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3 hours ago, civitas said:

When GR Forward came out I noticed these “remnant” triangles that are, unfortunately, very difficult to develop.

D0C381AA-A714-438A-814E-B809A70DBF26.jpeg

I'm curious what makes those triangles so hard to develop when other small, unusually-shaped properties have already been developed even in GR — like the "pizza slice" at Fulton & Ionia, which is around the same size. Birmingham (MI), by nature of its position along old Woodward, is replete with weird parcels, some of which have seen recent redevelopment amid their downtown revival. And if you look further to typical cities in Europe or Asia, most of the parcels there are irregular, small ones like this, and they seem to handle it fine.

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14 hours ago, ZAP! said:

I'm curious what makes those triangles so hard to develop when other small, unusually-shaped properties have already been developed even in GR — like the "pizza slice" at Fulton & Ionia, which is around the same size. Birmingham (MI), by nature of its position along old Woodward, is replete with weird parcels, some of which have seen recent redevelopment amid their downtown revival. And if you look further to typical cities in Europe or Asia, most of the parcels there are irregular, small ones like this, and they seem to handle it fine.

Woodward cutting through Birmingham is a good example. (although they have very few tiny triangles).  The 1st Chapter in DPZ’s new master plan for Birmingham is titled, “Connect the City - Overcome the Woodward Divide”.   Birmingham, like the Hinman ‘pizza’ site, is significantly built up and, therefore, has few opportunities to reconfigure streets to create a more desirable block pattern.  Market, however, is adjacent to a 5-600’ wide greenfield corridor offering complete design freedom.  Seems worth thinking about.  

Hinman’s pizza slice is directly connected to an adjacent private parking deck.  It is bigger than it appears.  As I recall, there was talk of vacating the street between them to create a more usable parcel.  It is a good example of architecture dealing with site constraints, but it represents a free-standing building.  It is not a walkable block within a neighborhood.  

BTW, the DPZ Birmingham plan includes some great Chris Ritter charrette sketches.  His work is amazing.  

 

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18 hours ago, civitas said:

When GR Forward came out I noticed these “remnant” triangles that are, unfortunately, very difficult to develop.  Market Avenue’s  diagonal slice also divides the Founders/Custers/Intersection/etc. neighborhood from the new riverside neighborhood.  It would have been nice if Market could have been realigned as  a ‘riverside drive’ and the existing street grid revised to create proper blocks out of the difficult triangles.  The service traffic currently on Market could move to internal  “B” streets and “A” streets could have been developed along the river and connecting to Founders, etc.  

I did a little ‘wondering’ about the idea a few years ago.  Too late to realign roads - but future river development should intentionally integrate the existing neighborhood with the new.  



 

D0C381AA-A714-438A-814E-B809A70DBF26.jpeg

Some of those streets I don't even think you'd need, like the "New Ave" that runs N-S through the middle could probably just be a public plaza. 

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Extension on amphitheater property:

https://mibiz.com/sections/real-estate-development/gr-amphitheater-property-sale-delayed-6-months

Seriously, I’d like to see one development in this city move forward as planned. I know supply chain issues and inflation are a problem, but with the lack of development lately, you’d think GR was a backwater town…

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9 hours ago, joeDowntown said:

Extension on amphitheater property:

https://mibiz.com/sections/real-estate-development/gr-amphitheater-property-sale-delayed-6-months

Seriously, I’d like to see one development in this city move forward as planned. I know supply chain issues and inflation are a problem, but with the lack of development lately, you’d think GR was a backwater town…

Yeah, I'm surprised they're still waiting for more detailed architecture plans. There are two AE firms working on this and they've been talking about the amphitheater being at this site for some time now. 

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7 minutes ago, GRDadof3 said:

Yeah, I'm surprised they're still waiting for more detailed architecture plans. There are two AE firms working on this and they've been talking about the amphitheater being at this site for some time now. 

And they got $30M in taxpayer money. It seems a bit strange,  counter productive and border line irresponsible to negotiate a deal, move a sewer main, get $30M in funding and still be like “eh, our team is still figuring it out”. I’m sure it’ll go through, just seems a bit sloppy (or arrogant, I can’t figure out which). :) 

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37 minutes ago, joeDowntown said:

And they got $30M in taxpayer money. It seems a bit strange,  counter productive and border line irresponsible to negotiate a deal, move a sewer main, get $30M in funding and still be like “eh, our team is still figuring it out”. I’m sure it’ll go through, just seems a bit sloppy (or arrogant, I can’t figure out which). :) 

Agreed. How do you get a $30 million earmark from the State when you don't have any plans to show? I'd like to get my hands on $30 million for some park projects. lol. (and a re-paving of the white pine trail). 

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11 hours ago, GRDadof3 said:

Agreed. How do you get a $30 million earmark from the State when you don't have any plans to show? I'd like to get my hands on $30 million for some park projects. lol. (and a re-paving of the white pine trail). 

Hey, we’ve got some ideas and things for projects and stuff. Can we have the money?!

Do you think this  forum can get $30M? We have lots of ideas that still need to have some feasibility studies done! LOL

Kind of makes me wonder if there’s a push to move the amphitheater to the north of 131 (like the renderings we’ve seen floating around).

I’m surprised we haven’t seen more WTF articles floating around (but then again, not many paid journalists to dig deep on the local beat anymore). 

Joe

 

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I don't really know if there's too much rush.... in order for the city to move to the county property, the county has to finish their building out in Walker, is that even close to happening?

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39 minutes ago, Floyd_Z said:

I don't really know if there's too much rush.... in order for the city to move to the county property, the county has to finish their building out in Walker, is that even close to happening?

The point is what is there to think about? Especially after receiving $$$. And, I have to imagine it’s much easier for the city to move forward with the purchase of the property done. 

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4 hours ago, wingbert said:

Well, I can tell you that my, as yet still unborn, great grandchildren are definitely looking forward to the groundbreaking ceremony 

Well once it does get started, wouldn't the construction time be much shorter than that of an arena or multi-story building?

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2 hours ago, Floyd_Z said:

Well once it does get started, wouldn't the construction time be much shorter than that of an arena or multi-story building?

Depends. While not as significant of a building, I bet they’ll run into contaminated soil, and building close to the riverfront (removing flood walls, etc) will be tedious work. 

joe

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3 hours ago, Floyd_Z said:

Well once it does get started, wouldn't the construction time be much shorter than that of an arena or multi-story building?

Depends on the scale. Amphitheaters generally are done in a year, historically. But this is going to be more than just am amphitheater. Parking/tower/plus the task of putting it next to a river, is going to be much more challenging than Pine Knob was to build.

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  • GRDadof3 changed the title to Proposed Downtown Amphitheater
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