West Village

[hood]

There is a new rendering out for the West Village development in East Lansing, and I't looks very nice:

Origional Rendering:

Site Plan:

It is set to be finished in mid 2006, for more onfo visit the realtor's site: http://signatureassociates.catylist.com/js...istingID=357442

[RustTown]

Nice! I like it much better. It will fill the corner much more nicely.

[jaredw]

Wow, this looks real nice. So, mid 2006, does that mean like the end of summer? If that's the case, that seems pretty fast, considering I don't think the site is cleared yet.

[statedude3]

Those renderings look great to me. I walked by the site yesterday, and it appeard like they were doing utility work. I think it'll be a little bit behind schedule, but I'm willing to wait for something of this quality.

[GRDadof3]

That's a great looking development I'm trying to remember what was at that corner before? There's a McD's right along that stretch to the East, isn't there?

[hood]

That's a great looking development I'm trying to remember what was at that corner before? There's a McD's right along that stretch to the East, isn't there?

I'm not sure, but I think that the old greyhound terminal and another building were on that site.

[jaredw]

The last time I went by that site, about a week ago, there is two houses, the greyhound bus terminal, a recycling station, and a chinese restaurant that has closed. If you go by the site, you can see the road next to beaners is one bound and the road across from Central Elementary is the second bound.

[RustTown]

GRdad, there is no McDonald's there. The only McDonalds on Grand River is past campus on the far westside of East Lansing. This is right before you hit downtown where Grand River and Michigan merge and turn into a boulevard/avenue.

Jaredw described the site quite well. It also sits on a slight slope coming down into central East Lansing so visually it's going to be even more striking than if it sat lower.

[jaredw]

The Mcdonalds in question actually was there at one time. It was in the current People's Church parking lot. It was a McDonalds express with no drive through, the main reason that it went out of business.

[statedude3]

The Mcdonalds in question actually was there at one time. It was in the current People's Church parking lot. It was a McDonalds express with no drive through, the main reason that it went out of business.

wow, i nevero knew there was a McD's there...how long ago was that? Must be before my lifetime...

[RustTown]

And mine as well. I had no idea there was anything else along Grand River here. If I would have had to guess it would have been more housing.

[GRDadof3]

I'm almost positive there used to be a full service McDonalds next to the church, as recent as maybe 1992 or 1993. I haven't been in that particular area since then. Whenever we went to Rick's or the Landshark, we would park in the lot right behind McD's. I believe also that the church there lost its steeple to a massive lightning strike and fire in the late 80's or early 90's. Is the steeple now flat-topped?

Oh yah, here it is:

http://kevinforsyth.net/ELMI/peoples.htm

Toward the bottom of the page, 1988. Boy, only 17 years ago

[RustTown]

I must have been too young, and don't remember. We moved to Lansing when I was 5 in 1990. But, I was rarely ever in East Lansing.

[GRDadof3]

Sorry to get you off topic. That will be a nice addition to that area

[jaredw]

Yeah, the McDonalds didn't have that long of a lifetime, it was there during the early 90's, i think it may have gone out around 95.

[RustTown]

I guess that's why they have the double-decker one on the east end of the area. There aren't too many of those in Michigan, if any.

[jaredw]

Here is a picture that I took that shows the overlook that the west village has. The buildings below are going to be torn down. The beige building is the Greyhound station, you can see the recycling bins, and the small building to the left of the station is the chinese restaurant. The building in the bottom corner is a substation, which I don't know if it will be removed too. I have included two pictures of the substation also.

[hood]

I found some higher resolution renderings and a site plan for West Village. The Site plan shows that they are going to build the origionally proposed Rowhouses along with the main building:

Looking Northwest at Grand River & Delta

Grand River Elevation

Site Plan

[davidb]

Will the Beaner's remain?

[RustTown]

I'd imagine they will probably be one of the first tenants within this new project. The company is a very tenacious and resilient one, and I can't imagine them just being displaced. It would only make since that the developer has already seeked them out, or vice versa, to keep them at that location.

[davidb]

It looks like on this layout that the original building will not be touched, but my concern is with the size of the store and the availability of the patio. The current location is a little too small for the amount of traffic it gets (try going to the bathroom on a Thursday around 7 p.m.) but I love the outdoor patio when it is nice out or if you are a smoker like me.

[hood]

I'm sure that if Beaners moves into this development it will be very nice. The lease rates for this building are $25/sq ft, thats pretty high, so I would assume that anything that moves into here will be of high quality.

[jaredw]

At today's city council meeting, there was a discussion about why the West Village still hasn't started construction:

"Council also set an April 4 public hearing to consider increasing the tax incentives being given to the developer of the West Village project. The developer has encountered significant costs in relocating public utilities, such as sewers, electricity and water lines.

Community Development Administrator Tim Dempsey recommended the council give the developer additional tax help to offset some of the costs of the utility work."

-- From the State News

[RustTown]

I'm as warying as the next guy about tax incentives, but this sounds alright seeing as how the developer has hit some unforseen cost that were out of his control.

[hood]

Not to mention those costs involved utilities, which I thought the city usually took care of in projects like this anyways. With the Stadium district the city gave Gillespie a discount on the sale of the property to offset the cost of relocating utilities.