Gateway Tower

[urbanvb]

I guess this project is still on hold due to the economy.. sure would be nice to see some buildings going up in TC.

[ronsmytheiii]

I guess this project is still on hold due to the economy.. sure would be nice to see some buildings going up in TC.

Patience young padawan, remember it took 80 years for the Hearst tower to come to fruition in NYC... so we are doing relatively well. Anyhow, skyscrapers are pretty overrated, I would rather see a Peninsula town center development start to take place and get a general urban atmosphere started, skyscrapers take awhile and dont necessarily make an urban core (see Norfolk from the 1960's-80's)

[vdogg]

I guess this project is still on hold due to the economy.. sure would be nice to see some buildings going up in TC.

Ask, and ye shall receive.

Town Center

The fourth phase, to include an office tower and hotel, has been stalled by troubles acquiring financing, Divaris said. But "in recent months, that has started to loosen up." He predicted that construction would begin by year's end.

[ronsmytheiii]

Ask, and ye shall receive.

Town Center

The real question is whether this is a remark based on some firm reason, or is it off the cuff [/over-analyzing]

Any how, cautious optimism should rule the day

[vdogg]

The real question is whether this is a remark based on some firm reason, or is it off the cuff [/over-analyzing]

Any how, cautious optimism should rule the day

One thing with Divaris that gives me hope is that in the past when they didn't have financing they simply said they didn't have financing. There was no Gadams like game playing. I would liken this more to an educated estimate of how long the process will take based on his past experience. This is the most optimistic news I've heard about this project in about a year.

[urbanvb]

Yeah, it's pretty speculative I think but since TC is 97% occupied I could see this happening as soon as the economy turns around. TC's occupancy rates are really amazing. I bet even DT Norfolk can't boast of anything close to this.

[Norfolk4Life]

Virginia Beach's central business district had a vacancy rate at the end of 2010 of 8.3%. Of their total 1,968,256 square foot of office space, that means they had 163,365 sqft vacant. Downtown Norfolk had a vacancy rate of 16.9%, meaning, of their 4,951,785 sqft, 836,852 was available. That sounds high, but 299,887 of that was brand new. To equal it out, since VB's CBD had no new space open up, if Downtown had no new space, the vacancy rate was only 10.8%. I don't think that's bad considering Downtown has over twice the space.

[urbanlife]

Anything under 10% vacancy is good for downtowns, it usually means there is some room for smaller things to open up, but there is going to be a need for bigger things, which is where new buildings come from. I have always been a fan of Divaris, with his history and his sincere interest within Virginia Beach and actually trying to build something that can actually have a cultural impact on the city because back when the town center was nothing more than a lot of trees, he managed to talk the city into spending more money to build infrastructure and garages for this new district rather than selling for more money to Walmart, which would of built a giant Walmart and a huge parking lot on that site.

He has always had a vision of bringing VB a real downtown and is actually following through with it. As for this tower, I do admire that he is optimistically honest with his comments. Basically his comment translates into, "we would like to see it start up by the end of this year, but it will probably be by next year that serious construction could begin." Which is about what I have been saying for a while know. The town center is very tiny and didn't grow too big too fast during that last boom which means that when things begin to stable out, the Pembroke area will be on a much better footing and will probably get a head start on future growth compared to cities that overbuilt on that last boom, which it is kind of a good thing that the City Walk didn't happen, though I still wish that plan would come to fruition.

[varider]

Any update?