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Studio Park - $140 Million Celebration Cinema/mixed use project


joeDowntown

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Definitely a huge fan of this.  According to articles the tower would be 10 stories on top of the parking ramp were it to be built.  Early 2017 start date,  what are the thoughts on if ground actually breaks?  616 has built everything they have proposed,  this is the most ambitious by FAR. 

When I first heard about the "Downtown area can support another 5000 housing units" study I thought it was a big number that would be realized slowly."  Now it seems like the major players are going gang busters and over hedging on it.  I guess in a year when the glut of the current inventory being built is online, a lot more about the sustainability of the market will be revealed.  I know I'm the doubting Thomas, it just seems like all of the good news we seem to get will have an expiration date at some point.

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11 hours ago, mpchicago said:

StudioC616.jpg

I was just saying the other day how I would like to see a building with more vertical windows downtown instead of the cookie-cutter box ones. It really makes the tower portion look taller in a way which helps. I also like how the slim side of the tower is facing 131 so it doesn't block the overview of the city. The only thing I don't like are, one again, the box windows on the courtyard building facing the arena. If they could place them like the tower, which has its vertical lines seemingly drawing people in, then it would be more inviting to people and draw them into that courtyard.

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48 minutes ago, mgreven said:

Wow! So.much.meat. 

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3 hours ago, WMrapids said:

Interesting article.  Loeks doesn't seem shy about saying that that he feels his downtown theater will NOT be self sustaining. 

"Loeks said the project was always intended to be more of a community asset than one to make his company money."  " He suspects the company's suburban (locations) will provide somewhat of a flotation device, financially."

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37 minutes ago, mpchicago said:

Interesting article.  Loeks doesn't seem shy about saying that that he feels his downtown theater will NOT be self sustaining. 

"Loeks said the project was always intended to be more of a community asset than one to make his company money."  " He suspects the company's suburban (locations) will provide somewhat of a flotation device, financially."

Remember that he is vying for financing help from the MEDC—and they're quoted in the article as being wary of supporting a downtown that's already doing quite well (though I think they'd be misguided to focus on sinking money into depressed areas, at the cost of helping thriving areas to thrive even further). I think that they were his primary audience for this statement.

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1 hour ago, mpchicago said:

Interesting article.  Loeks doesn't seem shy about saying that that he feels his downtown theater will NOT be self sustaining. 

"Loeks said the project was always intended to be more of a community asset than one to make his company money."  " He suspects the company's suburban (locations) will provide somewhat of a flotation device, financially."

A wake up call for everyone that desires a downtown with these types of assets to SUPPORT it. We already blew it with the bookstore. This fish is far too big for us to not put in the effort to utilize it as much as possible.

Consider every movie you see to be an investment in the downtown area.

 

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On 5/2/2016 at 7:48 AM, GR_Urbanist said:

A wake up call for everyone that desires a downtown with these types of assets to SUPPORT it. We already blew it with the bookstore. This fish is far too big for us to not put in the effort to utilize it as much as possible.

Consider every movie you see to be an investment in the downtown area.

We didn't "blow it" with the bookstore.  Or, you at least have to take in account that for the years the downtown Schuler was open (2008-2013), bookstore retail nationwide got shellacked.  Borders is gone, Walden is gone, Barnes & Noble is still tanking.  When Schuler closed downtown, they were making up for losses in all their stores, not just that one.  And don't forget Alpine closed less than a year later to much less anguish.  Hindsight being 20/20, a bookstore was never going to pave the way to new retail downtown.  We shouldn't be heartbroken over it.

I can't speak to the future of Studio C!, but I like that it will anchor a larger dining/entertainment complex, and will fill a real need for date-night-style entertainment that's missing downtown.

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On 5/2/2016 at 10:48 AM, GR_Urbanist said:

A wake up call for everyone that desires a downtown with these types of assets to SUPPORT it. We already blew it with the bookstore. This fish is far too big for us to not put in the effort to utilize it as much as possible.

Consider every movie you see to be an investment in the downtown area.

 

Ummm, I don't think Loeks wants everyone to go to the downtown theater who would otherwise go to Celebration North or South. That's called cannibalizing your own business. Perhaps maybe go to a movie more often, whether it be downtown or any other Loeks property? 

Plus, if it's part of a complex that offers entertainment options for before or after a movie, that will help. Especially if it doesn't have a bunch of unruly punks hanging around on weekends. :P

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I plan on going to this theater for as many movies as I can instead of driving 15 minutes to all of the current theaters.   For people that live near downtown this will be a great resource.  It'll also be great, as GRDadof3 mentioned, for people to do before or after events downtown.  Convention goers can catch a movie before going out to dinner and drinks at night.  Until we have a nice retail selection downtown there is a limit to what you can do during the day, beyond drinking...

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More details in this article about the background of this. It's interesting how Studio 28 prevented the idea of a downtown theater for some time. I also realized that the tower would be 16 stories with the 10 for residential and 6 for parking, must've missed that in the hype.

https://mibiz.com/news/design-build/item/23578-downtown-grand-rapids-theater-project-requires-developers-to-think-bigger

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