Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts

[cityboi]

map location of the park that will adjoin the performing arts center. It will be just as beautiful as Center-City Park across the street.  Katalyst, a California planning and urban design firm, Halvorson Design Partnership of Boston, Mass.and Biederman Redevelopment Ventures of New York are working on the park.  Halvorson Design Partnership designed Center-City Park so we may see some similar elements from Center-City Park. The park could include a children’s area, feature vendor shops, public art, a bar or beer garden, picnic grills, video screen that could potentially show some events going on in the PAC, a dog park, restrooms, fitness equipment, food kiosks and a food-truck zone. Its certainly going to be more than just a pretty urban green space. Both the park and performing arts center will open at the same time.

 

Katalyst also has some conceptual renderings of whats to come in downtown Greensboro! check out the park and huge pond where the old railyard is today! That has to be the proposed Rail Yard Park which is one of the last items on Action Greensboro's 2001 downtown plan that has not been developed yet. Rail Yard Park location is next to Southside and CityView Apartments. In another rendering there is a high-rise. Im not sure what thats about but I can see the Wells Fargo Tower (former First Union) in the background.

 

http://www.katalystinc.com/index.php/projects/event/Greensboro%20Center%20City%20Plan

 

The map below shows the location of the future indoor/outdoor glass building that will house a carousel. We should see the final renderings of the performing arts center around the end of January or early February with construction starting next fall.

 

 

Edited December 22, 2013 by cityboi

[crowe1856]

How old are the Katalyst renderings? They have the ballpark on South Elm.

[Urbanity]

 

Katalyst also has some conceptual renderings of whats to come in downtown Greensboro! check out the park and huge pond where the old railyard is today! 

 

 

 

It is not "whats to come" but what some group has proposed.   Charlotte puts out a master plan for its CBD every ten years.  Some of it comes to fruition in envisioned form, some comes to be in a different form than imagined and proposed, and some of it never happens.

[cityboi]

In downtown Greensboro's case everything but the railyard park and the IMAX theater is happening or has happened in the center city plan. I know rail yard park is still on the table. As far as IMAX, who knows

[zalo]

Interesting post from a GSO based blogger: The CFGG should stop dithering and agree to the City's terms which includes City majority ownership & control with a sizable minority voice for the private donors who ponied up their share of the money.
 
Greensboro’s Country Clubs Are Broke

January 1, 2014

From Dawn DeCwikiel-Kane at the N&R:

Private fundraisers for the planned downtown performing arts center welcomed 2014 with the announcement that they had surpassed their goal to raise $35 million by the end of 2013. The Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro said Tuesday that $35.4 million has been pledged for the Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts. The other $30 million for the $65 million project will come from the city, in what will be Greensboro’s largest private-public partnership to date.

From Amanda Lehmert at the N&R:


On Tuesday, Vaughan said she won’t agree to a private nonprofit controlling the center, as proposed in an early version of the agreement. “Ultimately, the city is going to be responsible for maintenance and any shortfalls,” Vaughan said. “We have said from the very beginning the city was going to own and operate it.”
If the Community Foundation knew from the beginning that the city demanded ownership, then why go through the process of raising 63.5% of the money?

Remember how a group of proven businessowners from east Greensboro approached the city with a plan to produce a television show and a request for $300K. Remember how the grant was changed to a loan request at the last minute and was eventually denied when the city was asked to accept a third lien on their property as collateral?

My sources indicate the CFGG performed similar due diligence on those pledging donations to the GPAC and discovered most of them are on the ropes financially. However, a bit of inference will prove it.

Greensboro’s wealth has always been made mostly in real estate and property development. We all know what happened to the real estate market and Greensboro’s top property developer declared bankruptcy. This person happens to be our former mayor and is regarded as being more astute than any of them. If the city’s biggest commercial property developer and broker has failed, how can the rest be doing any better?

If the CFGG has actually received $35.5M in pledges, then trot out the list of donors again with the amounts to which they have committed so they can be held accountable. This wouldn’t be the first time a big donor reneged on a pledge. If the CFGG cannot produce such a list, then the GPAC is dead.

Before we actually see the numbers, there is another thing we can infer. Most of the presumably bigger donors have fortunes which were actually created by their parents. Take Roy Carroll for example. He’s invested money in a failed downtown high rise, industrial parks for which he cannot get assistance in establishing infrastructure and a laughable conservative weekly newspaper. By all available evidence, the man is a damn fool. Check out the list and you will find several more idiot children of successful parents. These people have spent their lives squandering their inheritances. It is no accident that among their mistakes are donations to a music hall and wedding chapel which has been mishandled from the beginning and will never be built.

To be sure, there are many pledged donors who are responsible for their wealth and have good intentions. However, they are mistaken in the belief that like investment downtown generally, a performing arts center will elevate Greensboro in the eyes of potential employers. Unfortunately, events are quickly working against them.

Allowing Greensboro to be named the second hungriest city in America cannot be salved with a downtown PAC. Having Greensboro listed with Roanoke Rapids and Lumberton as the poorest cities in America is also not fixed with a public/private investment in the oligarchs. In fact, such an effort in this economic context makes us all look like damn fools.

Worst of all is that element of GPAC supporters who feel Greensboro is in some kind of competition with Durham and other big cities in our region. The cold fact is there is simply not sufficient wealth in Greensboro to compete with Durham. Rather than attempt to foist your shortcomings off on the public, get off your fat asses and generate the wealth to fund the GPAC with 100% private money.

I may as well be asking pigs to fly. The world has spoken and Greensboro is a failed city. A downtown PAC will not make that verdict go away.

I initially said with assurance the GPAC would never be built. I knew this to be true because Greensboro no longer has any great men. All that is left are effete momma’s boys. The failed economy has completely marginalized them, but they were never much to begin with.

Edited January 3, 2014 by zalo

[cityboi]

Demolition on the Greensboro Inn begins Monday. Its part of the site for the Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts. A terrible eyesore in downtown Greensboro will finally be gone.

 

http://www.digtriad.com/news/article/313263/57/Demolition-Of-Greensboro-Inn-To-Begin-Monday-

[cityboi]

Some of these bloggers are nut cases who don't have all their facts straight. I've seen a few make fools of themselves at city council meetings. One in particular makes an effort to go to every city council meeting just to irritate city council members.

Edited February 8, 2014 by cityboi

[cityboi]

Wells Fargo pledges $250,000 towards the Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts. Construction begins this fall.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/triad/blog/2014/03/wells-fargo-pledges-250-000-to-tanger-performing.html

[DCB]

Any idea when we'll get renderings of the project? They've released the plans for Lebauer Park recently and it looks great http://cfgg.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/lebauer-park-book_final.pdf and I really want to see how it will end up interacting with the PAC.

[cityboi]

Those are great plans. I like "the mall" concept, option 2. It would require the closing of the Davie St/Summit Ave intersection but this concept truly does make the LeBauer City Park and performing arts center one attraction and it seamlessly connects the PAC with the Greensboro Historical Museum, main library, Center-City Park and the Greensboro Cultural Arts Center (a pedestrian cultural district). I also like the uses for the LeBauer City Park that have been recommended. A hedge maze and a zip line would be really cool. I think the old Lincon/Mercury Dealership site which is next to the Children's museum and diagonally located northeast of the PAC site would be a great location for an IMAX theater. The triangular plaza across from the Flatiron Building would be a great pedestrian connector between the Performing Arts Center and the IMAX.

 

Now that an ownership/operation agreement has been made with the PAC, architects are now working on the final design. I'm guessing we'll see final renderings late spring or early summer. Im sure it will take at least a few months to design. Construction will begin around the time of the construction of the Wyndham hotel and  possibly Roy Carroll's 4 acre mixed use hotel project. A lot of large scale downtown construction will be happening over the next year. The first phase of the downtown university campus is also suppose to begin later this year as well.

 

 

The site just above the children's museum and to the right of the triangle plaza  in the aerial below would be a great location for an IMAX. Being next the the Children's Museum is very fitting and like I said above the triangular plaza would be a great pedestrian connector between the PAC and IMAX.

Edited March 26, 2014 by cityboi

[cityboi]

Update .................I came across a website where architects were chosen to compete for a design for the Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts...VERY IMPRESSIVE design!  Its the best design yet. The interior almost has the look of Radio City Music Hall in New York. I hope to see something like this. With a price tag pushing $70 million I'm sure we will.

 

Apicella Bunton came up with the design. And as great as it is, they were  only a finalist. H3 was chosen over them. So i'm expecting a design just as great or better.

 

http://www.apicellabunton.com/index.php?page=project&get=steven-tanger-center-for-the-performing-arts

Edited March 26, 2014 by cityboi

[cityboi]

The city is helping Boston's House of Jazz to relocate elsewhere downtown with $175,000 so the city can start prepping the land. The performing arts center is currently in the final design stage.

[cityboi]

Here are some details of what we can expect in the performing arts center

 

http://www.journalnow.com/news/local/design-firm-envisions-greensboro-performing-arts-center-as-building-to/article_93172362-c90d-11e3-9b4f-001a4bcf6878.html?TNNoMobile

 

Also demolition of War Memorial Auditorium at the Greensboro Coliseum is set for September.  It will be replaced with premium parking and the money will be used to cover any shortfalls at the new downtown performing arts center. The auditorium has served as Greensboro's performing arts center since it opened in the 1950s. The differences between War Memorial Auditorium and the Steven Tanger Center will be like night and day. Also Triad Stage and the historic Carolina Theatre will compliment the Steven Tanger Center. There were some concerns how the new PAC would affect the Carolina Theatre, but there will be no negative impact.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/triad/blog/2014/04/final-event-demolition-for-greensboro-s-war.html

 

War Memorial Auditorium served its purpose for many years but the facility inside and out looks like an oversized high school auditorium. Its a dump compared to PACs in Charlotte, Durham and Raleigh. But now Greensboro will have a 3,000 seat state-of-the-art performing arts center that will be the envy of much of the south. By comparison the PACs in Charlotte and Raleigh have around 2,200 seats and DPAC has 2,800 seats. One unique feature the Steven Tanger Center will have is removable seats for standing concerts. It will also have the widest stage of any PAC in North Carolina perfect for the Cirque Du Soleil type performances.

Edited April 26, 2014 by cityboi

[crowe1856]

I didn't realize they were tearing down War Memorial before the new PAC is built; was this always the plan? War Memorial hosted 50-60 events a year, many of which are too big for the Carolina Theatre and too small for the Coliseum/White Oak Amphitheater, so you're looking at an 18 month void in programming? This makes the planned surface parking at the new PAC seem even more desperate (yet no less inappropriate).

 

Have any decisions been made on the design of the park, or will it more likely be announced when the PAC's final plan is released? I sincerely hope the mall isn't the way they go. We should focus on making downtown a pedestrian-frendly environment as a whole, rather than create separate "pedestrian spaces" and "car spaces". Part of downtown's problem is that we already have such an irregular grid with numerous "superblocks" breaking up the flow of traffic. It's like putting a boulder in a stream; you stop the water where the boulder is, but the water runs deeper and faster around it to compensate. Elm street is very walkable, but driving it it a pain (inherent congestion from its narrow width, compounded by slow/poor parallel parkers, delivery trucks parked in the middle due to lack of alleys, and the absence of cross-traffic turn lanes at its primary intersections of Market and Friendly). To avoid Elm, drivers take other North/South streets, which, save sections of South Greene and North Davie, are overbuilt pedestrian wastelands. Closing another street will only worsen the situation. Moving towards a more uniform grid gives drivers more options as far as routes (spreading out rather than concentrating traffic), creates more on-street parking (which is evenly distributed, rather than concentrated in surface lots), fosters a more pedestrian friendly mindset (cars & people interact on more equal terms, and drivers themselves may actually have to walk a block or two), and makes for a more walkable environment (where you can walk a couple blocks in any direction rather than be relegated to one street or designated space). We should seek to create an environment that integrates rather than segregates cars & people.

[cityboi]

 

I didn't realize they were tearing down War Memorial before the new PAC is built; was this always the plan? War Memorial hosted 50-60 events a year, many of which are too big for the Carolina Theatre and too small for the Coliseum/White Oak Amphitheater, so you're looking at an 18 month void in programming? This makes the planned surface parking at the new PAC seem even more desperate (yet no less inappropriate).

 

Have any decisions been made on the design of the park, or will it more likely be announced when the PAC's final plan is released? I sincerely hope the mall isn't the way they go. We should focus on making downtown a pedestrian-frendly environment as a whole, rather than create separate "pedestrian spaces" and "car spaces". Part of downtown's problem is that we already have such an irregular grid with numerous "superblocks" breaking up the flow of traffic. It's like putting a boulder in a stream; you stop the water where the boulder is, but the water runs deeper and faster around it to compensate. Elm street is very walkable, but driving it it a pain (inherent congestion from its narrow width, compounded by slow/poor parallel parkers, delivery trucks parked in the middle due to lack of alleys, and the absence of cross-traffic turn lanes at its primary intersections of Market and Friendly). To avoid Elm, drivers take other North/South streets, which, save sections of South Greene and North Davie, are overbuilt pedestrian wastelands. Closing another street will only worsen the situation. Moving towards a more uniform grid gives drivers more options as far as routes (spreading out rather than concentrating traffic), creates more on-street parking (which is evenly distributed, rather than concentrated in surface lots), fosters a more pedestrian friendly mindset (cars & people interact on more equal terms, and drivers themselves may actually have to walk a block or two), and makes for a more walkable environment (where you can walk a couple blocks in any direction rather than be relegated to one street or designated space). We should seek to create an environment that integrates rather than segregates cars & people.

 

 I'm hoping that now they are turning War Memorial Auditorium at the coliseum into a premium surface parking lot to cover potential shortfall, there will be no need for the premium surface lot at the Steven Tanger Center. There certainly is no need for onsite parking anyway because the city's largest parking Deck (Bellemeade Deck) is across the street from the PAC site and the Church St and Davie St decks are also within walking distance. In addition there is on street parking. There is a plan to use some of the land on the PAC site for future development that could be attached to the Steven Tanger Center in the future. One of the conceptual renderings even shows a mid/high-rise attached to the PAC.

 

I don't think they are going with the "mall" plan for the park/PAC. The latest renderings of the park keep the streets intact. However ther has been some discussion about painting the streets to make it look like a pedestrian plaza connecting the PAC with the new park and center city park. So you have a plaza while keeping the streets. I'm sure the streets will be temporarily closed during some events. I'm really excited about the new park because of the activity that will take place there. It will have water features, performance space, food kiosks, a market, playground and maybe even a zip line and hedge maze. It will serve as a pedestrian connector between the Steven Tanger Center and the Greensboro Cultural Arts Center. The new park will sorta become an extension of Center-City Park as well.

 

But I imagine that the main arena at the coliseum will serve as a temporary space for events that normally take place at War Memorial Auditorium. They will just have to drop the curtain wall on the upper deck and section off the arena like they already do with some concerts. The Greensboro Symphony could have their concerts at either Aycock Auditorium at UNCG or the Carolina Theatre until the PAC opens.

Edited April 26, 2014 by cityboi

[cityboi]

btw here is more on the park, its activities and how it will link the performing arts center with other cultural attractions including the future indoor/outdoor carousel. The park will have a lot of gaming activities including putting greens. In addition there will be an art sculpture that will go over Davie street connecting Center-City Park with LeBauer Park. The center lawn is where the ice skating rink and ice coaster will go during the holiday season. A plant wall is even envisioned on the side of the Church Street Parking deck. The plan also show Davie street painted like a plaza. There will be a signature restaurant, beer gardens, interactive water features, children's playground, stage area, market pavilion, screen wall for movies ect. The new park will actually be slightly larger than Center-City Park. But the transitioning between the two parks will give the appearance that it is one large center-city park. After looking at the park plan, I'm very impressed. I think this is a better park than Center-City Park. The Lebauer Park will be the heart of the downtown cultural district.

 

 

http://www.katalystinc.com/index.php/projects/parks-open-space/event/LeBauer%20Park%20Conceptual%20Plan%20%20Programming

Edited April 27, 2014 by cityboi

[cityboi]

examples of performing arts centers with interesting designs. They don't look like your typical PAC and I'm hoping the same for Greensboro.

 

Edited May 4, 2014 by cityboi

[krazeeboi]

They look like they're in the middle of nowhere.

[cityboi]

They look like they're in the middle of nowhere.

 

The locations are awful indeed but they are interesting.  Many times projects are lacking on the architectural side because of budget constraints. I think if $65 million is going to be spent on the Steven Tanger Center it shouldn't look like a typical performing arts center. Downtown Greensboro lacks the kind of modern structures that stand out as architectural icons and for once I hope we see a bold design.

Edited May 5, 2014 by cityboi

[zalo]

OK, so ticket surcharges were endorsed by Mr. Brown last year as being a part of the City's contribution toward construction costs of the PAC. No worries expressed about being passed over by promoters or the fact that it is difficult to get some promoters to even come to North Carolina. This year it appears to be a different story, after the fact.


Coliseum Director Matt Brown told the council that he isn’t sure why the surcharge wasn’t enacted back in 1989, but it’s a bad idea now. “It will affect attendance and promoters will decide not to come to Greensboro,” Brown said. Brown said entertainment complexes in cities that have enacted such surcharges — including Charlotte and Roanoke, Va. — have been hurt by it. Brown said concert and event promoters often negotiate for half of whatever is made on a surcharge. If they can’t get it, they’ll raise already high ticket prices or decide to go elsewhere.Brown said it’s hard enough already to attract major promoters to North Carolina. Last year’s expansion of the sales tax to include concerts, sporting events and plays didn’t help, he said. “You can’t imagine the complaints we get from promoters who don’t want to come to North Carolina,” Brown said. “We have seen our margins shrink with the high cost of artist fees and the increasing cost of tickets. It has impacted our attendance.”


http://www.news-record.com/news/article_b706f686-f616-11e3-abcc-001a4bcf6878.html

[DanRNC]

One reason why the DPAC has been successful is Nederlander Productions-the booking agent.  I am sure they are not going to compete with themselves so they are most likely not an option. These logistics should have been worked out before committal to this project.

[cityboi]

One reason why the DPAC has been successful is Nederlander Productions-the booking agent.  I am sure they are not going to compete with themselves so they are most likely not an option. These logistics should have been worked out before committal to this project.

 

I think Nederlander will be doing the booking for the Steven Tanger Center

[zalo]

I hope Nederlander does a better job than the GSO Coliseum staff has done with LJVM.

[cityboi]

Demolition is underway for the Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts. The 3,000 seat facility will open in the spring of 2017 and onstruction will begin next fall. The link below shows a few picture of the site. A few more buildings need to be demolished.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/triad/news/2015/01/27/demolition-underway-at-tanger-performing-arts.html

Edited January 28, 2015 by cityboi

[cityboi]

More demolition is clearing the way for new Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts. Construction will start this fall but the public still hasn't seen the final design. Hopefully we'll see the design in the upcoming months.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/triad/news/2015/05/05/demolition-clearing-the-way-for-new-tanger-center.html

 

Edited May 5, 2015 by cityboi