Downtown Flint construction,projects & Photo post

[VeeFan]

I'm only ever in downtown at noon or just before. lol Stupid pedestrians who won't move out of the way....

[Pachuco]

Yeah on saturday there was some stupid hippies or college student taking picture blocking the corner by Capital Theatre.

[dnast]

LOL

[VeeFan]

Grand Opening of the Mega Coney Island set for Thursday, April 28th.

[Allan]

Yeah on saturday there was some stupid hippies or college student taking picture blocking the corner by Capital Theatre.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

LOL, yeah, I am one of those stupid college students who stands in the middle of the street to take a photo or two (although usually it's more like 10, since 2 isn't enough). When I'm not standing in the middle of the street, I'm probably in some abandoned building exploring and taking photos.

[dnast]

I probably won't be doing the middle-of-the-street thing. I get enough stares from simply taking pictures of Flint

[dnast]

Did anybody see the article in todays paper about the grants for downtown from the Ruth Mott Foundation? The DDA is getting the money to fix the fountains at Riverbank Park and in front of the Character Inn. The Sesquicentennial Commision received grants to clean up McFarlan Park (in front of the Durant Hotel) and landscape City Hall.

I'll be really glad to see the fountain in front of the Character Inn back in use. It looks so dead without water. I thought it was owned by the owners of the hotel. I figured they just didn't want to waste water, heh. The rest of the projects sound great, too.

As far as creating deadlines, it looks like the Sesquicentennial is starting to become a mini Superbowl XL. Too bad they waited so long for some of these projects.

[dnast]

I found out that the building near Marion Hall that is possibly getting renovated is the former Carriage Towne Inn. They even were approved for a facade grant, so it could very well be another nice addition to the MLK strip in Carriage Town. That, combined with the new Mega Coney Island, should start to fill in the big gap between the strip and the rest of downtown.

The gap really won't be filled in until something's built on that vacant lot across the street from Mega Coney Island (not the park ) and somebody steps up and renovates the former Durant Hotel. No telling how long until that happens, though.

[VeeFan]

Weren't there plans about a year ago to start renovating the Durant Hotel for residential use? I've never seen the inside, but when it was open, wasn't the lobby really elaborate?

I know which vacant lot you're talking about. ;-) What used to be there? You can tell that whatever was there before was torn down.

Back to Marion Hall once more. What's happening with the awning and the mural lighting?

[dnast]

Yeah. Those plans for the Durant were made by Alfred Kloss, owner of Daystar Development. They're supposed to be doing stuff with the 352 Building, Dryden, and Ferris Fur building, too, so....

I have no idea what used to be in that vacant lot. In the downtown master plan, there was a generic rendering of a midrise apartment building, I believe. That'd be great if anything like that happened.

As far as Marion Hall, I haven't heard anything since they got the approval for the addition. I'm thinking we'll see something in May or June.

[Pachuco]

Do you have a link to this "downtown master plan" ?

Edited April 26, 2005 by Pachuco

[dnast]

I wish I did. It used to be hosted by UM - Flint, but they seemed to have removed the file sometime in the past few months. I'd host it on my site but I think it was around 70MB and would kill my bandwidth in no time.

If I find the file on one of my backup CD's I'll try to find a good sharing site to post it to. It's a PowerPoint presentation and is a very interesting read (although it's mostly pictures and charts) for those interested in this stuff. I'll see what I can do.

Edit: Too soon to double-post, so I'll add it to this post.

I just found an article about downtown and the Rowe building at http://www.weyi.com/home/1477677.html

Besides the quotes from actual citizens, it's mostly a rehash of everything that's been said before. BUT, they did mention that there will be 22,000 sq. ft. of restaurant space and this project will bring almost 200 new jobs downtown (I'm assuming it wasn't bad journalism). Those jobs, combined with the Rowe employees and patrons of the coming restaurants and nightclub should really bring a lot of activity downtown.

This project is starting to seem even better than I expected.

Edited April 26, 2005 by dnast

[VeeFan]

What's this addition to Marion Hall?

[Allan]

200 jobs & 22,000 square feet of restaurant space?! Wow. I hope that is true, and not just sloppy reporting. It would add a good deal of foot traffic downtown, especially on Friday nights and Saturday nights, when downtown is pretty much dead.

[dnast]

What's this addition to Marion Hall?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I don't know why I wrote "addition". I meant the awnings and new lighting for the building. I must have been typing too fast. I need to re-read my writing before posting.

Hey Allan, you wouldn't happen to still have that PowerPoint of the Downtown Flint Plan, would you? If not, I'll have a lot of backup CDs to look through...

[Allan]

I think I have it, but you'll have to wait until next Thursday or Friday before I can get it, since it's on my other computer at home.

[dnast]

I couldn't really tell, but it looks like the north section of the Land Bank Center is getting a more modern facade. So far it looks good so I hope they don't mess it up.

Speaking of facades, it looks like there are still a lot of renovated ones coming. There are 4 buildings left on the west side of the 500 block that were awarded grants, and also Carriage Towne Inn, Flint City T-Shirts, and I believe the building next to it are getting new facades.

There's still no news about any of the buildings on the "Mott block". That's the worst-looking block downtown except for the beautiful Mott building - and even that building could use a wash. They should use a little money out of their billions for that.

[Pachuco]

Well the Brown Sugar cafe passed it's deadline,but at least their making progress though.

[dnast]

Yeah, I wonder how far along they really are. I'm not complaining, but they were supposed to open last year. Hopefully the plans for the former J. London building come to fruition; the Mad Hatter is getting a new facade and those will fill out the newly renovated block.

Oh yeah, I was browsing another messageboard (FlintTalk.com) and came across this:

"...look for that ugly white tile building next to Feris furs to start having some construction going on it sometime in the near future. A source tells me that the owner has secured a resturaunt tenent for the first floor. Removal of the tile is part of the project, I can't wait."

I'm not sure how true it is, and I can't even picture the building in my head, but I found it interesting and thought I would share.

[Allan]

Hopefully it is true, because the building is rather ugly. It is another one that was "improved" in the 1960s.

You can kind of see it in this photo.

[dnast]

Thanks. I ended up driving by there before I saw your post. I tried going through the official Allan Downtown Flint Photo Index, myself, but I can't see your pictures at work.

Anyway, I think I read about this building getting a new facade. I remember a statement like "Flint City T-Shirts and the building next to it are getting facade improvments." Both of those could really use one.

I know it's really too early to say this, but I hope downtown doesn't get oversaturated with restaurants. I like to eat, but I don't want Flint to be a Frankenmuth clone. That said, we're not close to having too many restaurants even planned yet; it just seems like that's almost exclusively what downtown's developers and landlords are targeting now.

[VeeFan]

Downtown Flint doesn't have too many restaurants right now, does it? Churchills and the Lunch Studio are the only ones that I can think of off-hand that are in the core concentration of downtown.

In the photo of the Ferris building, which white building are we talking about? The one directly next to it, or the one with the arched windows?

And I've been meaning to tell about this for at least a week and a half now, but I keep forgetting! lol It looks like work has started on the historic tree park next to the White Building on the U of M campus. I can't wait to see how that will look!

[dnast]

Downtown Flint doesn't have too many restaurants right now, does it?  Churchills and the Lunch Studio are the only ones that I can think of off-hand that are in the core concentration of downtown.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You forgot Bailiwick, Halo Burger, and Big Al's, but right now there aren't too many either way. It's just that we have the building next to Ferris Furs; 2 in the Rowe building; one next to Paul's Pipe Shop, also using the empty lot next to that; one for the former Dale's Health Food building combined with the Baker's Drug store; and possibly a restaurant for the Land Bank Center (if they can't get a grocery) all planned or proposed right now.

Other than that, at street level we have planned/under construction: 3 nightclubs and a coffee shop. And one of those nightclubs is just moving from one building to another. It the ratio of restaurants to everything else I'm worried about. That being said, I'd still take it over the downtown from 2 years ago.

In the photo of the Ferris building, which white building are we talking about? The one directly next to it, or the one with the arched windows?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I believe the guy from the quote was talking about the building directly next to the Ferris Building. I don't think there's much work to do on the facade of the more decorative building, so hopefully we're right. I'd love to see the building with the arched windows occupied and cleaned up, though. It definitely deserves to be in use.

And I've been meaning to tell about this for at least a week and a half now, but I keep forgetting! lol It looks like work has started on the historic tree park next to the White Building on the U of M campus.   I can't wait to see how that will look!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I can't wait to see how it'll look, either! Is the park going to be east of the White Building? I honestly forgot about it.

[VeeFan]

Trying to remember my directions if I'm standing on the other side of the river. lol It looks like it's going to be east of the White Building, and fairly close to the river. It's pretty much going to be in the area between the footbridge and the White Building.

Maybe having all these restaurants will be necessary with the number of residential units coming to downtown. ;-) Hint, hint...lol

Have you ever noticed on the north side of the First Street Lofts there's a section of the wall that looks like it's brown marble? I noticed it today staring off into space during my Math class... lol

[dnast]

LOL. I never noticed that about First St. Lofts.

Is there a link to details about the new park on campus? I might add it to my website.

By the way, does anyone know any details about the Flint Firefighters Historical Museum? I can't find much of anything on the Internet, but maybe somebody has something. I had some information about it last year, but I have no idea where I got it from...