RVA-Is-The-Best

This is actually one of the projects I've been most excited about, perhaps even more than some of the taller projects announced/broken ground in the past few years. VMFA really is a centerpiece of the city and state as mentioned above, and fun fact: as it stands, it is already the 57th largest art museum in the world by gallery space. It's right ahead of the Tate Modern in London and 10 spots ahead of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam (!!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_art_museums I can't wait to see how much new space this new expansion announces. VMFA is truly a treasure

50k a day, if only....

Yuppp. Willets Point. The NYC government has had a longstanding goal of redeveloping that whole area and it's been pretty touch and go for well over 2 decades now

What I always hoped would someday come is evidently in the works. RBS reports that the Willow Lawn owner (Federal Realty) is looking to rezone the center to UMU and turn it into a massive mixed use complex of over 2,200 units + commercial space. The only caveat of course is it would be phased and buildout spread "over a stretch of 20 to 30 years" ughhhhhh The urban aesthete in me appreciates this passage: That's what I like to see. Federal Realty wanted to discuss this at the Henrico Planning Commission meeting as early as Aug 10, but the county has apparently recommended extending that out to give FR time to flesh it all out. But yeah. great stuff all around, the gradual densification of the inner suburbs continues, and as the western terminus of the Pulse, I'm glad it will be densifying (if over a long period of time). Areas near stations should be doing this en masse. https://richmondbizsense.com/2023/08/07/willow-lawn-landlord-plots-mixed-use-urbanization-of-longtime-shopping-center/

Breaking from RBS: Sauer Center Phase 2 has officially been announced, which entails quote "2 million square feet of new construction planned for the 37 acres the firm owns between Hermitage Road, West Broad Street and North Allen Avenue." Essentially as they explain, building a new neighborhood from scratch on what is mostly (at present) vacant or underutilized land. This will take around a decade to build out per the article. https://richmondbizsense.com/2023/07/31/this-place-has-to-be-unique-master-plan-unveiled-for-next-37-acres-of-sauer-center/ Easily the most exciting part of the development is the planned centerpiece: a new 12-story, Art Deco-style building inspired by the CNB, which "Sauer wants to be visible from surrounding highways and be a beacon of sorts for the activity in the area." There seems to also be a special emphasis placed on quality placemaking, which to me is just as important as the density and height of some of these planned buildings. Big emphasis placed on inspiration drawn from classic European plazas or squares in the master planning. The first component to this phase will be breaking ground imminently per the article -- the 4 story office building that's been in the plans for about 2 years now. So yeah. Exciting stuff, and a major hole in the urban fabric will be filled.

CoStar height/CoStar feet will never not be funny

The RAMZ Hall fire. When it was under construction (the apt building with retail on the bottom -- I think at one point there was a Cold Stone and an Xtreme Pizza in two of those spaces -- that's presently next to the parking garage that houses the VCU bookstore on the bottom floor) That was something.

This came out of nowhere and honestly excites me more than the usual multifamily developments, I don't know why. It just looks so nice and the fact that it's a county-to-city relocation is so satisfying. We need more of that please

I always thought that was Hopewell lol (or at least the joke between our family was such)

Wanted to drop in to this thread for the sole reason to complain about Google inexplicably appearing to have removed the ability to add descriptions to new objects created on the map, allowing only a title and photos now (which is very frustrating). I noticed this as I was adding the Shockoe townhome infill development announced on BizSense last night. And that's why a lot of the new objects only have that and no descriptions. Objects that already existed before this change and had descriptions can still be edited. Very annoying, the descriptions contain links and useful information about the developments. Smh

Absolutely love that guy who replied to him mentioning the solar. That's a deep cut reference that I think will get lost over most of the BizSense commenters. Peak comedy

You can see the Honors College building there in the picture, which iirc is across from the Bookbinders.com building, which has long been rumored to eventually give way to a VCU-built tower per their master plan. Can't wait for that. This whole block is already looking nice and dense, and with Parc View there in the distance, you get a sense the city feels really large and punches above its weight in density, which I always thought it has. Edit: I meant Bookholders** lmao

Filling in Monroe Ward's empty lots with the highest density allotted by zoning would solve this quickly I feel. Not with the 4-6 story buildings we're getting now, but something more substantive. What's done is done though, and better we get Foushee Mews and One Canal now than the surface parking they've been for so long before. Also truth be told, we could fit a lot of people into the City Center/'Court End' area where the Coliseum/MCV/biotech area is, lots of empty lots/surface parking and underutilized space there, and would liven that corner of downtown up too, beyond the medical center keeping it alive 24/7 it's really kind of a no man's land.

At long last my god. This was one of my 'bucket list/will-they-won't-they' developments (shoutout Soda Flats and Locks 7/8). Excellent kickoff to the new year

We have BizSense confirmation (and visuals) on this. It's 26 townhomes. It fills out the plot quite nicely, I find. https://richmondbizsense.com/2022/12/19/two-dozen-townhomes-planned-for-dominion-owned-site-near-the-fan/

We now have a BizSense article (the true barometer for determining when a project is officially 'on') on the Sampson Coatings redevelopment. 250 units in 7 stories + a two story parking garage (275 spaces). https://richmondbizsense.com/2022/11/21/thalhimer-plans-7-story-apartment-building-on-sampson-coatings-site-in-manchester/ We also have this encouraging tidbit from Thalhimer And of course, we have everyone's favorite part of new project announcements, renderings. Truthfully, I'm not sure what to make of the blank brick walls on the side where one would presume windows to be, as they are on the main facade. But a minor gripe against something that will ultimately bring more density and height to a burgeoning, formerly low-rise area.

I....uh.... wow. It's not often that renderings leave me speechless.

I was reading an article on Jersey Digs (a Jersey City development site -- being a real estate development junkie extends beyond Richmond for me lol), and it was mentioning how Jersey City's downtown has added enough units in the past decade to rank 8th in the country for units growth in downtowns. Sure enough, I look at the graph in the article, and look who I found at 19th place. 7,329 units built. Got a kick out of it, figured you guys would too. The article, by the way: https://jerseydigs.com/downtown-jersey-city-growth-study/

So don't ask Dave to be like a cheerleader for it, cause he won't!

And just like that, we have visuals on the silo replacement project. https://richmondbizsense.com/2022/09/20/20-story-apartment-tower-6-story-office-building-planned-for-southern-states-silos-site/ 20 story apartment tower + 6 story office building. 290 units in the apartment building. Also included this exciting passage: Hourigan’s will start demolition later this year and aim to go vertical Q2 2023.

Fellow insomniac, you beat me to it Needless to say, this is incredibly exciting. In the next 60 days is awesome. So glad the specs haven't changed and that we're still at 12 floors. At long last

Interesting. The developers for the two towers that would block Legend Brewery are tweaking the plan, and in a twist that I certainly didn't expect: Of course, the curmudgeons over there at Legend still seem grumpy and qualified with their 'praise' as ever; this is their [comical] two cents per BizSense: Well, anything under three stories is just not good for Urban Planet, so sorry there Dave. https://richmondbizsense.com/2022/09/09/developers-tweak-two-tower-plan-to-preserve-legend-brewings-view/

Neat, an update on Activation Capital's attempts to build something on one of the largest remaining vacant (surface parking) lots in the BioTech park. https://richmondbizsense.com/2022/09/09/regional-pharma-partnership-to-get-boost-with-new-labs-in-richmond-chesterfield/ According to the article, 6 stories, 100k sq ft including wet lab space, could break ground this year, finish in 18-24 months. Hope this gets off the ground asap. That lot needs to be filled Hopefully we see some tasty renderings eventually

Neat small update: Google has updated Street View for Richmond with August 2022 imagery I'm not sure how much of the city got updated imagery but at least Broad definitely does with the striking red painted Pulse lanes. I'm going to go surfing through the streets virtually to see if I can see all the construction updates in various states of progress

Avery Hall is behind some of the best all-residential projects in NYC rn from a design perspective, hearing that they'll be the primary behind the architecture of this proposal as well as the developer already excites me no matter what height this thing turns out to be.