demhem

They are hosting an open house with information about the Market and doing public outreach with the West Grand Neighborhood Organization. My understanding is that they are trying to focus on hiring residents of the Westside. While I'm sure they could do more, I've been seeing advertisements and updates fairly regularly (but I also live on the Westside).

I had a similar experience living in Heritage Hill and share similar memories near Wealthy. I loved living there. Our block would host a party every year to get all the homeowners and renters together (it was about 50/50 homeowners and renters). Great community of people.

Chicago style pizza is a type of casserole.

Agreed. There is plenty of parking nearby but the lack of signage and one-way streets make it confusing to access unless you're familiar. I'm usually only there in the evening on a weekend, but I've never been there when it's not packed with a long wait. I almost always just grab a beer at the bar and find a standing table to order food.

I'm responding to "Michigan's infrastructure needs an overhaul." I was not directing comments at the GR metro area, but the State as a whole. I did not intend to pick I96 as an example to push any argument. My impression, if that is what we are calling it, is based on my experience rating roads for MDOT and working in transportation alongside county road commissions and city engineers. Michigan's population growth has been anemic since the 1980s with an overall increase of 7% between 1980 and 2015 (or 0.2% per year). To put that into perspective, the US grew by 41% during the same time period. Metro Detroit is a great example of sprawling land development and added infrastructure without any significant increase in population (base), as noted in this report from SEMCOG (5% increase in population vs 17% increase in developed area in 10 years): https://www.semcog.org/desktopmodules/SEMCOG.Publications/GetFile.ashx?filename=LandUseChangeInSoutheastMichiganCausesAndConsequencesMarch2003.pdf It is not logical to keep building (or widening) when you can't afford to maintain what you have. We need to increase the base, increase taxes, or reduce our overhead. We only really have control over two of those things. In my experience, there are countless roads built to maintain an "A" level of service (even in West Michigan, despite our growth) that are completely unnecessary given the cost of added maintenance per lane and the lack of use. Further, the following link contains data on total lane miles by state, determine whether your observations are accurate: https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/statistics/2008/hm60.cfm

Michigan's road infrastructure was overbuilt (in both lane widths and lane miles) and now we don't have the user (population) increase nor the political willingness to pay for it.

I was going to speculate the same. They have always been busy when I've stopped to get coffee.

I've seen first hand the cost of infrastructure deterring developers from going forth with a large development. Moderate densities and smaller lot sizes require water/sewer but it is cost prohibitive to install; thus, in the end, a new site condominium or plat with 75 lots becomes a handful of land divisions or one/two-acre lots with well and septic.

Has anyone else noticed that the Staybridge building placement is essentially a mirror image of the Woda building?

I've routinely snagged flights out of GRR that are cheaper than or equivalent to DTW and ORD. Timing helps typically, but on one occasion my flight out of GRR was $200 cheaper (on United through Chicago with final destination at SFO). Even my international flight to Frankfurt through Washington-Dulles was within $50 of a similar flight out of DTW. I've paid an arm and a leg for last-minute flights out of GRR as well, but that is typical of any airport.

It almost looks like throwback brutalist architecture. Is that facade concrete?

This I agree with. Some of the acceleration and deceleration lanes, particularly downtown, are incredibly short.

Can we please not do this? This is the definition of disparaging and beneath the conduct of a Mod, IMO.

Just a reminder. Increasing and expanding lanes does not necessarily solve or mitigate traffic issues. This is older thinking and has been challenged by the idea of "induced demand" or "induced traffic."

If you zoom in on sheet A101 near the center of the building it says "North Peak Brewing."

This project is adjacent to the Roosevelt Park neighborhood which contains the largest Hispanic and Latino population in Grand Rapids. Including the Hispanic Center in the discussion was a good strategic decision IMO.

Please tell me that this comment was a mistake and that you jumped to conclusions in frustration. Walkable urban areas (particularly fringe downtown areas) provide immediate access to employment and transit so that one does not have to own a vehicle (especially when they can't afford one). Also, do the human beings that work cleaning the hotels, cooking in the kitchens, and vacuuming the offices not deserve to live NEAR where they work? This is a well-documented issue in many cities. Those who work the minimum wage jobs in our downtowns must commute hours in some circumstances because they cannot afford to live anywhere near their place of employment. It's not like the entire project will be affordable housing; that lesson was learned long ago. IMO, we don't have enough details to sufficiently critique it, nor do we have the details regarding what they consider "mixed-income" as that could mean a variety of approaches.

Although this is small scale, it looks like someone is renovating the interior of 812 Butterworth SW. There are now two logos on the windows that say "Grain Sandwich Shop" and I believe "Westside Massage" opening soon. Anyone have any additional details?

Those "faux historic street lights" are pedestrian-scale lights which direct light closer to the sidewalk instead of the gooseneck lights which look like garbage, are intended for cars, and are typically terrible for improving safety and visibility for the pedestrian. However, in the picture above it looks silly as those are not adjacent to a pedestrian facility. In Allendale, those lights were installed with the intent of improving walkability and safety off-campus (and along M45) as they were installed behind the sidewalk and largely direct light straight down onto the sidewalk. The sidewalk, lighting, boulevard, and landscape project was paid for by MDOT and likely had little to do with GVSU "trying to look like a historic university." Those lights are just good design in a good application, IMO. What would you have them install instead?

You could say this about almost any neighborhood in the City. Maybe I'm biased, but as a neighbor of the Zoo I disagree with you once more. My house, as well as most of the houses around me are in exceptional condition for their age. Most are owner-occupied and most are very well kept. There are outliers, but this was the case in every older urban neighborhood I've lived in (Heritage Hill, Eastown, and Heartside). There is no evidence of my neighborhood "heading towards this end." Where do you live?

The irony in that is that I've heard the leadership at Habitat say the exact same thing about private developers and landowners. It seems that everyone is having the same issue in acquiring land. Do we have any small-scale developers on this forum that could shed light on the small infill topic? Difficulties?

I disagree, mostly. There are quite a few opportunities for small-scale development all over the city. These are not whole blocks but parcels here and there which are prime for infill development and could accommodate missing middle housing and small mixed-use structures. It's the diversity of housing stock (age, design, units) in neighborhoods which makes them eclectic, interesting, and affordable. You really love hating on the west side, don't you?

Although I also dislike the contrast between CHS and the addition, it seems like the brick color is very similar to Finkelstein Hall which is under construction. Did the neighborhood have a strong preference for brick in that color? I didn't actively pay attention to the NOBL public involvement process. They may be going in that direction over there as they build out the healthcare/medical campus. Nevertheless, the building looks very institutional. Although, I do like it better than the MSU Secchia Center, which is so institutional blah that it already looks 15 years old.

The original study critiqued in the link is likely admittedly flawed; however, the critique is also flawed as the author is comparing overall car MPG (which he admits is unfair^1) instead of auto city MPG as well as comparing overall personal vehicle load averages instead of personal vehicle load averages for urban metros where buses run (which could arguably be different depending upon where you live). Although he also admits that autos have their lowest load factors during peak periods, with most urban areas reporting 1.1 to 1.15. If anything, that article solidifies the need for additional studies which take into account previous failures in methodology. 1: "My use of annual averages is somewhat unfair to buses for a variety of reasons. First, for autos, there is a significant amount of freeway driving, urban, rural, and inter-city, where high, constant speeds and high mileage factors are achieved – this type of travel is a relatively rare portion of urban transit bus usage."

State universities are exempt from local zoning in Michigan so Allendale Township has little to do with why GVSU buildings are shorter out there. My understanding is that GVSU leadership wanted a village-like residential campus similar to the likes of Miami University in Ohio and Ohio University in Athens. If you look at the way that GVSU is structured it emulates the Miami model in a lot of ways (undergraduate focus, limited professional graduate programs, large presence of liberal arts in curriculum, theme dorms such as Women in Science and Engineering and the International House). Their strategy downtown may be similar in philosophy. 3-5 stories is human-scale, and provides a more intimate university setting than towering buildings. Obviously Eberhardt and Cook-DeVos are different; however, one of those is located prominently on the river and the other on the expressway. I think that all of this is not a lack of vision but an unwillingness to stray from the vision they already have for themselves.