Learning from Other Places

[elrodvt]

They have bike lanes there. 

[davidclt]

18 hours ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

Union Market district in DC. 
...
It’s home to the zip code with the most apartment units U/C in the country.

As an interesting aside; I remember before moving back to Charlotte and more specifically Dilworth from Seattle about 24 years ago believing I was moving to an urban, walkable place, with one car that I would drive to the suburbs for work, park on Friday and not move it again until Monday. (stop laughing) I may have been slightly hopeful delusional. Regardless, I started going to DCDA meetings thinking they would be an interesting entrée to my new neighborhood (have I mentioned I might be hopeful?)

In one of my first few meetings back, the owners of Kenilworth Commons, Edens & Avant were coming to the DCDA for approval of their expansion of the property. I remember them making bold promises about pedestrian accessibility, what wound up passing really was not particularly pedestrian friendly and in some ways pedestrian hostile with acres of parking out front.

Regardless, Edens has proven their mettle not just at the Union Market District in DC (I remember visiting in 2011 when it was still in the early stages of forming), they have also proven to be not horrible stewards of the Park Road Shopping Center and I would say a bit visionary in their development of the Atherton and even Myers Park Center could be way worse. Kenilworth Commons is still a bit of Frankenstein's monster but I guess it could be worse. . . 

[KJHburg]

Just back from booming Wilmington and a couple of things I saw we should do and or build in Charlotte.

Preserve your history and tell the story the good the bad and the ugly even if  it hurts.  

Downtown Wilmington is really 3 parts from the bridge north is first the historic residential district, then it is the historic commercial district with some new buildings and then there is the newer north end of downtown.  Why is the northend all new  buildings?  It was a huge rail yard for Atlantic Coast Lines RR that pulled out of Wilmington and laid off 1800 people in one day in 1960 in a city of 45,000 people! So much of that area was cleared and rebuilt now home of the sprawling Cape Fear Community College which covers 10 blocks and and lots of new hotels , the convention center, and massive new apartments like in Southend.  (But these apartments have river views! and their walking trail is the Riverwalk along the river not a rail trail.  (Though some rail to trails are planned too) Believe it or not I-40 was not going to go to Wilmington.  Congress turned it down in 1968.  They wanted to end in Myrtle Beach.  But Wilmington rose up and started a campaign to end it there.  The rest they say is history.  Population of the city doubled in doubled 20 years after the interestate came, tourism grew exponentially, the port grew etc.  Tourism is booming so much they have floated in houseboats along the river to as Airbnbs.    UNC W has over 16000 students now and unlike before many are staying around the city with their new jobs like at LIve Oak Bank, nCino, Thermo Fisher, plus lots of manufacturing.  

Notice how new buildings blend into the historic fabric of downtown.   Downtown Waffle House is a must in uptown Charlotte and or Southend.   Notice the signs about panhandling I have seen these in Houston now in Wilmington these are needed uptown asap.   High density beach housing.  Those 3-4 story  buildings have 5-6 three bedroom units in them.  If you can do it at the beach why not intown?    

Last couple photos from the Wilmington RR Museum from the ashes of that massive economic hit we have a tourism dynamo now and bustling diversified business community.  

Oh yeah the brick under the blacktop downtown.  As the blacktop fades on most streets downtown they will be returned to brick.  Why?  Some locals sued the city and said if we are in a historic district of which Wilmington has 9 of thenm, then the streets are part of the historic district.   Some they have 12 miles of brick paved streets the most in the US and over the next years more and more will appear.   Now that is a city that cares about history!  

No wonder this city is the heart of the movie and tv industry in both Carolinas as the downtown is a set already.  If you have not been lately plan a visit.  

 

Edited November 18, 2023 by KJHburg

[KJHburg]

Oh yeah one more thing Wilmington is the fastest growing metro in the state and with the return of Brunswick County back to the metro is larger than Savannah metro and growing a lot faster.   Just 3 counties  New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender.  

Edited November 19, 2023 by KJHburg

[KJHburg]

Hey at least in some places in NC historical facades are saved like these at the Raleigh Union Station Union West apartment tower 23 stories and local bus depot.  

Cary just built a fantastic new downtown park called Cary Downtown Park.  It cost $68 M and was 10 years in the making.  It has 2 vendors open including the Bark Bar next to the dog park and the whole park is a social district.  This is their new signature park in a town that has great parks already.  You need to check this park out when you are in Wake County.  It is spectacular.  

Home | Downtown Cary Park

[15895]

In LA Starting Dec 10, the A, C, K & E Light rail Lines will be every 8-10 minutes. 

B & D heavy rail is every 10-12 minutes or 5-6 minutes where the line is shared and they run every 20 minutes after midnight 

[CLT2014]

1 hour ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

In LA Starting Dec 10, the A, C, K & E Light rail Lines will be every 8-10 minutes. 

B & D heavy rail is every 10-12 minutes or 5-6 minutes where the line is shared and they run every 20 minutes after midnight 

It will be very interesting to see if the service improvements help ridership bounce back more. Beyond frequency, in a recent town hall and survey with 10,000 metro riders, safety was the #1 hot topic with the huge homeless population in Los Angeles and drug usage onboard trains, residents don't feel safe and moved to private cars. That's been a big focus of metro with increased security on trains, frequent station cleaning to remove feces and waste, et... (and it is helping ridership). 

LA's system still peaked in 2013 and ridership was declining 3% - 5% each year through 2019 even prior to the pandemic (losing about 100,000 annual riders). A big factor was exiting the recession and then AB 60, which gave undocumented residents (about 951,000 people in the county) the ability to get a CA driver's license. As soon as many undocumented residents could drive, they ditched public transport they were previously forced to use. 

Edited December 4, 2023 by CLT2014

[15895]

Holy cow. I know some people prefer bad news of places so here is one. It doesn’t affect the Green Line (heavy rail) or MARC train (regional rail). But man, Baltimore has just really seemingly neglected the maintenance of their system which I honestly don’t know much about their system so I don’t have much to add other than. Yikes. Light Rail ridership has been dismal at less than 10,000/day ridership. 30 buses will be pulled off their regular routes to provide bridge service along the route. 

 

Baltimore is by far one of the greatest looking U.S. cities. Such a gem, so unbelievably amazing. It’s such a shame mismanagement, neglect, historic racist laws, corruption, etc. and now just riddled with crime as it grapples with the decades of neglect. lts one of the greatest American cities & constantly gets the shaft mostly, again, due to the past.
 

For those who have never had the pleasure of visiting Baltimore, it’s such a beauty and feels very, very large and super urban. And has the best aquarium I’ve been to in the world and so many fun things to do.
 

 Baltimore, which a huge part of Baltimore feels like a huge dense downtown has so many gems. The library for example:

I love some of their monuments like the Washington Monument

 

And one of their saver neighborhoods (Federal Hill / South Baltimore below) among others are amazing, lots of retail including national chains .

 

I can’t wait for the day Baltimore turns it around, and it has been, but it’ll be a great day when the city is able to shake the past. 
 

Poor Baltimore. 

Edited December 8, 2023 by AirNostrumMAD

[rancenc]

Recent aerial view of Omaha NE and  I'm very impressed with the amount public greenspace within the downtown area.  Of course a lot of it is riverfront which enhances the vitality of the space, but impressive nonetheless.

 

[CLT2014]

The Riverfront in Omaha is a public-private partnership so 2/3rds of the cost was by private donors and a 1/3 by the city. Has Charlotte had any parks funded this way?

[KJHburg]

15 hours ago, CLT2014 said:

The Riverfront in Omaha is a public-private partnership so 2/3rds of the cost was by private donors and a 1/3 by the city. Has Charlotte had any parks funded this way?

Texas major cities do that a lot private public funding for urban parks like in Houston and Dallas.  

[TheMightyBK]

Interesting article in the Washington Post today about Cleveland turning its downtown around by converting office space into apartments around a public square that was created from a massive parking lot.  Where there were 40 apartments a decade ago, there are now over 1,500 and the core of downtown is no longer a ghost town after 5 PM.  Learn from that, Charlotte!

[15895]

52 minutes ago, TheMightyBK said:

Interesting article in the Washington Post today about Cleveland turning its downtown around by converting office space into apartments around a public square that was created from a massive parking lot.  Where there were 40 apartments a decade ago, there are now over 1,500 and the core of downtown is no longer a ghost town after 5 PM.  Learn from that, Charlotte!

Wow, thanks for pointing out that article. It was a good read. 

Link is below for others 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/interactive/2023/cleveland-downtown-empty-offices-transform/?itid=hp_mv-top-stories_opinions_p003_f001

[DMann]

Just read it, pretty nice

[DJ8hep]

It has been quite a while since I’ve been in downtown Minneapolis at night! I had forgotten how large “The Big Three” were in floor area! 

1 - IDS Center = 1,505,421 sf

2 - Capella tower = 1,499,994 sf

3 - Wells Fargo Center = 1,196,036 sf

A few additional various pictures of “The Big Three”

Edited December 22, 2023 by DJ8hep

[DJ8hep]

One type of building I hope to see more of in Charlotte is mixed use skyscrapers similar to the newly built RBC Gateway tower:

Also, the newly built Eleven, a luxury condo tower designed by the same architect who did 30 Park Place in NYC!

 

Edited December 22, 2023 by DJ8hep

[KJHburg]

Minneapolis is where Charlotte got the idea for the overstreet walkways.  Their reason was the cold our reason was the heat and humidity (no one wants to see a banker sweating through a 3 piece suit LOL ) 

We do need more mixed used towers like the one above.  All of Austin's supertall buildings are mixed use with office, apartments, hotel or some kind of mix.

In fact here are their tallest under construction and where they stand including the new tallest in the state of Texas and that is saying something.

 

Edited December 22, 2023 by KJHburg

[KJHburg]

This is more news from other places and speaks of the ills in the office market right now.  Both San Francisco and Seattle tech heavy office tenant markets have taken it on the chin.   SF has now pushed aside Houston the long perennial leader in the most  office vacancies.

From SF Business Times:

""The city’s roughly 88 million-square-foot office market recorded a vacancy rate of 35.9% in the fourth quarter — a new high, up from 33.9% last quarter. Office availability, a measure that includes all available space whether or not it is vacant, hit a record 38.5%, up from 37.5% in the third quarter.

Office vacancy and availability rates hit single-digit lows at the end of 2019, but have risen steadily in San Francisco since the onset of Covid-19 nearly four years ago. The quarter-over-quarter increase in vacancy and availability in the fourth quarter was driven both by several large blocks of space that were listed for sublease, said Colin Yasukochi, the executive director of CBRE’s Tech Insights Center, as well as tenants who declined to renew their leases for existing space.""

From the Seattle Business Journal:  these are companies not renewing their leases and giving up huge blocks of office space.

""What follows are the largest blocks of office space to become available, according to disclosures by the region's major tech employers this year:

Microsoft
City Center Plaza, Bellevue: 560,000 square feet (will not be renewed in 2024)
Bravern Office Commons, Bellevue: 750,000 square feet (will not be renewed in 2025)
Millennium Corporate Park, Redmond: 497,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
Lincoln Square North, Bellevue: 442,000 square feet (will not be renewed through 2025)
Amazon
West 8th, Seattle: 539,000 square feet (not renewed)
1800 Ninth, Seattle: 209,000 square feet (not renewed)
T-Mobile
90 North, Bellevue: 175,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
Commons 90, Bellevue: 70,000 square feet (will not be renewed in 2023)
Salesforce
Kirkland Urban North, Kirkland: 92,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
NorthEdge, Seattle: 200,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
Meta
Arbor Blocks 333, Seattle: 191,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
Block 6, Bellevue: 330,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
1101 Westlake, Seattle: 151,000 square feet (not renewed)
Key Center, Bellevue: 45,000 square feet (offered for sublease)
Skyline Tower, Bellevue: 37,000 square feet (offered for sublease)""

Note Amazon is shifting more people to Bellevue due to some differences with the city of Seattle on taxes. 

So while we have our challenges here in Charlotte we are actually in a lot better shape than many markets as our financial and diversified base is not giving up office space like the tech tenants are doing.    Austin has had problems with subleasing and tenants not occupying office space they leased.  
 

 

[15895]

Hello Miami, I mean Austin

 

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/gabetakesphotos/53422546883/

 

[smeagolsfree]

On 12/19/2023 at 8:08 AM, KJHburg said:

These area lTexas major cities do that a lot private public funding for urban parks like in Houston and Dallas.  

These are all relatively small pocket parks, but examples of how the public and private sectors are working together. There are other planned public spaces in new developments that are mandated by Metro planning in order to attain bonus height as well. The East Bank will be chocked full of public and private green space once the plan is fully implemented but this is going to be years in the making. It will include a new pedestrian bridge across the river paid for by Oracle.

 

Public and private park space cooperation can be mandated into public policy as Nashville is doing by incentives for parking and bonus height. The East Bank will be transformative as it will be a blank slate s there will be almost 350 acres to work with which is about the same size as with the Downtown and Sobro area is now. The East Bank as far as park amenities has barely been touched. Unfortunately, Nashville has not learned the lesson from other cities like Chattanooga, which IMO are leaps and bounds ahead of us. Chattanooga is worth a look if you have not been there to see how it is done correctly for river activation on both sides. I realize Charlotte does not have a river which is a major bummer, but pocket parks are a great alternative. 

Omaha is a great city and have enjoyed my visits there. The same to Des Moines which is under rated and has activated both sides of their river. It does not often flood though. 

This is a private/public park in Nashville that was done in the Capital View area of town in the N. Gulch. The land is owned by Boyle Investments.

Frankie Pierce Park | Downtown Nashville (nashvilledowntown.com)

Also, Noble Park in the South Gulch which is another public/private park. The land is owned by Market Street Investments.

Noble Park | Downtown Nashville (nashvilledowntown.com)

 

By the way Happy New Year from Nashville and I hope your new year brings the best for you guys and your city!

[rancenc]

Oklahoma City is shooting for the big time in terms of proposed downtown development!!

https://journalrecord.com/2023/12/details-emerge-on-1750-foot-downtown-okc-tower/

[smeagolsfree]

I think the key word says it all....DREAM. To get a building that tall built in NYC much less OKC is a daunting task and to fill it would be a much more daunting one.

Besides, beware of folks that only have linked in pages. They are a dime a dozen in Nashville. They come here trying to bilk folks out of money and garner attention and are so full of it. Alligator skin boots in a polo shirt.

I smell a rat. This guy's company has only done 5 million in revenue. Seen it before. Talks a big talk and gets the locals excited.

[KJHburg]

52 minutes ago, smeagolsfree said:

I think the key word says it all....DREAM. To get a building that tall built in NYC much less OKC is a daunting task and to fill it would be a much more daunting one.

Besides, beware of folks that only have linked in pages. They are a dime a dozen in Nashville. They come here trying to bilk folks out of money and garner attention and are so full of it. Alligator skin boots in a polo shirt.

I smell a rat. This guy's company has only done 5 million in revenue. Seen it before. Talks a big talk and gets the locals excited.

I have a bet along with @CLT Development that if this tower is built I am driving to OKC and steaks will be on me at the world famous Cattlemen's Steakhouse and since I will be driving through Nashville you can hop in too LOL!  I-40 westbound from Charlotte area to OKC!  I hope I have to buy these steaks!  Cattlemen's Steakhouse - History (cattlemensrestaurant.com)

Edited December 29, 2023 by KJHburg

[smeagolsfree]

I will be right there with you, but it will probably be a cold day in hell as they will probably lift the FAA regulations here and we will get a 1750' tower by then LOL. Dream on Nashville as that will never happen here either.

[KJHburg]

This is interesting the most stagnant skylines in USA (seems to be some British guy's video) many will not surprise you.