Downtown Phoenix happenings... (Scottsdale, Tempe, Goodyear: lofts, condo, neighborhoods)

[Cj81]

Actually you need the housing before your going to get the retail and other downtown "things to do". If you study the growth of the suburbs on the fringe of Phoenix, you will see that the first thing that gets built is the homes. Once homes are in, developers will build stores, and other amenities to accomodate them. Its not in an investors/devleopers best interest to build anything downtown unless they have statistics that show they will make money. Its been so easy and cheap for developers to purchase land on the fringe that downtown has been ignored for the last 50 years. Now there is a new urban redevelopment movement which is due light rail, traffic and all of the other failures of suburbanization, there is now a market downtown. So the fact is , The first thing downtown needs is the condos and people living there. Once people are there, they will create the demand for stores, entertainment, etc... So don't worry the cart is behind the horse as it should be. You have to remember, developers are not stupid, they want to make money and they study every statistic they can before they actually build something. If a developer were to build a grocery store downtown right now, it would be empty and would lose money until the housing was there, and that goes for anything, bars, stores etc... Downtown is on the right track..

[irwin]

Originally Posted by Cj81

Actually you need the housing before your going to get the retail and other downtown "things to do". If you study the growth of the suburbs on the fringe of Phoenix, you will see that the first thing that gets built is the homes. Once homes are in, developers will build stores, and other amenities to accomodate them. Its not in an investors/devleopers best interest to build anything downtown unless they have statistics that show they will make money. Its been so easy and cheap for developers to purchase land on the fringe that downtown has been ignored for the last 50 years. Now there is a new urban redevelopment movement which is due light rail, traffic and all of the other failures of suburbanization, there is now a market downtown. So the fact is , The first thing downtown needs is the condos and people living there. Once people are there, they will create the demand for stores, entertainment, etc... So don't worry the cart is behind the horse as it should be. You have to remember, developers are not stupid, they want to make money and they study every statistic they can before they actually build something. If a developer were to build a grocery store downtown right now, it would be empty and would lose money until the housing was there, and that goes for anything, bars, stores etc... Downtown is on the right track..

I agree that downtown needs people to create a demand for stores and other commercial services. Yet, the thing you are missing when comparing dense development with suburb-style development is that dense development often includes retail/commercial on the lower floors with residential in the upper floors. Therefore, a new building could be designed to include these services and work with possible retailers to design lower floor floor space that would fit the needs of say, a Safeway, a CVS, or some other service to residents of downtown. Therefore, developers should work to solicit these types of businesses and the city should encourage there development through zoning laws, street parking, etc.

[Cj81]

Yes I am well aware of mixed use developments, and that is one thing that downtown will accomplish differently than suburbs. The point I was trying to make is that downtown , with the exceptions of office buildings and a handfull of small business', is empty. Similar, the edge of the suburban sprawl is just vacant land. So there really isn't any kind of demand for downtown to grow without the housing. So until there is a population of people living downtown, most developers are just going to continue to sit on the land. I know most of the projects downtown are mixed use , for instance the 44 Monroe project is supposed to have a grocery store of some kind on the bottom floor. The question then becomes: Does 44 Monroe have enough residents to support the grocery store on its own? Well it would also have some assistace from the Orpheum residents. If it doesn't, then that space on the ground floor will just sit there vacant until there is more housing to support it. The developers have planned for a grocery store, but the last I had heard was that they didn't have a tenant lined up yet ,just negotiations as of now. Especially since AJ's jumped on bored with CityScape, other grocers are a little timid about signing a lease due to the close proximity. Its just a fact, downtown needs people living there in order for it to grow, the people create demand and that will bring more developments and more people, mixed use or not. Sure all of the new developments have allocated first floor retail, but they still need to fill up the spaces with tenants. that won't happen without more people and more people won't happen without more housing. The housing comes first, doesn't matter what kind of development.

[councilor j]

Some of those building do look like they belong in Florida and I cant believe that it took this long and hundreds of thousands of people to actually start building something like this downtown, but the downtown has nothing compared to even a city a quarter of the size of Phoenix, and the current skyline is small.

[HX_Guy]

32-story condo tower proposed for downtown Phoenix

Ginger D. Richardson
The Arizona Republic
Mar. 13, 2007 06:17 PM

A developer who has already made his mark in downtown Phoenix with one condominium tower is now proposing a second, 32-story residential project in the heart of the city.Moderator cut: copyright

[FastFerrari]

Thats looks like the Phoenix skyline will become alot larger along with the cities size. Nice to see some expansion going on out there. Cant wait till i move out there to see it with my own eyes.

[synapse]

I think that it's true that the housing comes before the retail. Look at one of the hottest neighborhoods in the country right now, the South Loop in Chicago. Chicago's downtown is more vibrant, to be sure, but the South Loop is largely condominiums. Grocery stores didn't open until recently and there's still far, far less restaurants than on the north side of Chicago. Why? Well, the retailers didn't want to build unless there were people there. Now that there are people there, retail is starting to move in.

Apparently quite a few of the buildings - 44 Monroe, the Summit at Copper Square - are largely sold out already. If people do move there who want to be closer to downtown, then retailers will move there too. Phoenix never really had a chance to become a city - itgrew too fast and now people are tired of being so far away from the center. It'll develop a new center. I think, with light rail, this really could work.

[HX_Guy]

New updates:





















Alta Phoenix



Phoenix Bio-Science High School

[Valley Native]

Good pics, HX Guy, but these new highrises currently under construction are just the tip of the iceberg. There are many more taller projects PLANNED ... most of which have been approved, and I certainly hope they materalize.

What do you think about all these highrises planned for downtown or the Central Corridor, but end up never being built due to all the protests or lawsuits against them? Look what happened with the Trump project on Camelback ... and now the W Hotel. Why do you think the powers that be here tend to give in to the old f.a.r.t.s. and NIMBYs? I could never figure that out. A lot of these people apparently have nothing better to do than to picket and protest things that will actually improve downtown Phoenix, so they really should just be ignored by everyone else.

[progrowth]

Originally Posted by Valley Native

Good pics, HX Guy, but these new highrises currently under construction are just the tip of the iceberg. There are many more taller projects PLANNED ... most of which have been approved, and I certainly hope they materalize.

What do you think about all these highrises planned for downtown or the Central Corridor, but end up never being built due to all the protests or lawsuits against them? Look what happened with the Trump project on Camelback ... and now the W Hotel. Why do you think the powers that be here tend to give in to the old f.a.r.t.s. and NIMBYs? I could never figure that out. A lot of these people apparently have nothing better to do than to picket and protest things that will actually improve downtown Phoenix, so they really should just be ignored by everyone else.

I agree with you 100%. These useless, smelly good for nothing skumbags, are destroying downtown to some extent.
For instance, the site that the "W" hotel was to be built on (the pile of rubble called sun merc), where was these "preservationists" before this hotel proposal. You didnt see them hanging around or inside the building to take photos or to have fun. As a matter of fact it was being used as a storage unit for the phoenix suns "stuff".

Since sarver owns the land, he should have had enough brian power to buy out these sun merc preservation skumbags and put them in a doungeon where they can meet all thier other skid row "rats".

The Phoenix government acts like cowards when it comes to the brainless nimby recluses.

If they dont like progress, then they should move to northern alaska or canada, where they will have all the space in the world to float their reclusive skumbag selves, and dont have to worry about growth or freeways or highrises or even more people.