Today let’s check in over at 18th and Chestnut where the Alta City House project is starting to go rise! The last time we looked at this project, in April, the parking garage was just starting to go up.
Here’s what is going on at the site as of a couple weeks ago. The parking structure has topped out, and has been for a few months now, the foundation for the apartment building is almost complete, and since there is minimal underground work, the framing for the building has already started to go vertical. The steel structure at the corner at 18th and Chestnut is the framing for a two-story entrance to the building.
I took this picture while coming down from the 18th Street pedestrian bridge. Even though this is going to be a 5-story building, it is going to be built right up to the property line creating a great urban wall. Imagine what this picture will look like a year from now!
Alta City House is now at the point where we will start to see the structure rise quickly. Completion was originally expected for fall of this year and as much of an impressive feat it would be to have it complete in a couple months, we probably won’t see this complete until mid 2014.
Sorry, but after all the blah blah blah, Chris at EWD, about streetwalls and affordability, this Alta House is a cheap job, a total waste of a unique site, the profound under-use of a square block NEXT TO the central light rail station of Downtown, NEXT TO a brand-new supermarket — THE magnet to all potential renters Downtown — NEXT TO every train and bus coming into Union Station, and NEXT TO Downtown.
Honestly, what were you guys thinking, when you dumped your option to build to the max, up to 240 feet? Sounds like you’re actually short of money, to build it right. The site is absolutely unique, and you’ve absolutely failed to develop its potential. This project makes me wonder if the city planners picked the wrong development team for Union Station, which pitched a mid-rise master plan, over the wiser high-rise plan, to better unite density with transit. Convince me I’m wrong.
Jim,
One thought that you might want to consider is whether the high-rise plan would have even come to fruition. The developer behind that plan has far more cancelled projects than anything that was ever realized and hasn’t done anything more than a couple hundred apartments in six or seven years. If Denver had gone for the riskier proposal that relied on significantly more private capital we might still be looking at barren field behind Union Station with RTD, Denver, etc desperately seeking capital. Or maybe a $100 million stop-gap solution with everything absolutely bare bones.
That said. City House is a woeful under utilization of this site and is reflective of the cash-strapped position that E/W has found themselves in recent years. I understand that immediate capital needs take priority over long-term but I wish that City House wasn’t the project that was used for a quick cash infusion. Certainly there was a less-attractive parcel that could have been used instead?
Paul,
Your skepticism about E/W is reasonable, given the history of the Convention Center hotel bail-out the city had to do to rescue that project, a few years ago. There seems to be a basic flaw in the Denver “public-private” development formula, which guarantees so much to builders, who still under-perform.
Looking back on the incredible wave of office building development in the 60’s, 70’s and early 80’s — which was mostly on privately-owned Downtown parcels, as well as quite a bit of old Post-Urban Renewal parking lots — you wonder how much the city can really do to stimulate new construction.
All that office space development was driven by the huge run-up of oil prices, and Mountain States oil and gas speculation, centered in Denver as a “Headquarters” City, for hundreds of energy speculators. With fracking, a lot of that speculation has returned, but the energy companies are operating out of office “campus” settings now, in Houston and Dallas.
Denver’s economic growth seems to be a lot more lifestyle-driven now, for the Millenials, who just want to live in a cool city, almost regardless of job opportunities. Much like the drivers that brought millions into California, seeking a hip scene in an urban setting. Becoming America’s Marijuana “Amsterdam” adds to that attraction to Young Urbans, which is fine.
The smartest thing Denver leaders and planners have done is to focus on building rail, centralizing around Union Station. Seems like the biggest strategy failure of the city has been the PUD approach, puttig the entire Denver Union Station project in the hands of one private entity.
Instead of limiting the city’s options down to chosing between only two development teams for virtually the entire project, why haven’t they been smarter, marketing each block separately, setting clear development guidelines and minimums, to several builders’ proposals? With that approach, the city’s risk with each developer is on a stand-alone basis, rather than risking the entire Planned Unit Development on one outfit, which we now know can fail to deliver.
“City House” is very close to a breach of contract, given the distinct location and value of the site, and the earlier 23-story proposal, compared to the project now being built. What amazes me is that a building permit was even issued for this job, given the city’s strong hand, which wasn’t played at all. The silence on this disappointment — to citizens and taxpayers — from the Planning Office and Mayor’s Office, is deafening.
There’s still time to rescue the Union Station development, but it’ll take some real leadership from the city government, which seems afraid to even look at the problem, before it gets worse.
Union Station has the potential to become an urban home run. City House is looking a lot more like a fumble.
I agree this project should have been a high rise. They at least should have built the foundation of the parking garage so a tower could later be built on top of it. On the other hand, with so few units in such a prime location, they could fetch very high prices if they are converted to condos in the future. Maybe in the distant future the parking garage will be torn down and a condo tower built, rectifying the under-utilization of this site,
Yes, Corey, I hope you’re right — that at least the garage can be ripped out, so a tower can be built. But for now, it’s an outright insult to the spirit of the Union Station Master Plan — or whatever it’s called.
The NIMBY zeal to put size and height limits on everything has failed to call for Height and Size MINIMUMS on key sites. If government’s going to rule everything through zoning and viewplanes, then why not Minimum Development Requirements, on any project involving public money?
Basically, the developer cuts the whole city short, by not best-using the site, in jobs, retail customers, renters, and all the taxes they pay.
Bottom line, city planners and politicians have caved to the NIMBYS, and played into the hands of developers who want to build the cheapest possible job, with all the public-private infrastructure built in, at very little risk of failure.
So, politicians and planners, you’re ending up with less, for more. This hostility to the private sector simply discourages good development, by putting a lid on land use.
Time to start putting Minimum Developent language in these public-private contracts. Some real rules about performance requirements from developers, since they’re getting a virtually guaranteed-to-succeed deal.
For the City, is Less really More?
I’m way late to this game, but I guess I would ask that you not judge a painting by the first brush strokes.
(And, for what it’s worth, this site is not part of the Union Station master development program. Heck, we bought it before FasTracks passed.)