SWOH

I figured it would be wise to start a thread on this topic because it seems like a lot is in the works for 2014. (at least we can hope) Here's info from the DBJ: http://www.bizjournals.com/dayton/blog/morning_call/2014/01/citywide-looks-to-downtown.html?page=all In particular, projects include: MidPark http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/business/mid-park-project-to-start-this-spring/ncgXY/ Centre City conversion http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/business/downtown-building-wins-tax-credit-for-18m-in-resid/ncQhH/ Charlie Simms / Fairgrounds & Downtown http://www.simmsdev.com/patterson-place http://www.simmsdev.com/Rubicon-Square Fairgrounds Site Redevelopment / Genesis Project http://www.wdtn.com/news/local/montgomery/montgomery-county-fair-eyes-new-location http://citywidedev.com/neighborhood-development/genesis And conversions at the K + K building, the Merc, and 11 W. Monument Merc: 11 W. Monument (Beerman): https://maps.google.com/maps?ie=UTF-8&layer=c&z=17&iwloc=A&sll=39.763931,-84.193512&cbp=13,328.2,0,0,0&cbll=39.763660,-84.193293&q=11+w+monument+dayton&ei=iqLOUsPdHbLNsATqvIDoCw&ved=0CCoQxB0wAA (I do not have any onfo on K +K, nor do I know where it is, actually....)

I definitely think it is good press. Unfortunate that people write us off so quickly though, but in a way I am happy about it because it keeps the cost of living low for the rest of us. I know when I get out of college I have no intention of moving anywhere outside Dayton preferably, but I would venture to Columbus, Cincinnati, Louisville, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Toledo, of Detroit if necessary. Nowhere else though - California and NY, etc. are way outside of my budget haha.

Also would like to see renderings from the MidPark project too. The DDN is reporting today that it will start construction this spring! http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/business/mid-park-project-to-start-this-spring/ncgXY/ Here's some background on what is being proposed from 2009: http://www.scribd.com/doc/23753577/Greater-Downtown-Dayton-Plan-CityWide-Development-Corporation-MidPark-Development-Recommendations And Esrati's commentary http://esrati.com/midpark-part-of-someones-plan/10018/ http://esrati.com/writing-off-the-big-picture-the-midpark-silver-bullet/3354/

Looks like NOTL is making a lot of good moves! Possibly re-positioning itself as the more family-friendly alternative to the Banks? Wouldn't be a bad idea given the Aquarium is right there.

They do say there will be "accommodations" for pedestrians and cyclists.... so a bike path? Wouldn't be a bad idea to have a bike path in the area, probably would get a lot of use. And it would make sense to have some good bike/walking paths lead to the Eastern Corridor, otherwise what is the point of having light rail if you can't walk to it?

SAF, I'm assuming you have some sort of inside connection to Steiner. Is there any chance they are building a pedestrian bridge across Oh 129 to actually make this a walkable community to major employment and educational venues? ( Cincinnati Children's and Lakota East HS respectively)

Last I've heard about its redevelopment... http://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/morning_call/2013/01/middletown-mall-in-line-for-20m.html http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/news/local/new-towne-mall-owners-purchase-elder-beerman-prope/nZNXQ/ They also have a Facebook page, little development updates though aside from a name change to "Towne Mall Galleria" https://www.facebook.com/pages/Towne-Mall-Galleria-in-Middletown-OH/122819054544548 Interesting they purchased the E-B property. To me, this seems like a straightforward renovation - subdivide the Dillard's property into 3-4 big box units, entice a movie theater to locate at the south entrance (and the Danbarry would convert to a second-run format in response), and try hard to get Burlington Coat Factory at the site if E-B decides to leave. And the August DDN article acknowledges they have obtained four "major tenants" at the Dillard's site. I don't think the mall will ever compete as a regional mall again, but I can see it as a viable local center with good positioning. The JCP remodel at Northgate into multiple big-box stores has been very successful, and it is evident from there, Dayton Mall, and what's left of Tri-County that there is a strong trend towards big-box stores moving out of shopping centers and into malls. Just to list the stores which have recently moved from shopping center locations to Northgate Mall, Dayton Mall, or Tri-County Mall: - Marshall's - Burlington Coat Factory - DSW Shoes - h.h. gregg - Michael's - Dick's Sporting Goods - Ethan Allen - Ulta Cosmetics Some of which would be a good fit and some would not at Towne Mall, and all of which could probably support a store in that general area as well as the Tylersville / Liberty Center area. Housing/condo/apartment prices are low in Middletown, and there is a lot of office space so I doubt a lifestyle center would work.

^That is great news! I couldn't find much on the developer, Karim Haber. But I would be really interested in seeing the renderings for this conversion... exciting stuff!

I guess that depends on the definition of "success". As a mall replacement.... no. I have a strong suspicion that its tenant mix will strongly resemble what leaves Tri-County and chooses to continue operation in the northern Cincy area. And probably a decent mix of stores will locate there that did not want to give Tri-County a go like White House/Black Market, H&M, Chico's, etc but I doubt that store population will eclipse 25% of the total retail footprint. So basically it will lead to more retail de-centralization, creating an overall weaker retail environment in the northern suburbs. Tri-County will still operate in a weak capacity, and the center will be competing for stores and retail traffic against Mason, Tylersville Rd., Union Centre, Bridgewater Falls, and even Monroe with its outlet mall (Saks off 5th probably wouldn't have been a bad fit for this center). For a large case study on what de-centralization does to a retail environment, take a look at the northern Dayton area - it has the population and economy to support a large centralized retail location, and did support one for a while. But poor location and changing demographics killed the central retail core (Salem Mall), and its capacity was never replaced in the northern Miami valley. Instead, multiple weaker retail centers exist, and it will be hard for the area to land stores which would probably locate to the area if one strong retail center existed. As a "place"... possibly. This depends on your definition of place in the built environment. If you believe "place" is a new urbanist interpretation of a traditional city core, then possibly - although with the current distribution of retail to office, residential, etc. this development appears to place a heavy emphasis on the retail component if it were to be judged as an urban development. So as an urban substitute I do not see this development being a success. The site is entirely hemmed in by highways, making it impossible to walk off its grounds. And plus, where would you walk to? It may be possible to live, work, and shop at the site, but I don't imagine it would be possible to live there without a car as it would in a city. But if "place" simply means a traditional new urbanist development in a greenfield, then yes it will be a success. As a revenue generator... possibly. I know the Greene in Dayton has been very successful. And most of that success does not even have to do with its retail offerings - its mix of independent and chain restaurants and bars is its real success. In fact, they probably could have cut the amount of retail in half and replaced it with office space or residential and it still would have been just as successful as it is now. But the verdict is still out on whether or not the Greene will have a long (50+ yr) life span. I'm hoping it will, but retail odds say it won't - most centers generally aren't planned with any future past 20 years. Look at Eastland Mall, Brice Rd. and the rest of eastern Columbus if you want a good example. At least this center will be easier to mold based on changing demographics and tastes over time than a traditional mall. Retail can be converted to office, office can be converted to residential condos, and residential condos can be converted to apartments with relative ease. What will be needed is a strong leasing partner with this development over the long term to ensure its success - and since Steiner has a number of these centers now, hopefully they will stay behind them for the long term. If not, then I wouldn't bet on any financial success.

Agreed. There are many roads out there where bikes (or pedestrians) do not belong. This is inherent in the design of these roads, and that is the issue which needs to be fixed. Going into this: .... and that is where the issue lies. An active plan for cyclist expansion needs to be pursued based on current cycling demand. But with that, bike laws need to be reformed to keep cyclists off of roads where their presence is a danger to themselves or other motorists. For instance, this Dublin road below is marked as bike-friendly on Google, but take a look for yourself if you are reading to see if you feel the same way as a cyclist or motorist: The road - https://maps.google.com/maps?q=dublin+ohio&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=0x8838ecc4d450a11f:0xc2176815689028,Dublin,+OH&gl=us&ei=IMCnUp-LNIi1rQHgnoGQCg&ved=0CJUBELYD=bike&dirflg=b&f=d The area - https://maps.google.com/maps?q=dublin+ohio&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=0x8838ecc4d450a11f:0xc2176815689028,Dublin,+OH&gl=us&ei=IMCnUp-LNIi1rQHgnoGQCg&ved=0CJUBELYD=bike&dirflg=b&f=d I would not take my bicycle on that road, and I would be p*ssed if I was in a car behind a cyclist there too. The fact it is marked as cyclist-friendly is honestly disgusting. There is no infrastructure present to support cycling. But a sizeable number of people would probably like to cycle on the road if they could, so infrastructure should be built to accommodate this demand. Better yet, separate trails should be built to connect major points throughout the metro (as has been done in many areas of Dayton), with a good bike lane network in the core city to support a viable cycling option. In conjunction with the existing walkable built infrastructure, cycling has a viable purpose for short to mid distance (1/2 mile - 10 miles) of travel in a transit schema if the infrastructure exists.

^actually wouldn't think that to be the case, as the site formerly housed a Delphi plant which employed about 1,000 people. The area has the infrastructure in place to support the development, and seems like a very logical choice. Overall, I am very happy this will be built. It is good adaptive re-use of the site, and hopefully will draw in traffic to the Ramada Plaza at Wagoner Ford as well as provide a reason to re-develop the Dayton Grand hotel site (now in severe need of demolishing) at Needmore. I also think there will be a good local/ regional clientele base to support it - probably won't be the same people visiting the downtown casinos.

Find it hard to believe they are going through this project without the second retail anchor.... Especially since they probably pitched the site to Saks (and lost) and there is no word on Macy's moving from Tri-County yet. They must be very confident that they will be able to pick up enough of Tri-County's scraps to make this viable.

Yeah, on the pictures, the one payday loan place is a Cricket store, the only things in the plaza are Dollar General, Cousin Vinny's pizza, a barber shop and the China one What's really interesting is that Cousin Vinny's recently moved to that center. Before there was a location by the Huber Heights Wal-Mart (yuck) at I-70 and 201. But then the particular franchisee chose to drop the CV franchise and re-branded as "Wise Guys". CV responded with opening the new location in that plaza, which is at the opposite corner of Huber.

There hasn't been, except I would assume this development counts as progress at the site. Either way, I can definitely see a restart here. And if you listen closely, you can probably even start to hear rumblings of retailers leaving Tri-County right now, as much as I hate to say it...

Figured it would be better to post about Bass Pro here than in the Forest Fair thread because Bass Pro is moving here, and likely site plans will be coming out soon... http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2013/12/11/bass-pro-buys-land-for-new-west.html Looking at the map, I'm fairly certain the site is triangular-shaped, bounded by a tree line, I-75 and Allen Rd. If this is the case, there is just a small edge of the property that meets the surface road with restaurants paralleling I-75 NB directly south of the Union Centre interchange. So connectivity with the microscopically small Streets of West Chester looks to be unlikely, although continuation of that development out towards the Bass Pro site with the inclusion of some more stores, offices, and some apartments would make logical sense...

It definitely could. But the sale had to happen... that fairgrounds site was severely out of date, and there is a lot of development potential there. My guess at what will happen at the site is office along Stewart (hopefully stuff that is new and builds off the presence of the GE EPISCenter and UDRI), residential (likely Simms and Oberer developed townhomes) in the middle, and MVH will buy rights to the northern reaches. And I'd be willing to bet the vegetation buffer along Patterson stays to isolate the new residential. This will put MVH in direct conflict with any historic building preservation at the Fairgrounds site. But I hope that I am wrong and the plan looks more like the one Jeff posted. The only modification I would make to Jeff's plan personally is higher density residential along Apple St. so the Salvation Army and FHA piano buildings across the street would be more likely to have a loft conversions happen to them in the future.

^Actually, Miller-Valentine would pay somewhere between $16 mil - $18 mil for the site. And to answer the question - not yet... The Fair board voted tonight on whether or not to sell the site and move to Brookville. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they make the move to Brookville and open this up for a cool urban development, but we will see what happens I guess. The new site is actually quite nice and well-placed, right at the NW corner of the I-70 / Arlington Rd. interchange in the business park with the Payless Shores DC. It's 66 acres, and it has interstate visibility, access to the bike trail, and a nice pond.

That makes sense. So their campus area is really downtown. Thanks, I always wondered haha

That is true. Especially with this type of highly regionalized industry, they have to be careful to have both Dayton and Cincinnati influences. That's why I was really surprised when the outlet mall was dubbed the "Cincinnati Premium Outlets" and included a fugly replica of Union Terminal as a focal point. No Dayton (or even Butler/Warren) reference there whatsoever. But I guess it's not cutting into sales, so I doubt it will make Simon care much about regional identity in the future

Good perspective on the streetcar issue (surprisingly from the Enquirer... why weren't they supportive before?) A lot of good points. Cincinnati won't stay competitive in the global talent market without better transit options: http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20131204/EDIT02/312040121/Streetcar-debacle-hurts-our-reputation

Interesting idea, I hope they can get approval. Quick question on Witt - does it have a campus-oriented business district?

Pine Club Makes "World's Top 10 Greatest" List: http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/entertainment/dining/pine-club-makes-top-10-list-of-worlds-greatest-din/ncD6d/

Bummer... http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/business/economy/hauer-music-to-relocate-to-former-krispins-locatio/ncD2T/

What makes me sad is that the developer said he is sinking his life savings into this project...

Apparently this is going to not be a re-use project, according to the DDN. Caresource is looking for space to build a new 250k building... http://www.mydaytondailynews.com/news/news/local/55m-project-proposed-in-dayton/nb889/ (behind the paywall)