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Here's how I'm looking at it: 1) I figure that they wouldn't post rents like this if no one is leasing (or rents will drop until they start leasing). 2) If people are willing to pay that rent, then it's not too high for Cleveland. 3) If it's not too high for Cleveland, then we can expect more developers (and lenders) to invest in new construction, not just office/warehouse conversions. I remember being at a talk maybe 4-5 years ago after the Uptown Apartments opened where Ari Maron said that for new construction to really take off in Cleveland, he believed it would take a catalyst project and something in the range of $2.50/sf rents. Maybe this is it?

The website's a lot more expansive than it used to be, and it says they are leasing for Spring 2018 occupancy. https://oneuniversitycircle.com/

Renderings are usually supposed to help sell/promote a project, so I find that the real thing rarely looks as good as the renderings. That's not a good sign for this project where even the renderings look bad.

Not sure if this goes under this topic, but here's some news from Legacy Village: http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2017/11/arhaus_is_expanding_at_legacy.html

The land under the current CDC building is now controlled by UCI. I'm sure they'll be reaching out to area developers if they haven't already.

They're pouring the roof of the 20th floor today! :clap:

From what I understand, the City's current code only allows 4 over 1, but the code is outdated as it is based on the 2012 International Building Code. The newer International Building Code allows 5 over 2, so the City will allow it with a variance and will eventually update their own code.

It is definitely 5 floors of wood over 2 floors of concrete. I did some investigating after some of the first photos of wood framing were posted. Standing on the third floor, they would be standing on the top of the concrete podium, so yes the floor of the third floor (or the ceiling of the second floor) would be concrete. They need a strong floor made out of concrete (or other projects may use steel) to build five floors of wood on top. There are no concrete decks above that floor. The "voodoo magic" that rockitect mentions was just a variance granted by the City based on a more recent version of the International Building Code (I don't recall which one).

For the anchor tenant, Pace is talking about a large office user, not a retail anchor. I have no inside info, but I could imagine Sherwin Williams wanting to move there. It would be great though to get a company from outside the region to move to town.

^I saw in one of the articles that it's postponed indefinitely.

^The most recent Centric article on Cleveland.com (from December) shows 7 floors in the renderings (5 residential over a 2-story retail/office podium)

Yeah, I thought there were code issues with 5-stories of wood frame over a podium like that. I guess they got around that... or maybe I'm mistaken.

^Actually it is under the building, or at least it's under most of the building, as you can see in "Playhouse Square Img09" on the left side of the image. They couldn't fit the entire garage under the footprint of the building because it would be a horribly inefficient parking garage and would need 10+ floors to get enough parking to support the apartments above. Either that, or the building's footprint would need to take up almost the entire parcel and you would be left with a much shorter building (probably O or U shaped) to get the same number of units. And that wouldn't solve the problem of the massive garage facade anyway.

On the south side of Abbey Ave. between Columbus Rd. and W. 21st Pl. They have a map on their website with a yellow star for the location of the project.

Johnson also doesn't seem to want to acknowledge that the $18M being offered translates into $56M after you add the State's contribution (assuming the funds are used toward school construction/renovation as CMSD has implied they would be). When you consider the time value of money, you would need to assume a somewhat low discount rate to make $121M over 30 years equivalent to $56M today (about 5.9% if it's a flat $4M/year and likely closer to 5.0% as the $121M number probably assumes that the project's taxes increase over the 30-year period). I haven't personally seen the numbers or the presentation, but I would guess that this is the way that Stark's team came up with the $18M offer to begin with (some sort of NPV calc on the $121M and then rounding up to make the offer enticing enough to be accepted). I don't think the project would die entirely without the school portion of the TIF (purely guessing here), but it would likely be drastically different, much smaller, much less valuable, and would therefore produce much less than $121M for the schools. Take the deal, CMSD, so we can keep the City's momentum going!

It's from CMSD, so I don't think they're targeting anyone in particular to advertise for the project. They are holding hearings to get opinions from the community prior to making their decision in August. I received the same notice though, and I don't even live within the district's borders, so maybe they are advertising a little...

Doesn't this guy understand that he bought a place in an urban environment and density and development are typically a good thing? IMHO, he should be cheering for a new apartment building that adds more eyes on the street and more activity for the retail in the neighborhood. Pretty much anything else would hurt the value of his house. More townhouses would compete with his if he ever wanted to sell. Leaving it as a vacant lot certainly isn't preferable to new construction. Does he think someone will buy it and turn it into a nice park or something? I'd love to know his reasoning for spending so much time and tens of thousands of dollars on a lawsuit.

^^and from what I found, Liberty Blvd. was renamed Martin Luther King Jr. Drive back in 1981 (changed to a boulevard sometime thereafter).

Here is an explanation from http://www.judsonsmartliving.org/blog/whats-new-with-the-nord-family-greenway/ for traffic on MLK and 105th: "University consultants performed traffic studies for MLK Boulevard and East 105th Street, with slightly surprising results: “We discovered the volume of traffic wouldn’t concern us, but the speed of traffic along there was an issue,” he said. Those streets were actually designed so that cars could get through the intersections quickly; the roadways are wide and there are no traffic lights to slow down the vehicles on them. The primary solution at MLK and East 105th is creating an extra-wide crosswalk, new curb cuts and striping, and installing a traffic light. That way, Lowenstein said, “cars will have to stop for pedestrians.” MLK also will be narrowed in the area of the greenway to eliminate parking lanes where stationary cars might obstruct drivers’ views of pedestrians (or pedestrians’ views of moving vehicles). This portion of the roadway also will feature pedestrian-activated warnings. “With just two lanes in each direction, it will be a fairly narrow street,” Lowenstein explained. “That will slow cars and, with no parallel parking, make for better visibility for pedestrians.”"

I like the density! Clearly it's primarily student housing (maybe some medical residents as well) given that there are 45 units (40 of which are less than 700sf) and only 16 parking spaces. With only 16 spaces, I'm not too concerned about safety with the garage door fronting on Mayfield - that's not adding a lot of traffic. I agree that it would be better if the parking plan was flipped 180 degrees, but with the grade change from front to back, this is the only configuration that would really make sense. Plus, I'd trade off a little extra car traffic for 45 units in that location any day. :clap:

^^^I didn't mean to imply that the filming would completely prevent future development. I had heard a rumor recently that they were tearing down the remaining portion of Woodhill Supply, so that was either false or it's just being delayed. I was more curious if anyone knew what the movie was (which is why I said "not entirely development related") and if anyone had heard anything new about the site or the Visconsi project in general.

Not entirely development related, but does anyone know what movie's being filmed in the old Woodhill Supply lot between Coltman and 123rd? That kind of activity doesn't bode well for further demo or future development on that site unfortunately.

Anyone else notice that construction fencing is up?! :clap:

I heard today that there might be a new gastro pub going in on Mayfield. Does anyone know where/when/what it is?