From the article:

"Because it has parking in the back, we could creatively use the parking area to connect to the main building," Kenat told me.

 

The plan would be to build additional apartments that connect to the main building with a courtyard space. Kenat said this could potentially open up the large surface parking lot across the street for development.

 

Hope they follow through on that "creative use". Those non-rectangular spaces aren't well-suited to parking for apartments, resulting in unusable triangles. You can see in the current configuration how they stack the cars in rows, which obviously wouldn't work if you were blocked in by 3 or 4 other cars (unless it was managed by a 24-7 valet). It'd be smart to use that space for something other than parking, and put the parking in a centralized location (garage or surface) that has better geometry for storing cars.

A big crane is set up today in Roots Alley bringing new HVAC equipment to top of the Merchants Building at 6th and Race. I remember that this project got historic tax credits but can't find much more information about it. Does anyone know what they are planning to do with the old Newberrys base? I know there are going to be apartments above, but the base looks so different than the tower, I wonder what the plan is for that section. Anyway, its good to see this project is still moving forward since I hadn't heard anything about it in a while.

Round 17 list of applicants for Ohio Historic Tax Credits, winners to be announced at the end of the year.

Would love to see the 3 buildings in the core get some credits:

 

Traction Building

Fourth and Walnut Center (First National Bank)

Textile Building

 

Curious as to what is 12th and Walnut...

Would love to see the 3 buildings in the core get some credits:

 

Traction Building

Fourth and Walnut Center (First National Bank)

Textile Building

 

Curious as to what is 12th and Walnut...

 

Probably Germania Building

Looks like the building at 106 W 7th ( https://goo.gl/maps/MPe3dHwSMKC2 ) is being renovated into a Marriott Town Place Suites. http://city-egov.cincinnati-oh.gov/Webtop/ws/council/public/child/Blob/46287.pdf?rpp=-10&m=1&w=doc_no%3D%27201601447%27

 

The project description says there will be a 17,000 sqft addition to the property.

^Awesome news.  Looks like the same developer did two hotels at Union Centre Blvd. so it must be legit. 

 

Also, I went through this building right before McHahn's closed and it is in great shape.

I live in the Groton and knew the two vacant buildings on either side of us would get redeveloped in the not to distant future.  If this moves forward lets hope someone jumps on the other one with Payless on the street level.  It's actually is bigger and looks to be in better shape then the one above so I think it very easily could be converted into apartments. 

Very nice, great news.

 

I think they tried getting that to become apartments and couldn't make it work before even with State Historic Tax Credits, if I am correct on that one.

 

Good to see this move through without the need for Historic Tax Credits.

 

Also, $40k per year in CPS Taxes and $24k per year towards the streetcar.

 

A bit off topic, but I am most excited for the possibilities downtown in the next 5 years from 5th Street South.  There seem to be a lot of underutilized buildings and that 4th Street Corridor has all the possibilities in the world to be a buzzing urban center.  With the PNC Annex building, 4th and Race, and the other large buildings on 4th looking for Historic Tax Credits, the possibilities are exciting

Get a look inside the newest apartments in downtown Cincinnati

 

 

Newberry Lofts on 6th, a redevelopment project of the former Newberry’s Department Store, is already generating a lot of interest from renters.

 

In fact, 24 of the 62 loft-style apartments have been pre-leased. The first residents are expected to move into their apartments in December.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/11/04/get-a-look-inside-the-newest-apartments-in.html

Neyer Properties reveals name, plans for downtown office tower upgrade

 

 

When Neyer Properties announced it had purchased the former URS Tower in downtown Cincinnati, the Evanston-based commercial real estate company knew it would upgrade the office building. But it didn’t have a name yet.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/11/04/exclusive-neyer-properties-reveals-name-plans-for.html

Any hope they are going to remove that horrible facade on the Newberry Building?

 

Any hope they are going to remove that horrible facade on the Newberry Building?

 

That facade has to stay as part of the historic preservation review connected to the tax credits. The new facade was constructed within the period of significance for the historic district.

 

Although I wish the original facade was never altered, I actually appreciate the Newberry's facade and neighboring building.

I assume the building on the left is the one under the facade, I understand the historic preservation review of the facade, but it seems like restoring the original would trump even a historic facade.

 

Photo:  http://digital.cincinnatilibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p16998coll6/id/5546/rec/23

^My understanding was that the Newberry's building at the corner was built new, and then the buff brick facade was stretched across the mid rise building for consistency.

 

There is a rehabilitation standard that recognizes that additions or alterations to a building may gain significance in their own right and be worthy of preservation.

I walked by the other day. They are framing up the facades a installing new glass. It looks ten times better than when that wig shop was there.

In St Bernard, they have finished a really nice streetscape project on Vine St, including wider sidewalks, buried utilities, trees, and new lights. The improvement run roughly from Bertus to McClelland. I'm not sure when the project started/finished, but I am very impressed with the final result.

 

Anybody know where the funding came from for the improvements? I think there was a TIF district, but I'm not sure how much the total project cost and how the funding was split up.

^ I agree it does look nice. Unfortunately, the wider sidewalks eliminated the street parking, which resulted in the demolition of a few nice buildings for a small parking lot.

Which buildings were torn down for the parking lot?

https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1672949,-84.4982974,3a,75y,149.25h,89.55t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sP6dLoKvfuM6zgdbrN4c-Gw!2e0!5s20110801T000000!7i13312!8i6656

 

https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1664983,-84.4995728,3a,75y,146.25h,82.76t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1srI2Lc7CRnzkhZgNIHUld0g!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

 

 

That was a very "one step forward, one step back" thing to do.

Evendale buys land for advanced manufacturing campus

 

 

The village of Evendale has purchased more than 24 acres of land from Landmark Baptist Temple Inc. for the development of AeroHub, an advanced manufacturing campus.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/11/21/evendale-buys-land-for-advanced-manufacturing.html

Does anyone know about this building at Montgomery and Williams in Norwood?  They did a truly exceptional job restoring the brickwork.  In fact they may have completely rebuilt it.  Notice that the brick under the windows is completely new, and there's some extra courses on the parapets, but you really can't tell.  Yet they did bog standard aluminum storefront windows and some pretty awful glass block.  That makes me sad.  Still, this isn't some commercial flip job (is there even such a thing?).  I'd love to know the story. 

United Dairy Farmers owns it (their HQ is across the street). Could be some extra office or meeting space.

FYI -- For those of you who don't subscribe to the Business Courier, you can get a full year subscription for a discounted rate of $55 right now.

Does the subscription come with digital for all the cities Biz Journals handles?

I just checked, and I was able to read paywalled Columbus Business Journal articles with my Business Courier subscription.

I'd buy that for a dollar!

 

 

Or, I did for $55

Office, R&D space planned in 1st phase of AeroHub

 

 

A developer working with the village of Evendale on the first phase of AeroHub, a planned advanced manufacturing campus, has seen a lot of interest from potential tenants.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/11/28/office-r-d-space-planned-in-1st-phase-of-aerohub.html

The City posted RFPs about two city owned properties downtown:

 

http://choosecincy.com/Cincinnati/media/Cincinnati/EconDev/RFPs/Shillitos-West-RFP_one-pager.pdf

http://choosecincy.com/Cincinnati/media/Cincinnati/EconDev/RFPs/9th-and-Plum-RFP_one-pager.pdf

City wants development proposals for two major downtown sites

 

 

The city of Cincinnati is asking developers for ideas on how to rehabilitate the western part of the Shillito’s complex at Seventh and Elm streets and what to build in a parking lot to the west of City Hall.

 

The sites are underutilized, according to the city, and should be used to create more quality homeownership and rental projects.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/11/28/city-wants-development-proposals-for-two-major.html

Northside Distillery expanding to Race Street. I'm glad something is going into this space. Has anyone tried their booze?

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/12/01/northside-distillery-expands-downtown.html

^Haven't tried it, but I'll be excited to go there. Hopefully this will help to start to activate that quadrant of downtown that is currently pretty dead after business hours.

Really excited about this adding more night life closer to the CBD. Also glad they are reusing a historic space without it being demolished.

Archdiocese of Cincinnati investing millions in downtown office building

 

 

The Archdiocese of Cincinnati is looking for a few good office tenants and it’s investing millions of dollars to make its space more attractive.

 

Four years ago, the archdiocese made its decision to keep its headquarters in downtown Cincinnati at 100 E. Eighth St. Jeff Bohrer, director of property management for the archdiocese, said the archdiocese was committed to staying in downtown Cincinnati. But the more-than-100-year-old building needed some work.

 

More below:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/12/02/archdiocese-of-cincinnati-investing-millions-in.html

^ This is going to be a very neat project.  The newer storefronts on the first and second floor are awful and do the building a huge disservice.  Fortunately I can say that there's a lot of evidence left of the old storefront (both remaining in-place and in old photographs), so we have plenty to work with. :)

Speaking of old storefronts, the Sleepy Bee is under construction on Fourth St, and they've removed the modern metal cladding, revealing the original "Burkhart Bros" hand-painted storefront. Not sure what the plans are for the final design, so check it out now if you're a fan of ghost signs.

From last week...

 

33 W 4th Street ( https://goo.gl/maps/7hx7Q1JRgBy ) now has signs in the window about an upcoming "mixed use development" but with little other info besides a phone number.

 

Something interesting to note on this is that the property was supposed to be a part of the McAlpin condo redevelopment. The City owned the building and sold it to the McAlpin developer for $1 (with no claw-back provision if the property did not get redeveloped). The property sat vacant for the past decade and the owner who got it for free just sold it to the current owner for $750,000. Pretty nice reward for not doing what was originally agreed upon.

106 W. Seventh will be redeveloped into a TownePlace Suites by Marriot hotel. This building was going to be redeveloped by Peak Properties Group but that plan died when the tax credits they received were insufficient to make their numbers work.

^Also $24k per year to the streetcar.  Wow, somehow I think once all these new developments get online and cracking in the next 5 years, the streetcar will be way in the black.  What happens then??

Great news!  I was in that building many years ago, you can't appreciate how big those windows are until you are in the space.

^Also $24k per year to the streetcar.  Wow, somehow I think once all these new developments get online and cracking in the next 5 years, the streetcar will be way in the black.  What happens then??

 

It depends on who's in office. If Cranley is still around, he'll probably force SORTA to cancel its deal with Transdev and hire SORTA employees at a higher cost, in order to create yet another controversy. If Yvette wins, we could probably leverage the money to buy additional streetcars.

Well $24k doesn't buy a streetcar but we can't let people be fooled into thinking the purchase of one additional streetcar and putting one additional streetcar into service at almost all times is any sort of financial strain on the city.  It's practically the same cost as running just one more Metro bus. 

Sure, but I was suggesting we finance an additional streetcar or two and then use the surplus operating money to make annual payments. The city now locks in tax abatements for 12 years, so we are pretty confident how much operating money will be coming in each year. (As opposed to sales or income taxes which could swing wildly up in booming years and down during recessions.)

I'm not sure where to put this, so I'll leave it here. Apparently George Lucas is looking for a city to place a Lucas Museum with tons of memorabilia. He's having trouble finding a spot, even though he will 100% fund it. I feel

Cincinnati could be a contender, since this was the home of Kenner Toys. What do you guys think?

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-01-03/george-lucas-can-t-give-his-1-5-billion-museum-away?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-businessweek&utm_content=businessweek&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

New condos at 813 Broadway St., anyone with pay access care to summarize the details?

 

EXCLUSIVE: High-end condos coming to downtown Cincinnati

Jan 4, 2017, 11:12am EST

Tom Demeropolis

Senior Staff Reporter

Cincinnati Business Courier

 

 

An Indianapolis development company is working to convert a downtown Cincinnati office building into residential condominiums.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2017/01/04/exclusive-high-end-condos-coming-to-downtown.html

I'm not sure where to put this, so I'll leave it here. Apparently George Lucas is looking for a city to place a Lucas Museum with tons of memorabilia. He's having trouble finding a spot, even though he will 100% fund it. I feel

Cincinnati could be a contender, since this was the home of Kenner Toys. What do you guys think?

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-01-03/george-lucas-can-t-give-his-1-5-billion-museum-away?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-businessweek&utm_content=businessweek&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

 

 

I think that's a very good idea. As a vintage toy dealer I can tell you that Cincinnati is especially rabid about Star Wars toys due to the Kenner connection. Cincinnati loves them some G.I. Joe as M.A.S.K. as well, but Star Wars is the big tadoo.

New condos at 813 Broadway St., anyone with pay access care to summarize the details?

 

EXCLUSIVE: High-end condos coming to downtown Cincinnati

Jan 4, 2017, 11:12am EST

Tom Demeropolis

Senior Staff Reporter

Cincinnati Business Courier

 

 

An Indianapolis development company is working to convert a downtown Cincinnati office building into residential condominiums.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2017/01/04/exclusive-high-end-condos-coming-to-downtown.html

 

What's going to be great about this project is that it will show the market that there is demand for new condos in the CBD. Right now, people like the Dennison Hotel's owners can say, "there's no demand for condos in the CBD," based on the fact that there haven't been any new units built in the past 5+ years. Once you have one developer come in and build some units and they sell for $266k and up, other developers will start to take notice and snatch up other vacant or underutilized buildings in the CBD.

pay article, but more great news!

 

EXCLUSIVE: Downtown Cincinnati office building to become hotel

Jan 5, 2017, 10:56am EST

Tom Demeropolis

Senior Staff Reporter

Cincinnati Business Courier

 

The Jeweler's Exchange Building, located at 37 E. Seventh St., has been purchased by Vision Hospitality Group, which plans to convert the building into a hotel.

 

A Tennessee-based hotel company purchased a downtown Cincinnati office building with plans to convert it into a hotel.

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2017/01/05/exclusive-downtown-cincinnati-office-building-to.html