We have been discussing the redevelopment of the Lakewood Hospital site in the general Lakewood developments thread. However, the redevelopment is moving forward and is big enough that it deserves its own thread.

 

A couple of weeks ago, leasing/marketing materials were publicly released for the redevelopment of the now-closed Lakewood Hospital. With the completion and opening of the new Lakewood Family Medical Center at Detroit and Belle, all former hospital-related activity has apparently been moved out of the old hospital. Its demolition is now a matter of when, not if.

 

Replacing it will be this:

http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14519-Detroit-Ave-Lakewood-OH/13192180/

 

Presentation:

http://images3.loopnet.com/d2/WL23aqK7XFmUZQBF5tJklUH_1PrtrGO9Y9thp1IXjvU/document.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

I am still hoping for the high rise but this design is great too.

Might as well put the high-rise rendering in this thread too. :)

I'll take the high-rise rendering any day.

 

I just noticed that the plaza columns on the corner are from the hospital.

I'll take the high-rise rendering any day.

 

I am fine with the mid-rise too though.

I'll take the high-rise rendering any day.

 

I am fine with the mid-rise too though.

 

Well its more for the businesses below, If you just have shopping and food, people will drive, but if it's right below you, then it's just a better business model.

I think I read in the other thread that the city was in favor of the mid rise version.  Does anyone here know where the decision stands or if the high rise version is still a possibility?

Is the proposed residential rental units, or condos for purchase?

The city is confident that the number of people (about 300-400) living in mid-rise residential apartments, the for-sale townhouses and the office workers (about 1,200) will more than make up for the loss of 900 hospital workers and hundreds of daily visitors. Many of them parked in the now-demolished garage and walked through the enclosed walkway over Belle Avenue into the hospital and never set foot on a Lakewood sidewalk, let alone patronized a downtown business. Although many of the office workers will likely use the proposed parking garage, they won't have a large, in-house cafeteria like the one the hospital used to have. They will be forced to look for lunch outside unless they brown-bag it.

This will also be a taxable parcel now.  I bet Lakewood comes out ahead in this deal.  It will never be enough to silence the hospital truthers.

The "hospital truthers" aren't wrong, but that battle is lost and this development looks pretty nice.

Uh, yes they were and are wrong, and that's why they lost.

Can somebody sum up the hospital truthers for the non-lakewooders? Gonna take a shot in the dark, the Clinic was in cahoots with the city and the developer to make lots of money?

Many of them parked in the now-demolished garage and walked through the enclosed walkway over Belle Avenue into the hospital and never set foot on a Lakewood sidewalk, let alone patronized a downtown business.

 

Sounds like the Clinic...

Can somebody sum up the hospital truthers for the non-lakewooders? Gonna take a shot in the dark, the Clinic was in cahoots with the city and the developer to make lots of money?

 

Well you should not shoot in the dark because you will usually miss.  The chosen developer was not even in the picture when the Clinic decided to close the hospital and if I recall correctly the city did not want the hospital closed.

Lol I don't believe that, I'm just trying to imagine something a "hospital truther" might say.

Workers are swarming over Lakewood Hospital this week and next, removing asbestos, preparing to shut off utilities/cap gas lines, putting up fencing and preparing for demolition. Sorry for the bad drive-by-shooting pics....

Some pre-demolition photos of the Lakewood Hospital. Demolition is scheduled to occur this winter with a groundbreaking due next summer. The hospital served us well...

Edited December 4, 20186 yr by KJP

Just documenting more of Lakewood Hospital before it is demolished. I don't think they're ready just yet, as the lights are still on inside. It will probably start after the first of the year....

^ I'm somewhat glad that the hospital controversy hasn't permeated UO. There's a reason why I try to avoid local politics or know too much of what goes on.  I don't want to be overly angry and/or miserable.  Ignorance is bliss.

I've also not gotten emotionally involved in the hospital situation. Sure, I hate the fact that CCF felt the need to leave a city with 50,000 people to a soulless sprawlburb with 23,000 people and that the city didn't apparently try to find another hospital company to replace it. But I am happy that the city found something significant to quickly replace it rather than have an empty hospital drag down downtown Lakewood -- one of Cleveland's few suburbs with an actual, traditional, walkable downtown. And what will replace downtown Lakewood won't be some strip shopping center like the one on Warren and Detroit.

 

In the end, Lakewood should end up with as many workers as with the hospital. One Lakewood Place adds new offices plus more residents and retail/restaurant workers, which should put many more feet on the street in downtown Lakewood. And they somehow managed to keep a 24-hour emergency room and medical facility with a 230 employees. That's a pretty significant retention considering Lakewood Hospital had 860 workers. The new offices at One Lakewood Place should have about 600 workers in them, added to the 230 CCF employees across the street. So that's pretty much a wash. Then you add the 200 residential units and the retail/restaurant workers. The city taxbase and the downtown business district should come out ahead in all of this once the tax abatement wears off. The city found a way to make lemonade out of this lemon and I commend them for it.

I'm not sure if I'm interpreting you incorrectly but there will be no abatement or TIF on the new development.  It will no longer be an exempt city owned parcel. Lakewood and the school district should come ahead.

Really? No abatement or TIF? That's pretty remarkable. And that's a good point about it no longer being a city-owned parcel. I see the city's subsidy is to sell the land to Carnegie for $1. Looks like the city makes that back in five years, even though this is no out-of-pocket cost to the city.....

 

http://www.onelakewood.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/One-Lakewood-Place-Real-Estate-and-Income-Tax-Analysis-April-2018.pdf

I hope I'm not opening a can of worms by asking this question, but can someone briefly explain the "controversy" behind the Lakewood Hospital closure? I was just moving into the neighborhood when it happened, so I didn't get all caught up in it. My assumption is that the hospital wasn't making money and CCF made a business decision to close it. With Fairview being less than 15 minutes from virtually anywhere in Lakewood I don't really see the problem from that standpoint. 

Google "Lakewood Hospital, observer" to see what their version of the "controversy" was.

^^^First I've heard of that publication, and wow, quite the peanut gallery of commenters on that website. Makes the cleveland.com comments sections seem boring and PC. Not sure I was able to get a level-headed take on the hospital closure, but certainly an interesting read...

1 hour ago, cle25 said:

I hope I'm not opening a can of worms by asking this question, but can someone briefly explain the "controversy" behind the Lakewood Hospital closure? I was just moving into the neighborhood when it happened, so I didn't get all caught up in it. My assumption is that the hospital wasn't making money and CCF made a business decision to close it. With Fairview being less than 15 minutes from virtually anywhere in Lakewood I don't really see the problem from that standpoint. 

 

CCF was under contract to manage a facility it didn't own for the benefit of the community.  This is called a fiduciary duty because there's a conflict of interest involved-- of course CCF wants to max out profits, but it agreed for a price to put that interest behind Lakewood's.  CCF violated its fiduciary duty by intentionally steering profitable work to Fairview and other CCF facilities, essentially running Lakewood Hospital into the ground on purpose.  This is not an isolated problem; many rural and inner-city facilities are disappearing in similar fashion nationwide.  Large hospital systems are better off operating as few facilities as possible, ideally newer facilities in more profitable neighborhoods. 

1 hour ago, 327 said:

CCF violated its fiduciary duty by intentionally steering profitable work to Fairview and other CCF facilities, essentially running Lakewood Hospital into the ground on purpose.

Hmm, interesting take here...thanks ?

 

Does anyone know if the city/developer settled on the mid-rise concept or the high-rise concept? I would think the mid-rise concept is better suited for this area and market.

24 minutes ago, cle25 said:

Hmm, interesting take here...thanks ?

 

Does anyone know if the city/developer settled on the mid-rise concept or the high-rise concept? I would think the mid-rise concept is better suited for this area and market.

 

Previous posts have suggested that the mid-rise is a lot more likely, in part because there's opposition to a high-rise.  I'm curious what the opposition is based on.  What are your thoughts?

A lot of people on the Lakewood community Facebook page were dead set against the high rise concept, saying the city doesn't need another tall building. I remember one person commenting that Lakewood would turn into Cleveland Jr. with more high rises.

 

I guess even a relatively progressive city like Lakewood has NIMBYs too.

Edited December 17, 20186 yr by RoabeArt

I think the midrise might be more feasible for the developer too. Costs increase significantly above 6 stories.

Looks like the utilities were turned off inside the hospital buildings. They're running temporary cables and lighting along the ceiling of the first floor and all of the ground-floor windows have been removed.

 

My guess is that they are days away from starting demolition. 

 

CORRECTION: someone turned on lights on two of the upper floors. So apparently they still have power.

Edited January 18, 20196 yr by KJP

On 12/17/2018 at 5:51 PM, RoabeArt said:

 

I guess even a relatively progressive city like Lakewood has NIMBYs too.

 

I don't think there is much correlation between progressive cities and NIMBYs. Look at San Francisco 

Demolition of Lakewood Hospital has started.

I’ve yet to hear a word about this project having any financing. I’m not sold on this project happening. 

I'm curious about why the demolition activity I photographed and shared two posts earlier on Feb. 13 represents the extent of demolition progress they've made since. In other words, demolition progress stopped the day (or maybe one day later) I took those photos.

I walk my dog by here frequently. It appears they are doing interior demolition in the front part of the building at the moment. 

 

I heard from a source who is working on this project that funding is not an issue. This project is allegedly shovel ready. They are waiting demo and final project approval from the city. 

 

 

 

So did they demolish that part to make a bigger opening for Bobcats and such to enter/exit the building to/from the main parking lot? Even so, much of the debris from February appears to still be sitting on the ground.

I agree that demo has slowed. All I can say is that when I walk by there are definitely people there and they are definitely doing something in the interior. 

 

When I spoke to my source at the end of last year, demolition was supposed to be wrapping up in early spring. They are definitely behind. I believe the developer was hoping to start moving dirt in July/August, I'm sure that has been pushed back as well.  

2 hours ago, KJP said:

I'm curious about why the demolition activity I photographed and shared two posts earlier on Feb. 13 represents the extent of demolition progress they've made since. In other words, demolition progress stopped the day (or maybe one day later) I took those photos.

The biggest question is whether they are running into financing issues with the RE market softening for such projects. I do love the project and location. I drove past it a few weeks back and thought the proposed project would be a good asset to the area. Although, I was sad to see Lakewood Hospital close as I had fond memories of that place.

Cool design but what's with the brown areas on the facade of the large building? Is this a look that many people like? I've always been of the opinion that mixing a brick facade look with a contemporary glass and steel look doesn't look very good and that it would look nicer if they went fully one way or the other.

I can confirm that my intuition was correct. They are completing interior demo of hazardous material. 

 

This plan still needs final approval from the city. It appears that the new plan is pretty much the same but it does a better job of scaling from Detroit as it heads towards the residential part of Belle.

 

I cannot remember if this was true in the last rendering but the garage is totally wrapped as well. The plaza will remind you of Perk Plaza if Perk had a water feature. 

As per the Lakewood Observer FWIW, the developer allegedly wasn’t aware of the presence of an underground river. And more interestingly, the entire project was allegedly a conspiracy, predicated to shift money toward gubernatorial candidate Ed Fitzgerald. 

 

[popcorn emoji]

Updated renderings:

 

http://www.onelakewood.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Summary-Pages-from-One-Lakewood-Place-ABR-Meeting-April-23-2019.pdf

On 3/25/2019 at 12:03 PM, surfohio said:

As per the Lakewood Observer FWIW, the developer allegedly wasn’t aware of the presence of an underground river. And more interestingly, the entire project was allegedly a conspiracy, predicated to shift money toward gubernatorial candidate Ed Fitzgerald. 

 

[popcorn emoji]

underground river AKA culverted stream.  Lakewood Observer used to be informative but is now a conspiracy theory tabloid. 

3 hours ago, freefourur said:

underground river AKA culverted stream.  Lakewood Observer used to be informative but is now a conspiracy theory tabloid. 

I pleaded to Jim O'Bryan to at least stop calling this project a "strip mall." To no avail lol. 

Wasn't there a plan to keep the Lakewood Hospital curved sandstone corner blocks and use them as a new entrance to the plaza, b/c it isn't in any of the new renderings? or was that a competitors plan to pay homage to what used to stand on this parcel?

Just now, WhatUp said:

Wasn't there a plan to keep the Lakewood Hospital curved sandstone corner blocks and use them as a new entrance to the plaza, b/c it isn't in any of the new renderings? or was that a competitors plan to pay homage to what used to stand on this parcel?

I remember that too. Think they used that to appeal to the Lakewood sentimental voter.  Brickhaus pulled the same thing on the church on Lake and 117th. I wouldn’t expect it.