Uptown - LynLake - The Wedge - News & General

[seanrichardryan]

I think they are the Turkey-to-Go house flippers with a HGTV network show.

[twincitizen]

From the "Apartment Boom" topic, vacancy rate stats for Q4 2014 were released today.

Despite all of the new units, Uptown's vacancy rate actually fell from 2.5% to 2%.

This obviously bodes well for future construction in Uptown. We've basically knocked out of all of the vacant land in Uptown, so perhaps we'll finally see pressure on the several blocks encompassing Arby's/Cub/Acme/PP. That recently-closed CarX at Lake & Colfax should be added to the above list as well. I think we'll probably see the tabled proposal for the Buzza parking lot resurface as well. It was reported that there was some kind of clause in the National Park Service historic funding for Buzza's redevelopment that prevented additional development for a certain period of time. I don't recall if it was 3 years or 5 years or what, but that proposal will definitely be back, though it will probably have to allow for greater sightlines of the Buzza building than the last proposed version did.

No matter what, I suspect someone besides CPM will sling a new proposal soon.

Re: the proposed replacement of Wells Fargo at Lake & Humboldt, I wonder what conversations (if any) have taken place between WF and Lisa Bender's office. If there was ever an opportunity to capitalize on a site that was already being redeveloped, without displacing any business or existing housing, that would be it! Anyone know if that WF rebuild will have to go to the Planning Commission? They are significantly re-configuring the site, so I'd think they'd at least need Site Plan Review, but perhaps it's just done administratively by staff and will never see the court of public opinion. It's unlikely that ECCO neighborhood would take a stand and be like "WE DEMAND THAT YOU PUT HOUSING HERE"

Will we ever see a proposal for a mixed-use housing development on Hennepin Avenue proper? That has been conspicuously absent from the current boom. Will Lunds do in Uptown what they did with the Byerly's in Edina?

[seanrichardryan]

They've started hauling sand into the lower parking level at CPM world headquarters on Knox. Trucks were lined up that last two mornings.

[bapster2006]

Interesting plans for the "Garfield Aquarium". Possible co-working office, apartments, and other stuff:

http://www.southwestjournal.com/notes/d ... orking-hub

[lordmoke]

Interesting plans for the "Garfield Aquarium". Possible office, apartments, retail and other stuff:

http://www.southwestjournal.com/notes/d ... orking-hub

Awesome.

[mattaudio]

Interesting plans for the "Garfield Aquarium". Possible office, apartments, retail and other stuff:

http://www.southwestjournal.com/notes/d ... orking-hub

I knew about this one for quite a while. Aaron is a founding signatory of the Charter for the New Urbanism and a good architect (who also lives in the neighborhood) so I'm excited to see this project develop.

[buzz]

New retail venue going in the former CarX location, 1001 W. Lake.
http://www.startribune.com/local/minnea ... 42831.html

[grant1simons2]

Strib didn't show the rendering so here it is on the architecture firms website: http://roehrschmitt.com/?portfolio=1001-w-lake-street

Pro tip: Use arrows to look through renderings

[David Greene]

Disappointing. It's hard to tell but it looks like parking will front Lake. It's a small one-story suburban strip mall.

[TommyT]

Well, I'm glad something is going in there but what it REALLY needs is to be torn down and rebuilt at the street. Oh well.

[Anondson]

Yeah, what a waste.

[twincitizen]

Only disappointing in the sense that no one stepped up to invest $30MM+ in a new mixed used building on the site. It's a reuse of an existing building AND a transition away from a purely automotive use.

[Anondson]

I suppose that's true. Would like the parking lot entrance moved off Lake and on the side.

[twincitizen]

Corner of 35th & Emerson is just SCREAMING for someone to come along and develop it, including underground parking spaces to replace these 15 or so garage stalls. What a bizarre site... a hideous, dilapidated garage farm.


IMAG1329 by twincitizen, on Flickr

[min-chi-cbus]

It would have to be pretty big, no -- to be able to replace all of those garage spaces AND the new building AND its required parking spaces? Do you think that's feasible on this smallish lot? I would think a new development would have to be at least 5 floors to fit enough revenue-generating units to offset the costs of replacing this lot.

Perhaps this is why there hasn't been enough interest yet for this parcel...

[twincitizen]

I haven't done an exact count, but it was no more than 15 stalls. My take was that they were arranged in a really inefficient manner too, and could be accommodated much more compactly in an underground garage. A single level of underground parking, plus a single row of surface parking out back (adjacent to the alley) could accommodate these spaces as well as those for a new building. Who says you'd need to replace all of them anyways?
All in all, it was just an observation...there are many more attractive parcels to develop, and we haven't seen much development in Uptown that isn't directly on the Lake St./Greenway corridors. This one is simply an idea for the future, or perhaps a good project for a smaller local developer. They'd probably have to buy the apartment building first (right side of photo) to which these garages belong.

Here's a story about a new tenant in the historic White Castle building at 33rd & Lyndale: http://www.southwestjournal.com/news/bi ... on-lyndale I'm definitely gonna have to check that one out.

[mister.shoes]

Are each of those garage stalls fully private or does that complex just have a bunch of doors into big shared spaces? If the former, an underground garage doesn't fully replace would be lost. That's nowhere near a big enough reason against redevelopment; just a relatively minor point.

[mulad]

Looks like these garages are used by residents of the apartments on the other side of the alley at 3450 and 3440 Dupont. All of them have the same owner.

[MNdible]

So, I'm guessing that this isn't exactly the same situation that these garages are addressing, but...

I know that there's a not-insignificant number of people living in the greater Uptown area who have "summer-only" vehicles (motorcycles or sports cars or classic cars) and no secure garage space to store them. First world problems, I know, and several people I know have subleased garage space from somebody else, which works well as long as you can find it. But I do think there's a market for some off-site but still local securable vehicle storage space.

[twincitizen]

Investment opportunity at Lake & Grand: http://www.edinarealty.com/commercial-f ... -123969703

Your chance to be directly across the street from the WTF?! building.