Portland Tower - 516 S. 8th St.

[twincitizen]

WF will be opening a new branch just 4 blocks up Portland in their new DTE office complex. But yeah I agree, they eventually will need to close the half-block-occupying drive-thru location and allow that to be redeveloped (and the one in Northeast too!)

[grant1simons2]

DSC_0675 by grant.simons, on Flickr

I took this with my real camera for some reason. Anyways. Hello Mr. Excavator!

[AccordGuy]

DSC_0675 by grant.simons, on Flickr

I took this with my real camera for some reason. Anyways. Hello Mr. Excavator!

Agreed ! Pick a spot, and start digging.

[bapster2006]

10 of 110 units reserved, and dirt hasn't turned yet. Sure, that doesn't mean they will move in, but not a bad sign of demand.

[mattaudio]

But, generally, isn't there a minimum number of pre-sales required before banks will finance? Isn't that what has killed many projects, from the Nicollet to the original Penfield? Granted, that may not apply to Stanton if he self-finances or has nontraditional finance streams.

[MNdible]

Yeah, Stanton has generally not been beholden to the bank financing that is critical for most developers. He apparently didn't get the memo about only using Other People's Money.

[bapster2006]

Quick update: no digging yet but the rumor is soon.

[Andrew_F]

From my walk past earlier this week it looked like they've been doing some utility relocation along the alley.

[lordmoke]

Construction trailers and materials on site!

[grant1simons2]

Dirt moving. Sidewalks out

[Enrique612]

https://twitter.com/brianjohnson32/stat ... 08/photo/1

Pile driving started here today too...

[struct100]

They are drilling holes for caissons, not pile driving.

[J2K]

I haven't noticed much, if any pile driving during the recent boom. Is drilling the newly preferred way or is it required due to the hospital close by? I remember Target Field was all pile driving but can't think of any since.

[grant1simons2]

Be the Match in North Loop had it. Maybe it's a geographical thing?

[struct100]

Driven piles are used for building on poor soil conditions, where the soil is too weak to support spread footings. Most downtown projects are digging out 3 stories of parking below grade. At that point you are near bedrock, if not right on top of it, so the foundation will either be spread footings or caissons drilled into bedrock.

The caissons here are being drilled from grade down into bedrock. Most likely, the structure being supported above is outside of the parking level footprint.

[MNdible]

My sense is that if you have good soils and bedrock at shallow elevations, as is the case in most of downtown, then caissons or even straight excavation to bedrock (which would require sheet piles to retain earth) is your best bet. In the Bassett Creek valley (which encompasses a good chunk of the North Loop), you're likely to encounter terrible soils, and so pile driving is probably necessary to get the bearing capacity you'd need.

[What Struct said above.]

[bapster2006]

20 of 110 units reserved.

[TommyT]

That's kind of insane, is it not? Just goes to show that there is actually a need for new condo developments.

[MNdible]

Kind of insane.

But not insane like this.

[Enrique612]

Here's another article about it, most of these condos will be going for close to $300K.

http://www.journalmpls.com/news-feed/po ... aks-ground