  E_hemingway Member Username: E_hemingway Post Number: 1891 Registered: 11-2004 |
It might cost about $50 million to restore the whole thing. But how much would it cost just to make the first floor or two operable, fix the broken windows, seal off the upper floors and fix the roof? You don't have to bite the whole thing off at once. The Harvard Building (?) on Broadway is an example of this. The first floor is operable but the upper floors are vacant and have been so for years. (Message edited by E_hemingway on December 10, 2008) | ||
Hockey_player Member Username: Hockey_player Post Number: 465 Registered: 10-2003 |
This is like when they put fake awnings on the Statler Hotel in 1980 for the Republican Convention. It worked for a short amount of time, until all the floors above it deteriorated, and the facade crumbled to the ground. The Statler is no longer here, because cosmetic work like that does nothing to ensure a building's long-term survival, particularly when it's a disaster inside. | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3887 Registered: 07-2004 |
No, HP. Mothballing or partial restoration isn't like putting window dressing on a building for a one-week press event. Sheesh. I understand you have a point of view, but there are lots of different ways to deal with properties. It's just that we've been conditioned to deal with our historic buildings mostly in one way: Tear that schitt down. No plans for redevelopment, no ideas who would buy it, just rip it down quickly. And, followed to its logical extreme, you would have the streetscape of Hiroshima in 1946. | ||
Hockey_player Member Username: Hockey_player Post Number: 466 Registered: 10-2003 |
It's not my point of view - If I had my way I'd save every crumb of a building older than 30 years and polish them up all shiny and new. I am merely saying what the prevailing thought on the building is. The city is broke. It can't protect the people in its city limits. It can't tear down abandoned houses in which children get raped on their way to school. It can't clean up piles of tires dumped in people's front yards. Now go tell Detroiters who pay taxes that even more precious money should be diverted from the budget so some building downtown can be mothballed so it can sit empty for a while longer. See what their response is. (Message edited by hockey_player on December 10, 2008) | ||
E_hemingway Member Username: E_hemingway Post Number: 1892 Registered: 11-2004 |
I think a better question is why should Detroiters pay to tear down some building downtown when all of those things are happening in their neighborhoods, especially when mothballing said structure is much cheaper? (Message edited by E_hemingway on December 10, 2008) | ||
Detourdetroit Member Username: Detourdetroit Post Number: 459 Registered: 10-2003 |
I think we should start a swanky new yearly fundraiser for downtown's endangered gems. It should be called the MOTH BALL I guess there's something similar in NYC for a literary mag, but I think the name suits our purposes much better! | ||
Warrenite84 Member Username: Warrenite84 Post Number: 450 Registered: 01-2007 |
The Downtown Business District and property along Woodward will become more useful and valuable if we get LRT in Detroit. LRT is not a silver bullet but would suppress the,"tear it down", mentality. The future Mayor needs to be committed to protecting property and forcing owners to secure and MOTH BALL their properties. Detroit's slow implosion cannot be stopped unless the citizenry demand it. (Message edited by warrenite84 on December 10, 2008) | ||
Hockey_player Member Username: Hockey_player Post Number: 467 Registered: 10-2003 |
Sigh. I am wholeheartedly a preservationist and would like to see the Lafayette restored the way the Book Cadillac or the Fort Shelby was. I'm basically playing Devil's Advocate partly because contrary thought rarely exists on threads like this, leading to soft-brained, unscrutinized ideas like volunteering to scrub a building where whole floors have crumbled into hazardous rubble and chunks of the stone exterior are crashing to the sidewalk. The city has several arguments it offers in favor of demolition. What's the counterargument here? "We like looking at it so we'll scrub the windows and then you need to pay to preserve it indefinitely so we can take pictures of it from the sidewalk and post them on Flickr." I guess that's real "urban." Not very useful, though. The Book Cadillac got saved because investors had an idea for reuse along with the money to do so. They didn't go on the Internet and fantasize about simple solutions, demanding that others pay for their daydreams. They engaged in real-world actions instead of echo-chamber indignation and smugness on a forum. | ||
Bearinabox Member Username: Bearinabox Post Number: 1089 Registered: 04-2006 |
quote:Yeah, but first it had to sit empty for twenty years. If the city had demolished it sooner, any ideas investors might have come up with in 2005 would have been rendered irrelevant. | ||
Busterwmu Member Username: Busterwmu Post Number: 597 Registered: 09-2004 |
PS, the Statler "mothballing" by plating over windows and adding awnings didn't work by the time it was demolished because the same cheap fix up stuff had seen over 20 years of "real life" without a dime being spent on their maintenance. If we mothballed the Lafayette tomorrow in the same manner, in 2028, would we expect the awnings to be in the same shape as today? of course not. Mothballing requires some investment, to clean up and seal off, but then that must be maintained, to a higher or lower extent. That's why a piece of plywood doesn't cut it. | ||
Digitalvision Member Username: Digitalvision Post Number: 1503 Registered: 11-2003 |
Well, here is your second source, slipped into the bottom of an article. Full demolition is the intent to be wrapped up by the end of next year. This corroborates what RB said and in my mind cements that what he saw was real and that it's on the fast track to come down. Check this Crain's article from last month, it's on George Jackson's priority list. http://www.crainsdetroit.com/a rticle/20081116/FREE/311169996 /1068 "Other development initiatives that Jackson expects to move forward or come to fruition in 2009 include: Demolition of the Lafayette Building, a vacant office tower between West Lafayette and Michigan Avenue at Shelby, across from the restored Westin Book Cadillac." (Message edited by digitalvision on December 10, 2008) | ||
Busterwmu Member Username: Busterwmu Post Number: 599 Registered: 09-2004 |
Thank you for that real tangible published link, DV. Isn't demolition always on George Jackson's priority list, no matter what or where it is? *sigh* Another probable loss for the preservationists and adaptive reuse promoters in our city. | ||
Sean_of_detroit Member Username: Sean_of_detroit Post Number: 2370 Registered: 03-2008 |
Something that no one has mentioned; the affect abandoned buildings have on real estate property values on adjacent properties (like all those new condos in the Book-Cadillac, or the potential ones at the Griswold and Stott). Would the removal of certain buildings save or attract others? (Message edited by Sean_of_Detroit on December 10, 2008) | ||
Detourdetroit Member Username: Detourdetroit Post Number: 460 Registered: 10-2003 |
well that just about says it all, and with jackson helming the way to d day it goes a long way to sealing the deal. he's played this game before and doesn't suffer the empty pockets of the preservation community lightly. if questioned about motivation, he'll say he's the "real preservationist" but isn't in the business of "preserving blight," which of course the lafayette is. he'll top it off by saying that he and his crack staff looked at the building five ways from friday and couldn't make the numbers work. only a business person deal maker like gilbert and co. could sway him at this point. even if cockrel felt different--the mayor is really the only other that could convince him otherwise--he'll likely be able to have his way as cockrel will be too distracted to second guess his chief downtown development guru...especially someone who now has the cred of delivering a project on the scale of the book. kudos to him and his staff for all the good they've done...and they have...i just wish they'd work on filling lots before making them...* if people are really interested in saving lafayette, the writing is on the wall. the ink isn't dry, but it doesn't look good. as someone who's been through this before, i offer few bits of advice: 1) start working on this now! 2) find out where the money is coming from. if you need to, foia DDA records (they're the public entity, DEGC will use the private of their public/private aegis) 3) on second thought, i'm happy to brainstorm with people off forum, but don't think it prudent to share a game plan that would only put people already in a good position in a better one. *hey, maybe that's a come back to his blight quote. I consider the vacant lots of downtown (even if used for parking) are a pretty blighting influence too. With large scale demo's like the Statler, DEGC's created a bit of blight too. (Message edited by detourdetroit on December 10, 2008) | ||
Novine Member Username: Novine Post Number: 920 Registered: 07-2007 |
No shocker here. DEGC's mission in life is destroy whatever stands in the way of "the deal". What's "the deal"? Who knows but you never know when "the deal" might emerge so you have to have plenty of vacant properties/parking lots that can accommodate "the deal". Can anyone dispute that DEGC has destroyed more than it has created? | ||
Hunchentoot Member Username: Hunchentoot Post Number: 123 Registered: 03-2005 |
Why can't the federal money that is enough for demolition but not enough for renovation be used to renovate only the exterior of the building and the ground floor? Create a special tax structure within the city or state for this purpose, seal off the upper floors, stick some windows in and fix up the bottom level. Maybe even pop in some LED lights to make it look as though the upper floors are occupied. Now the building that needed hundreds of tenants needs a dozen or less and the building can stay, without the expense of renovating, heating and cooling the entire building or supplying parking to hundreds. | ||
Lmichigan Member Username: Lmichigan Post Number: 6520 Registered: 10-2003 |
Who'd own and pay the taxes on this building under such a plan? Anyone have any good examples of well mouth-balled buildings anywhere? BTW, just to put this in quotes so everyone sees it: quote: Just because it is a goal of Jackson to bring it down does not mean that there is yet a plan in place to destroy it. We are so much earlier in the process than on other properties the DEGC has brought down, say, the People's Outfitting/Detroit Commerce Building, for instance. For anyone wanting to voice and opinion, or check up to see how determined they are to do this, here is an email contact form for the DEGC: DEGC Request Form and a phone number: (313) 963-2940 And, Mayor Cockrel's number: (313) 224-3400 | ||
Hunchentoot Member Username: Hunchentoot Post Number: 118 Registered: 03-2005 |
Thanks for the contact info. My suggestion of a special tax structure would tax the building as though it were a smaller space -- just the section being used. The owner could be anybody. A developer wanting to renovate the Lafayette could then put up the money to fix the ground floor and receive funds from the government that otherwise would have gone towards demolition to do the structural and cosmetic fixes to stabilize the rest of the building. If the upper floors were ever needed the process could repeat and the building audited as a larger space. This is actually a "natural" progression that has happened with many smaller downtown buildings without happening in a formal way. The Coney Islands, some buildings in Greektown, Nemo's in Corktown, Seaman's on Randolph. Book and Broderick Towers (the last two aren't great examples of this strategy but could be with funds for cosmetic cleanup of the Book and money for rope to tie Mr. Higgins to a train headed out of town). I don't know how their taxes work but they all operate ground-floor businesses with shuttered upper floors. My suggestion is to encourage this for the sake of preserving the building. Another example is that this is how we even build new buildings -- parking garages. A strip-mall volume of retail in a building the size of a mid-rise tower. | ||
Busterwmu Member Username: Busterwmu Post Number: 433 Registered: 09-2004 |
Well, just polished up my letter to Mayor Cockrel about this issue...turns out he chairs and co-founded the Detroit Green Task Force. You can bet I had a field day with the "Greenest Building is the one that is already built" aspect. I expect a reply as the last bricks fall and will pleasantly surprised if I get one before then. | ||
Digitalvision Member Username: Digitalvision Post Number: 1264 Registered: 11-2003 |
I was over at the B-C today, and took pics - but they're such a pain to upload I'll have to wait till later. But basically, I do agree with George Jackson that something should be done. I disagree on what, especially after spending some time poking around the block like I haven't in a bit. That strip is just about done and ready for retail invasion. I was walking around there with a critical eye and realized that it's one of the few blocks we have that I was like, "now, this reminds me of Toronto on Sunday" (the traffic wasn't very busy, frankly). It's ready to go with BC garage retail, the Coneys already bringing people in (which is a HUGE leg up), and then two hotels anchoring it for tourists. The Lafayette in it's current state DOES look like dog shit to the average person, and it IS a hindrance to the success of the Book Cadillac and to some degree Park Shelton hotels. It's foreboding, uninviting, and gross, especially to someone who isn't desensitized to it (I think about my stays at the Royal York, the Edison, and other historic hotels across the country, and how impressed with the areas I was). Michigan avenue between Washington and Griswold has a metric ton of potential, but not as long as the Lafayette is in the way. That said, the preferred route would be rehab. Even if it's do blackout windows all the way, stabilize the structure, and then utilize the bottom three floors (they look like at one time it was a retail mezzanine, but I don't want to be mistaken). We need to spend these funds, if the building is structurally sound (that's a big if, and I'm not qualified to know that), on keeping this one. We've got a chance to have a great central core tying CMart, Financial, and really what's now almost a hotel district. We may not be able to spend these particular funds on rehab - but maybe Cockrel should go win some points in the neighborhoods by talking to community groups and using the money there how they want, or find a way to redirect these funds. But something DOES have to be done; it in its current state is hurting Ferchill and other's investments in the city as the vacant hulk it is now. | ||
Detourdetroit Member Username: Detourdetroit Post Number: 324 Registered: 10-2003 |
thanks for the recon DV. i vote for $$$ for ground level restoration/retail whitebox and upper story stabilization and proper mothballing. btw, that clunky granite facade which is scaring everybody on the sidewalk ain't original and should be removed and ground up for b'field hills patios, etc. | ||
Gencinjay Member Username: Gencinjay Post Number: 80 Registered: 03-2008 |
I'm sorry to see this building go, but I understand the city's thinking. Somebody listed other buildings that are empty or near so and asked what made this one different. The difference is, it's owned by the city. The other buildings may be empty, but there is somebody paying taxes on them(or supposed to be anyway)and responsible for any public liability associated with the property. Moth balling may be cheaper this year, but would still require money over the next 10 plus years that the building would stay empty. Add to this the liability issues with pieces falling off and moth balling no longer looks like a cheaper alternative. | ||
E_hemingway Member Username: E_hemingway Post Number: 1477 Registered: 11-2004 |
The demolition line of thinking is seriously flawed if not completely laughable. The city will still be liable for an empty lot, meaning any yahoo walking by the empty lot can trip on the sidewalk and sue the city. And if there is a parking lot there, then the city has to worry about liability of the people parking their car there, too. Somehow I doubt maintaining a safe, evenly graded parking lot will be high on Detroit's list of things to do. The liability issue is a non-factor as long as the city owns the property. The city should put out a Request For Proposals for the Lafayette, but this time it should include the option of the owner buying it to properly mothball it. Then at least the city is free of liability, has more tax revenue and someone who will keep it within a proper aesthetic of the Book Cadillac, i.e. cutting down the vegetation and blacking out the windows. This is the most inexpensive option and would actually net the city some money in both the short- and long-term. There is a high probability that the Lafayette will increase in value and become economically viable if it survives a few more years. The establishment of the Woodward streetcar line, success of the Book Cadillac, expansion of brownfield redevelopment grant and tax breaks and continued investment in downtown are all things that will push the building's value up. There are a number of buildings that were abandoned longer and in worse shape (Book Cadillac, Fort Shelby Hotel and Opera House to name a few) and have been brought back as successful venture. The same can and should happen with the Lafayette. | ||
Novine Member Username: Novine Post Number: 911 Registered: 07-2007 |
Come on people, DEGC doesn't create, it destroys. Outside of Campus Martius, what has DECG done that's positive for the long-term health of the downtown or the city? It exists to benefit a privileged few (Illitch) and to allow city leaders to distract with talk of pie-in-the-sky schemes and possibilities that never come about. DEGC stands for Detroit Economic Growth Corporation. Where's the "Economic Growth" they are responsible for fostering? | ||
Gencinjay Member Username: Gencinjay Post Number: 82 Registered: 03-2008 |
Yes there will still be liability with a parking lot, but that liability would be offset by the revenue generated by said lot. Believe me though, I'm the LAST person that wants to see a parking lot there. I wouldn't mind seeing them sell to somebody that could properly moth ball it for a while. | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3300 Registered: 07-2004 |
Well, let's see. With 21st century trends looking MUCH different from 20th century trends, a parking lot may not be so great. Consider that a parking lot produces a certain amount of revenue. Great. Now consider that a historic building could multiply the value of surrounding properties when rehabilitated in 10 or 20 years. Essentially, the city could be forgoing tens of millions of dollars of revenue down the line for tens of thousands of dollars of revenue today. Without a 21st century vision, our answer will always be more 20th century demos, more parking lots and more talk of "new development." | ||
E_hemingway Member Username: E_hemingway Post Number: 1479 Registered: 11-2004 |
quote: You're kidding right? The few thousand dollars that lot will generate will be a drop in the bucket compared to the tens of thousands of dollars in attorney fees and salaries spent to defend the city and the final payout of many more tens of thousands of dollars. The city shouldn't own the Lafayette at all. | ||
Gencinjay Member Username: Gencinjay Post Number: 83 Registered: 03-2008 |
Like I said I'm the last person that wants to see a parking lot there, but I can understand if not agree with the city's thinking on getting rid of the building. Unfortunately they don't have the luxury, knowledge or experience of long term planning. | ||
Detroitrise Member Username: Detroitrise Post Number: 3728 Registered: 09-2007 |
^So that justifies destroying a great city? | ||
Gencinjay Member Username: Gencinjay Post Number: 84 Registered: 03-2008 |
"You're kidding right? The few thousand dollars that lot will generate will be a drop in the bucket compared to the tens of thousands of dollars in attorney fees and salaries spent to defend the city and the final payout of many more tens of thousands of dollars. The city shouldn't own the Lafayette at all." Drop in the bucket or not it is still revenue coming in from a property that isn't currently generating any and is more likely to incur real liability in it's current state. I fully agree with your last statement, but they do. |
