This would be a nice addition downtown. Sounds unlikely in Collegetown, however. I'm looking forward to John Schroeder's book.
Jeff's Stein's article in The Ithaca Voice:
http://ithacavoice.com/2014/07/jason...-height-limit/
Jason Fane proposes 12-story Collegetown building that would be twice the current height limit
By: Jeff Stein | 9 hours ago
Ithaca, N.Y. — Mega-developer Jason Fane proposed a 12-story building in Collegetown Tuesday night that would be twice the current height limit for that site.
City officials met the idea with skepticism.
“I really don’t think there’s a snowball’s chance in hell of this passing,” said JoAnn Cornish, a member of Ithaca’s planning and development board. “To be honest, it’s going to be a really tough sell.”
Fane appeared in person at a marathon six-and-a-half hour planning board meeting last night that also saw a heated discussion over a controversial affordable housing proposal for Spencer Road.
Fane’s proposal — if passed — would add housing at 330 College Ave., which is by the heavily trafficked intersection of College Avenue and Dryden Avenue. It’s the site of the now-defunct Green Café.
“330 College is the premier corner in Collegetown and as such should have an iconic building,” Fane said, according to prepared notes given to a reporter after he spoke.
“I instructed the architect, Jagat Sharma, to plan a dramatic and beautiful building that would have the economies of scale so I could spend the extra money to create an icon that would stand head and shoulders above the others.”
Fane shed some light on why 330 College Ave. has sat empty since February 2012. Many officials have openly questioned why Fane would keep such valuable property vacant for so long after Green Café’s closing.
“When that tenant failed, I had to decide whether to keep the store vacant so it could be developed or to give a long lease, so I could get a strong tenant,” Fane said.
“In keeping with my original plan, I have held it vacant as a development site and gambled that a favorable zoning law would be passed.”
Now, with the city approving new Collegetown development guidelines, Fane said he wants to turn the site into additional housing units. (Fane owns $38 million in Collegetown real estate, according to an analysis in 2013 conducted by The Cornell Daily Sun. He declined to be interviewed after the meeting.)
City officials expressed high praise for the architectural beauty of the rendering, which was done by Jagat Sharma.
“This is really your best work,” said John Schroeder, a planning board member, to Sharma.
But Schroeder also had some major problems with the proposal. In particular, he pointed out that the rendering displayed by Fane in fact would be impossible to view from any point. (The rendering is shown from a perspective that appears to be across the street, but would actually be behind the building across the street.)
“This is a fictional view,” Schroeder said, gesturing up at the screen showing the design. “You would never see this building from this vantage point.”
Sharma, the architect joked in response, “You would have to come to this meeting to see it.”
Schroeder had a quip in response, too.
“It is your best design,” he said, “I will publish it in my ‘Unbuilt Ithaca’ book.”