Another Ithaca Journal article ref: the need for housing (apartments mostly) downtown:
The Cayuga Green Apartments east of the Tompkins County Public Library, is an example of new housing in Downtown Ithaca. The building was completed in 2008. A housing study commissioned by the Downtown Ithaca Alliance suggests downtown can support around 1,300 new units of housing in the next five years. / SIMON WHEELER / STAFF PHOTO
Study: Ithaca housing demand outpaces supply
1,000-plus units needed to meet five-year demand, consultant finds
Written by
Liz Lawyer
Ithaca -- A housing market study commissioned by the Downtown Ithaca Alliance to support its 2020 Strategic Plan indicates the downtown area could add as many as 1,350 new housing units in the next five years to meet existing demand.
For the study, the Danter Company, an Ohio-based real estate research firm, took a 100 percent data sample of available housing in an approximately 16-block area comprising downtown, between Buffalo and Clinton Streets on the north and south, and Albany and Aurora Streets on the west and east.
In addition, the study identifies an Effective Market Area, or the smallest geographic area that will contribute 60 to 70 percent of support, or potential residents, for new development in the downtown area.
Downtown Ithaca's Effective Market Area includes the city, part of West Hill, Cayuga Heights and a good chunk of the Town of Ithaca, and much of the Village of Lansing.
The 2020 Strategic Plan for downtown calls for 1,500 new units of housing in Ithaca during the decade leading up to 2020. The Danter Study, released Thursday, suggests that 350 for-sale units and 1,000 rental units, could be supported by the downtown Effective Market Area.
There are 5,063 conventional, not condominium, apartment units, 4,793 of them market-rate, rather than subsidized or involving tax credits, in the downtown market area. The study found there is an extremely low vacancy rate in the market-rate units of housing in the study area -- 0.5 percent. Nearly half of the apartments in the downtown market are occupied by students.
The study says there is evidence of a rental housing shortage not only in Ithaca, but in Tompkins County, regarding all levels of housing, but that the middle of the market is particularly lacking.
"Ithaca is missing the middle of the market -- ALL rents have moved well beyond what would usually be considered 'the middle,'" the study says.
It goes on to suggest a strategy encouraging non-student rental housing development within a moderate range -- $700 to $900 for Ithaca.
The full study can be found at
www.danter.com/studies/ithacacity,nyd1104.pdf.
here's the link:
http://www.theithacajournal.com/arti...text|FRONTPAGE