Quote:
Originally Posted by combusean
I'm not sure if Phoenix is actually getting "better" with the 19th St and Indian School project and the 8th St and Camelback project either. The buildings that were there before were low density multi-use stuff that wheezed their last breaths of character, these two projects are somewhat higher density (R-4), monolithic, single-use garbage. I noticed That's a Wrap! is gone, for example, which was popular when it opened.
The setback for the apartments on 19th St from Indian School is something like 76', and they had to get a variance to get it that low (lots predate the code, apparently) amongst, many, many others, and it was still opposed by people at the VPC, but passed 14-4.
https://sites.google.com/site/petersviewneighborhood/ |
I don't think any of the projects proposed and built by the Alliance + ORB team are improvements - or, at least, a good fit for their locations. I worked on a marketing project for Alliance, and they couldn't stop talking about how their 'urban' apartments were doing so much better than others, so it's no surprise that they keep churning them out. But, calling them 'urban' is misleading (hell, most of their projects are gated) and it's sad to see them in areas along the Central Corridor, particularly Broadstone Arts District and 3rd/Roosevelt.
Their Tempe lakeside project is probably the best, likely due to the geographic/site limitations more than anything else, and even in that, they've proposed a "co-working space" for residents (aka a business center) to appease the DRC who wanted commercial space to complement the live/work theme that has developed along 1st Street.