Montgomery development news

[thoraudio]

Big mixed feelings on the developments going on in Prattville. It's nice to see the area growing, and it'll add more to Montgomery's overall MSA, BUT it's not smart growth, just fancy stripmalls...

Prattville lands electronics giant

By Marty Roney
Montgomery Advertiser


Prattville's retail offerings continue to grow, with Circuit City filing plans with the city to build a store in one of the two sprawling shopping centers under construction on the east side of the city.

The 20,304-square-foot store will be built at the Prattville Towne Center on Cobbs Ford Road, the plans state. The proposal does not state when construction will begin.

Melvin Johnson wishes Circuit City would open this week.

"I'm having a Super Bowl party at my house Sunday, and I would love to watch the game on one of those big plasma screens," he said with a laugh. "I've been waiting for us to get a Circuit City or Best Buy in town so I can buy the big screen locally. I want my tax dollars to stay at home."

Circuit City will join several other shops in the 400,000-square-foot Prattville Towne Center including Steinmart, Ross Dress For Less and Books-A-Million and anchor stores Target and Home Depot. Target is scheduled to open by midsummer.

Best Buy has also been mentioned as a potential anchor for either Prattville Towne Center or High Point Center, a 900,000-
square-foot development planned across Cobbs Ford Road.

Mayor Jim Byard would not confirm Tuesday whether Best Buy is coming to Prattville.

"There are many nationally known stores that are interested in coming to Prattville," he said. "Hopefully we will have more exciting news to announce in the future."

Bass Pro Shops is building an Outdoor World as an anchor for High Point. J.C. Penney, Dillard's and Kohl's are also planning to set up shop at the plaza.

[hiijakd]

I wuld just like to say hello to everyone on here. I am the pastor that was mentioned in the story by David Irvin. I am currently nearing the completion of my project at 111 s Court st. and I am looking for the next one to get started on. possibly new construction lofts, townhomes, or infill. although my first project here is going to be on the higher end of the price range (i am using very high end everything,) my plan is to do some new construction lofts that would be affordable for college students, maxwell folks, and even myself. feel free to ask any questions you have about my project and if you would like i would be happy to give tours.

[thoraudio]

Welcome to the board.

We're definately glad to see you doing what you're doing.

[Capital Heights]

I wish someone would build condos downtown that are a little more affordable than what I have been seeing. I do not understand the economics, however, something in the mid-100's would be nice.

[Brown Duckz]

Originally Posted by Capital Heights

I wish someone would build condos downtown that are a little more affordable than what I have been seeing. I do not understand the economics, however, something in the mid-100's would be nice.

In my opinion property values are causing the higher price in Downtown living.

[thoraudio]

no, it's the price of new construction...

new construction high rises run about about $160/sq ft and up. Make it $200 for nicer amenities and to cover the cost of the property, and you've got a $200,000 1000 sq ft condo before the developer has even taken their cut.

That's not to say that some people aren't trying to work on somethings though

[Brown Duckz]

Thoraudio, I was referring to the renovation of older buildings into "loft style apartments".... the properties cost a lot of money initially before any construction or renovation cost the developer must take on.

[bystander1]

Welcome hiijakd! Its great to see that you're one of the ones who's on the 'ground floor' in what's growing to be a huge market.

Originally Posted by hiijakd

although my first project here is going to be on the higher end of the price range (i am using very high end everything,) my plan is to do some new construction lofts that would be affordable for college students, maxwell folks, and even myself.

That's what many of us are looking for. Many college students (TUM, ASU) and military people would love the opportunity to live downtown; being close to school and work. Even AUM is moving some of its government-related classes from the TechnaCenter out east, to the Bailey Building downtown to be close to the Capitol.

Originally Posted by Thoraudio

That's not to say that some people aren't trying to work on somethings though

How about something that will give me a nice view over the river?

[hiijakd]

i can tell you first hand that renovations are expensive and when you figure in the costs of the property, demolition, and refitting, $200 per square foot is a reasonable amount to ask the units. I am using very high-end fixtures in all of mine and my prices for the sale are figured around $200 per square foot. I believe 246 Lofts have theirs listed between 213-225 p.s.f. Unfortunately those cost are something you can't get around at this point until some of the land bankers that own all the property start to be more realistic about what they are asking for their properties. Right now many of them are asking post-boom prices for buildings that need new everything.

There is good news on the horizon though. The city is now able to apply the IEBC (existing building code) to structures already in existence and that will help drive the cost of renovations down. In addition the smart code will also allow alot more flexibility with projects and will take much of the hassle out of trying to do something good for the city.

If I had the money of some of the big dawgs, I would already be building on Bell Street and some of the other vacant lots around town. Keep your eyes open because I am looking for my next venture as we speak.

[thoraudio]

How has interest been in the properties you've got right now?

[Chad Emerson]

You all have probably heard by now but Jones School of Law and Envision 2020 are partnering for another Seaside Institute (www.theseasideinstitute.org) conference--this one focusing on Smart Growth and School Design/Location.

Our keynote will be John Norquist, the CEO of the Congress for the New Urbanism.

Here's a radio interview that Lynn Beshear and I recently did on the event:
http://wtsu.troy.edu/wtsu-fm/Community%20Focus%20Jan%2029%20to%20Feb%202%20%202007%20(2).htm

[thoraudio]

holy poop... $275 is alot of cheddar for some info....

Hmmm..... I teach Sunday School.... maybe I could get in for that free teacher discount.

[kevinlpugh]

By David Irvin
Montgomery Advertiser


Montgomery is one of the newest additions to Microsoft's live search maps page, which catalogues detailed aerial imagery of numerous cities across the nation.

The technology can be used by prospectors to find locations good for their trade, to pinpoint a meeting spot or simply just to explore the city, a company representative said. The project originally was launched in six key cities in December 2005, including New York, Seattle and Las Vegas.

Microsoft's 45-degree angled view differs from other online applications because all the high-resolution photos are taken from low-flying planes. Other companies such as Google and Mapquest.com have aerial views on their maps, but those are pieced together from satellite imagery.

Christopher Payne, corporate vice president of MSN Search at Microsoft, said the search maps page is a good resource.

"The combination of ... aerial imagery, customizable map annotations, innovative driving directions and the ability to share local search information with others gives users an incredibly powerful and easy way to find what they want and get where they want to go," Payne said.

Historic sites in Montgomery like the state Capitol and the Five Points area can be viewed from multiple angles with the new technology, which was made available here Jan. 19. Microsoft intends to continue updating the aerial imagery and adding more information in the coming years, the company said.

[thoraudio]

This probably affected high rise development in Montgomery for years.

February 7, 2007
1967 fire leaves legacy

By Crystal Bonvillian
Montgomery Advertiser


The spectacular view of downtown Montgomery was part of what made Dale's Penthouse Restaurant and Lounge so popular among Montgomery's politicians and business elite.

Forty years ago, there was no RSA Tower obstructing the remarkable sight of city lights seen from the windows of the posh establishment that sat on the top floor of the 11-story Walter Bragg Smith apartment building on Clayton Street.

Before the night of Feb. 7, 1967, was over, however, all eyes would turn toward the rooftop restaurant as it went up in flames, killing 25 people.

It remains the deadliest fire in Montgomery's history and is credited with helping to bring about better safety standards across the country.

James Amsler recalls that night with near perfect clarity. Then a 17-year-old witness, Amsler now serves as Montgomery's fire marshal.

"I was at a friend's sister's house a few blocks away," Amsler, 57, said as he sat in his office at Montgomery Fire Department headquarters. "I can't remember if we heard about it on the TV or the radio, but when we heard about the fire, we drove over."

The teens sat across the street from the building and watched as firefighters went in. They saw chairs from the restaurant crash to the sidewalk below as patrons broke windows to escape the flames. Glass rained down as people climbed onto a 2-foot ledge on the building's west side and made their way to a patio and temporary safety in the 28-degree temperature.

"It was amazing," Amsler said. "Of course, we didn't know at the time that 25 people lost their lives. We didn't learn that until the next morning."

Robert Brashears, whose sister Ann Harris, Dale's bartender, perished in the fire, declined to speak about the tragedy when contacted last week.

"It's been so long, I really wouldn't want to bring it back up," Brashears said.

According to all accounts, the night of the fire was a typically busy one at Dale's, with more than 100 people enjoying the friendly atmosphere.

Co-owner John Englezos made the rounds, greeting a Tuesday night crowd that included Ed Pepper, former Alabama public service commissioner. Pepper and his wife were dining with Sidney Zagri, chief counsel for the Teamsters Union and a right-hand man to Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa.

All three would die in the blaze.

The crowd had thinned to 60 to 70 patrons by 10 p.m., when wafts of smoke began drifting out from the restaurant's cloakroom, near the elevators and stairwell. Fire officials would determine later that a discarded cigarette was the likely source of the fire.

Most of the patrons continued eating while the restaurant's cook, Jesse Williams, and waiter Austin Burroughs tried to put the fire out with a fire extinguisher from the kitchen. The extinguisher, designed for grease fires, did nothing to stop the flames.

Amsler said employees' attempts to extinguish the fire were the first mistake made that night. Delaying the call to the Fire Department, which came in about eight minutes after the smoke was spotted, was another.

Flammable building materials, including wood paneling, rubber-backed carpeting and wood fibers used for decorative effect on the ceiling tiles, ensured that the flames spread rapidly, the fire marshal said.

When the first firefighters arrived, they had no idea of the inferno that awaited them. They took one of the building's two elevators up with the intention of getting off on the 10th floor and climbing the stairs to where the fire was. They were unaware the elevator had taken them to the 11th floor instead.

Prying the elevator doors open a few inches, they were startled to find flames and smoke shooting through the opening at them. The men crammed a tarp and their coats into the crack to buy time as they climbed out of the elevator hatch and slid down the elevator cables to the floors below.

When the firefighters climbed out of the elevator, they discovered Williams in the second elevator. The cook, who later was heralded as a hero, had become stuck after ferrying two loads of patrons out of the burning restaurant and down to safety.

A second group of firefighters walked up the smoky stairwell and began fighting the fire from the inside the restaurant, while a pumper truck rained water on the building from outside. Because the department's 100-foot ladders fell short of the patio where dozens of people awaited rescue, the firefighters inside the restaurant used a water stream to create a passage through the flames for their escape down the stairs.

Initially, firefighters thought all of the patrons and employees had safely escaped. Only when they ventured farther into the restaurant did they find the bodies.

Nearly all of the victims were found huddled together in the office area of the restaurant, which was the farthest point from the flames.

[Brown Duckz]

Retail Center Could Generate Millions for Auburn

A new retail development could be in Auburn's future. The developer says the finished product will be a place to shop and dine in luxury and hopes it will create millions of dollars for local schools.

The new development will be built just off Interstate 85, at exit 51. The plot of land may soon be home to the largest retail development the city of Auburn has ever seen.


For the first time, developer Tom Hayley of Hayley and Redd development is speaking publicly about the project. His company purchased 215 acres along the interstate and Shell Toomer Road. This is the site where they will construct a multi-million dollar retail and restaurant shopping center called West Pace's Crossing. The center will have about a dozen new restaurants, five major department store anchors and dozens of smaller retailers.

"I know for sure some people will be shopping by 2008, we are going to turn over pads in September of 07 and they will begin to build there. Tight now 20-percent of the project is development, planed and talked about," Hayley said.

Hayley and Redd is working to annex the land into the city of Auburn. If that's done he expects the lifestyle center could generate about 5 hundred million dollars a year, which would mean about 15-million dollars a year would go to the Auburn City School System. Hayley says West-Paces will be one of the largest and nicest retail projects between Mobile and Atlanta.

[Brown Duckz]

Will Hyundai's Troubles Mean Good Fortune for Montgomery?

It's no secret one of Montgomery's biggest employers is going through some very tough times. Its chairman is in jail, sales are down, and Hyundai's reputation is in tatters.

But is there a silver lining for Montgomery? All these bad signs might point to something else - more work in Alabama.

It's a scene that embodies Hyundai's fortunes lately; its chairman headed to jail. Combine that with slumping sales and it's a tough period for the company.

This time last year, Hyundai sold 11643 of its signature Sonatas made here in Montgomery. This year, just over 7200.

Even the local dealer has a booming inventory.

"For some reason, new car traffic is just slow," said Bob Meridith from Capitol Hyundai.

Meridith says there are several reasons for the slump. The scandal hurts, but he says Korea's economy is another reason. Right now, the Korean currency, the won, is strong against the American dollar.

"If it was the other way around, we could probably save a lot of money over here," Meridith said.

In contrast, the Japanese yen is relatively weak, which means Honda and Toyota can offer better deals.

"Such as incentives and low cost leasing and discount rates and so forth," said Meridith.

Then, there's 12 work stoppages or strikes in 2006 at Hyundai's Korean plants.

All that caused a 22 percent drop in profits the last quarter of 2006 but there are some encouraging signs on the horizon.

The Montgomery produced Santa Fe nearly doubled its sales, going from just under 3000 units last January (2986) to more than 56-hundred.

That's why Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo quotes an unnamed Hyundai executive as saying 'the Alabama factory is just more reliable than our Korean plants."

In the same article, the executive says is about to ratchet up production here in Alabama.

We asked several times to speak with Hyundai executives about the future in Hope Hull.

They declined all our reqeusts for an interview.

But Bob Meridith says he thinks the company might expand here and produce Hyundai's luxury car, the Azera on the same assembly line with the Sonata and Santa Fe.

Hyundai Korea says it plans to appeal the chairman's jail sentence. Prosecutors there also say the case is closed with his conviction.

[Brown Duckz]

City approves cameras at red lights

By Nigel Duara
Montgomery Advertiser


A decision Tuesday to place red light cameras at major intersections citywide could lead to more rear-end crashes but fewer side-impact collisions if research proves accurate.

The Montgomery City Council voted 5-4 to pass an ordinance that will allow for the installation of the cameras. The vote also opened the door for camera companies to enter the bidding process.

A national study conducted by the Federal Highway Administration in 2005 looked at seven areas that implemented red light cameras. The study found that side-impact crashes fell by 2.9 percent in those areas, but rear-end crashes rose almost equally, to 3 percent.

"The devil is in the details in implementing these programs," said Dave Willis, a senior research scientist at the Texas Transportation Institute, a leading traffic research organization based at Texas A&M University. "We find that (camera enforcement) dramatically reduces T-bone crashes (but) there's also an increase in rear-end collisions."

Willis' organization doesn't take an official position on the effectiveness of red light cameras, but City Council members certainly did.

Councilman Willie Cook said the potential increase in rear-end collisions and decrease in side-impact collisions "is like asking, if you're gonna get shot, do you want it in the head or in the chest."

"The chest," responded Councilman Glen Pruitt, who sponsored the ordinance to get the cameras installed. "You still got a chance that way."

The FHA study showed cameras saved about $39,000 per camera site per year in "net benefit," or costs to people involved in crashes. The study found that the decrease in side-impact collisions economically offset the increase in rear-end crashes.

Numbers aside, Willis said, fewer side-impact crashes means fewer people will be seriously injured in accidents at intersections.

"What it does do is reduce a lot of pain and suffering," Willis said. "When people are killed or maimed, oftentimes it's in a side-impact crash. From a pain and suffering perspective, (red light cameras) make more sense."

The four council members opposed to the cameras said the city is acting too quickly.

"We're leaping into the dark on this," said Councilman James Nuckles, who advocated the creation of an ad hoc committee to study the cameras. "There's too many unanswered questions."

Cook said the city was addressing only part of a problem. He advocated the addition of radar guns to the cameras to catch speeders in Montgomery along with red-light runners.

"If you're genuinely sincere about saving lives, address the issue of speeding," Cook said. "Speeding is probably the cause of running red lights anyway."

City Traffic Engineer Bubba Bowden said a bidding process will begin for the digital cameras "as soon as possible."

The cameras will go up at the busiest intersections, Bowden said, at a cost of about $5,000 to set up. The company that gets the contract and installs the cameras will maintain them, he said.

The cameras will go up on traffic lights in at least 10 to 15 intersections.

[AUCPA]

Did you see that the Montgomery Advertiser had an article on Montgomery maps being updated on the website that you told us about last week? Guess they read the forum also!

[kevinlpugh]

Wednesday February 7, 4:12 pm ET

The new, larger Regions Financial Corp. has listed more than 100 branch properties for sale through real estate services firm CB Richard Ellis Group Inc., including four in Birmingham.

As part of their merger late last year, Regions and AmSouth Bancorporation already had agreed to sell off 52 AmSouth branches as part of a divestiture required by the U.S. Department of Justice in markets where two banks' combined foothold was too strong.

Of those, 39 were in Alabama, in the Mobile, Tuscaloosa, Montgomery, Huntsville, Selma and Decatur markets. All the Alabama branches were sold to RBC Centura Bank, a subsidiary of Toronto-based Royal Bank of Canada.

Now, Regions is selling off additional existing branches and parcels of land in five states. The company is offering to sell sites in geographic packages or individually.

CB Richard Ellis lists 20 properties in Alabama; 11 in east Tennessee; 29 in middle and west Tennessee; 32 in Florida, and 22 in Louisiana and Mississippi, along with 15 leases on properties in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee the company does not intend to renew.

Among the Alabama sites for sale, four are in the Birmingham area: a Center Point branch at 2020 Center Point Road; a Homewood branch at 1908 29th Ave. S.; a Village at Lee branch at 1301 Doug Baker Blvd.; and a Five Points West branch at 2250 Bessemer Road.

Others are scattered throughout the state, in Dothan, Cullman, Athens, Arab, Albertville, Guntersville, Spanish Fort, Owens Crossroads, Opelika, Muscle Shoals, Montgomery, Madison, Gulf Shores, Gadsden and Florence.

Of the leased properties, four are in Alabama: on Morgan Road in Bessemer; on Forestdale Boulevard in Birmingham; at Helena Market Place in Helena; and on Helena Road in Pelham.

Offers are due on pooled sites in Florida and Tennessee by March 5, according to the CB Richard Ellis Web site. The due date is April 23 for offers on pooled sites in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi.

Published February 7, 2007 by the Birmingham Business Journal

I also have it under good authority that 60 commerce st is on the chopping block!

[bystander1]

It's official. Freddie B's is locating across the street from Eastdale Mall!