Huntsville updates

[Rail Claimore]

Originally Posted by neilson

It's the oldest park in the entire Southern League. Consider that.

And it looks about twice its real age.

[HSVTiger]

Hopefully this project is dead, what incompetence by the developer.

By JOHN PECK
Times Staff Writer [email protected]
Agreed-upon downtown restaurant still in doubt; condo rights may be lost

The Big Spring Summit project downtown may have reached its peak.

Nearly a year after a divided City Council gave Triad Properties another chance to put a restaurant in the office building before allowing construction of a condominium tower next door, Triad executive William Stroud cast uncertainty over whether either project will materialize.

"The restaurant has been my focus," Stroud said Tuesday when asked if the eight-story condominium is still planned.

Stroud said he's negotiating with an out-of-town restaurant proprietor to lease or buy vacant ground-floor space. The restaurant may also operate an upscale "mix and mingle" type of lounge on the Summit's vacant top floor. Stroud said many issues remain, including financing, layout plans, timing and whether the restaurant would lease or buy. (What the heck have you been doing for the last two years? Timing?? what a moron)

"I'm hoping to have a signed commitment (for a restaurant), but I tell you what, I can't tell you with any degree of certainty whether we will or not. It's a major undertaking," Stroud said.

But Stroud said the condominium market appears a bigger challenge than first thought. "It just appears that selling condos in Huntsville downtown - that condo living is not widely accepted yet," he said.

Uhh hey Bubba you have to a have a product first, and then make it attractive for people to want, you failed on both of those. So blame yourself,
as Donald Trump would say "YOU'RE FIRED!"

[HSVTiger]

in the above article there was this little hint of a project

"and a possible renovation of the old Lincoln Mill building along Meridian Street with a mix of residential, office and retail venues."

There is some renovations happening with the homes in that area and it has great potential so I can see this as being a big catalyst. Renovation of the old mill water tower has begun as well.

[HSVTiger]

Bridge Street construction which is still alot going on.

Old Navy/ Ulta section



Blalock building photo

[HSVTiger]

North Alabama Bank location open at Providence. A very good looking building
with stone work and exposed steel.




Fite building photo

[HSVTiger]

Huntsville Laser Center on South Parkway/Airport Rd area.


Fite building photo

[Exodus]

Originally Posted by Rail Claimore

And it looks about twice its real age.

Wow, I suppose the attitude is different these days about ball parks. Treat them like cars, when they get just a few years old, get a brand new model.

[Rail Claimore]

Originally Posted by Exodus

Wow, I suppose the attitude is different these days about ball parks. Treat them like cars, when they get just a few years old, get a brand new model.

I never said that old ballparks should be replaced. I was criticizing the fact that Joe Davis Stadium looks twice its real age, not the fact that it's somewhat dated.

That's a potshot at shoddy construction, not old age.

[HSVTiger]

Carriage rides return downtown. This is popular in the Twickenham, Old Town
Historic districts.

NewsChannel 19's Ellis Eskew reports:

The Huntsville City Council approved a bid Thursday night to allow carriage rides.

River City Carriages owner Jeff Markham says he has two horses trained to pull the carriages. He plans to give rides for weddings and tourist events around downtown Huntsville.

"In Huntsville and Athens and Decatur weddings will probably be a great deal of the business," said Markham. "But we contacted Bridgestreet and hope to work out over there. "

The City Council unanimously approved the carriage rides. You may even see them downtown before Christmas.

[jmanhsv]

Originally Posted by HSVTiger

in the above article there was this little hint of a project

"and a possible renovation of the old Lincoln Mill building along Meridian Street with a mix of residential, office and retail venues."

There is some renovations happening with the homes in that area and it has great potential so I can see this as being a big catalyst. Renovation of the old mill water tower has begun as well.

...And today, it was announced...

The Lincoln Mill building in Northeast Huntsville will be renovated into shops, restaurants, offices, and up to 60 condos selling for $150 to $200 sq ft. Local doctor James Byrne purchased the Lincoln Mill building, and plans to spend $20 million renovating the two remaining buildings. The larger building will be converted to offices/retail on the first floor, while the 2nd and 3rd floors will become condos. The smaller building will have restaurants, retail and possibly an "independent movie theater."

http://blog.al.com/breaking/2007/12/lincoln_mill_to_be_renovated_f.html

[HSVTiger]

Originally Posted by jmanhsv

...And today, it was announced...

The Lincoln Mill building in Northeast Huntsville will be renovated into shops, restaurants, offices, and up to 60 condos selling for $150 to $200 sq ft. Local doctor James Byrne purchased the Lincoln Mill building, and plans to spend $20 million renovating the two remaining buildings. The larger building will be converted to offices/retail on the first floor, while the 2nd and 3rd floors will become condos. The smaller building will have restaurants, retail and possibly an "independent movie theater."

http://blog.al.com/breaking/2007/12/lincoln_mill_to_be_renovated_f.html

That's excellent, 20 million ! wow. This should be the kick start needed for that area. The water tower renovation is underway as well. Now if they could just put in a light rail line from Oakwood to Parkway Place with stops
at the Depot, Intermodal/Bus station and Constellation it would be too cool.
This could also spur redevelopment of the Oakwood Village shopping center (need a grocery store) and tie in well with Five Points. There is gold all along this area, somebody just has to dig it up.


"Local architect Paul Matheny said the residential units in Lincoln Mills should be attractive to young professionals. The building is solid throughout and still in relatively good shape. While the metal panels retrofitted over the window openings gave the building a warehouse look, they protected the frames and window panes, he said.

"The intent (with the renovation) is to do everything possible to preserve the image of the building and restore it as much to its original character as possible," Matheny said.

City leaders have been trying to spark redevelopment along Meridian Street and other areas immediately north of downtown through rezonings, pedestrian-friendly amenities like sidewalks and greenways and landscaping.

Bostick said Meridian will soon be resurfaced and lined with sidewalks and trees and better lighting. A recent rezoning created a new zoning category designed to protect residential areas that abut industrial areas. "

[neilson]

CompUSA is closing all locations, so expect the Westside Center spot to be open for another store to move into by February.

http://www.reuters.com/article/mergersNews/idUSN0734134020071208

[Bama_Bull78]

I know this hasn't been leaked to the press yet but i figured i would let everyone know!

SO long to a Golf course that has been around a long time. Monrovia golf course well be closed in the upcoming of days. MY info is that by the end of the year they will be shut down and then Clearin house of the golf carts to the ones they own. And then the bulldozers surveyors. To my understanding This is on the corner of jeff road and hwy 72 has u have seen the shell has not been rerentd. There are going to widenin the road the length of there property down jeff to five lanes. And are going to have mix use he sai kinda of like Providence. Homes townhomes and condos and retail. So far Krogers and a starbucks, And some other stores coming too but this all he could rember and me too he named some more stores but they were mostly the same ole same ole.
Just i thought i would let u know.
Anthony

[HSVTiger]

Originally Posted by Bama_Bull78

I know this hasn't been leaked to the press yet but i figured i would let everyone know!

SO long to a Golf course that has been around a long time. Monrovia golf course well be closed in the upcoming of days. MY info is that by the end of the year they will be shut down and then Clearin house of the golf carts to the ones they own. And then the bulldozers surveyors. To my understanding This is on the corner of jeff road and hwy 72 has u have seen the shell has not been rerentd. There are going to widenin the road the length of there property down jeff to five lanes. And are going to have mix use he sai kinda of like Providence. Homes townhomes and condos and retail. So far Krogers and a starbucks, And some other stores coming too but this all he could rember and me too he named some more stores but they were mostly the same ole same ole.
Just i thought i would let u know.
Anthony

Not surprising that is VERY valuable land and great location. Guess Kroger feels it better get busy before Publix completely takes over.

[HSVTiger]

Saturday, December 08, 2007By MARIAN ACCARDITimes Business Writer [email protected]


$12 million renovation has Commerce Center ready for business

One of Huntsville's landmark buildings opened Friday after a two-year, $12 million makeover.

The eight-story, 96,000-square-foot building at Memorial Parkway and Clinton Avenue - now called Commerce Center - was once occupied by Intergraph Corp. and SAIC and was, mostly recently, the corporate headquarters for SCI. The Breland Companies, led by its Chief Executive Officer Louis Breland, acquired the vacant building in 2005, and it was gutted except for the concrete in the structure.

Entrances to a city should be vibrant and exciting, Huntsville Mayor Loretta Spencer said at the building's ribbon-cutting ceremony. "That's what Louis has done with this landmark."

The Commerce Center project helps extend downtown west of Memorial Parkway, Spencer said, and makes "a strong statement" to those entering Huntsville.

The building may have been considered a financial risk, said Breland. "We saw a golden opportunity." He said that after two years of hard work, he was ready to bring a historic building back to the community.

The building's very visible location, with more than 110,000 cars passing by each day, is "second to none," Breland said. "I saw (the building's redevelopment) as a no-brainer."

Two other major projects are planned nearby.

On the east side of the Parkway, the $150 million Constellation project, developed by Scott McLain, will feature two Marriott hotels - Courtyard and SpringHill Suites - stores and restaurants.

The Huntsville City Council recently approved a $5.25 million contract with Pearce Construction of Huntsville for a new downtown fire hall/police precinct office on Clinton Avenue just west of Memorial Parkway.

Tenants for Commerce Center are First National Bank, a Pulaski, Tenn.-based bank that will open its first Alabama location here on Jan. 15, and Lanier Ford Shaver and Payne, Huntsville's largest law firm, which will move into the center in early 2008. Other tenants are Future Electronics, Systems Development Corp., HPH Homes, Kuehne + Nagel Inc. and Breland Companies.

About 12,000 square feet of space in the building is not leased yet, Breland said.

[Bama_Bull78]

Originally Posted by HSVTiger

Not surprising that is VERY valuable land and great location. Guess Kroger feels it better get busy before Publix completely takes over.

yea winn dixie use to have every good and bad corner in the city now publix is taking over. Kroger i got a feeling will prolly announce that and another store and one prolly closer to county limestone line once the sewers start pumpin in north madison county.

[HSVTiger]

Air Cargo continues to push forward..

By MARIAN ACCARDITimes Business Writer [email protected]
New building expected to be completed in '09

A project to expand air cargo facilities at the intermodal center next to Huntsville International Airport will get under way next year.

Construction is expected to start in March on a new 78,000-square-foot air cargo building at the J.E. Mitchell Jr. International Intermodal Center, with the building ready for occupants by January 2009. Airport officials received proposals in late October from several contractors for the air cargo building that will feature office and warehouse space, and have been negotiating with the low bidder, Fite Building Co. Inc. of Decatur.
Airport officials are trying to persuade Asian cargo carriers to use Huntsville as a gateway for air cargo into the southeastern United States. Bradley, along with Jeff Sikes, chairman of the Huntsville-Madison County Airport Authority, and Rick Tucker, the executive director of the Port of Huntsville - which includes the airport, intermodal center and Jetplex Industrial Park - traveled to China in May and again in October to visit the home offices of seven carriers to make their case.

"It's a matter of educating them and letting them know what we can provide," said Bradley.

Among selling points of Huntsville's inland port are less airspace congestion and less congestion on surrounding roads compared to major gateways and competitive real estate costs and landing fees.

The west runway was extended from 8,000 feet to 12,600 feet - at a cost of $31 million - to accommodate fully loaded 747 freighters.

"We were well received by all" of the carriers, "and I think we're on their radar now," Bradley said. "We're working with a couple of them to come here for a site visit."

Huntsville International handled a record 152.4 million pounds of air cargo freight in 2006, up from just over 115 million pounds in '05.

That growth earned the airport the distinction of being the fastest-growing cargo airport outside Asia in 2006, according to a ranking in Air Cargo World magazine.

Another record is expected to be set this year. "It looks like we're going to be 10 percent over" last year's freight weight, Bradley said.

[HSVTiger]

Housing steady

Huntsville has not fallen into the same traps the rest of the country has fallen into,"

http://www.al.com/business/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/business/1197195853305360.xml&coll=1

That national trend may be felt in Huntsville in one respect, Hughes said: Homeowners in places like Virginia, who could move here as part of the BRAC process, are currently facing a difficult market as they try to sell their homes.

The number of days on the market in Huntsville, from listing to sale, is currently up to around 99 days for the past two months. Hughes said buyers have become more cautious in the face of the national news. This summer, a traditionally busier time, the days on market according to the Huntsville MLS was 78 days in June, 69 days in July and 83 days in August.

Hughes said the foreclosure rate here is about .25, less than 1 percent, a number in sharp contrast to current national delinquency rates of 5.59 percent, the highest figure in the U.S. in 20 years.

Jennifer Brittain, senior vice president of Servis 1st Bank's mortgage lending division, said the Huntsville market continues to grow, while in most of Alabama, things have flattened.

[HSVTiger]

A vision of the future I share with this writer..this in regard to the renovation of the Lincoln Mill into condos just announced.
It's good to have a wide range and variety of developers

http://www.al.com/news/huntsvilletimes/lroop.ssf?/base/news/1197195673305360.xml&coll=1

Only two of the old textile mills survive - Lincoln and Lowe - and both are in the control of the kind of people you wish owned everything historic. Jim and Susie Hudson, who own Lowe Mill, and Dr. James Bryne, who owns Lincoln, see the value of a city's story, not just the profit in a plot of property.

A city needs people like that, and Huntsville is generating them now in numbers. May their numbers increase.



"Imagine a nice spring night 10 years from now.

A trolley runs from Five Points north up Andrew Jackson Way to Oakwood Avenue, then west to Meridian and back downtown.

Young women whose skirts dance in the breeze and men alive with the anticipation of the weekend step on and off for dinner, drinks or shopping, or stay aboard to the downtown entertainment district and the Von Braun Center"

[marvingardns]

"Imagine a nice spring night 10 years from now.

A trolley runs from Five Points north up Andrew Jackson Way to Oakwood Avenue, then west to Meridian and back downtown.

Young women whose skirts dance in the breeze and men alive with the anticipation of the weekend step on and off for dinner, drinks or shopping, or stay aboard to the downtown entertainment district and the Von Braun Center"

I'll take it!