NEW ORLEANS | Project/Development Thread

[tennis1400]

Originally Posted by Blitzen

I'm sorry to contradict you, but it was bureaucrats who determined how cities grew after 1945, not the people. The 1945 GI Bill gave down payments and loans to soldiers returning from the war, but only on homes on lots that weren't connected to one another. This caused suburbs all over the country to boom, and left denser inner city cores abandoned.

Here in New Orleans, the areas around St. Claude, 7th Ward, Storyville, CBD (along Loyola Avenue), Tulane/Gravier (along Claiborne on both sides) were filled with dense blocks of connected townhouses that were left abandoned. Then in the 60s/70s they were bulldozed into what we have today. The same story is repeated around the country.

People are looking back towards downtowns as necessity and efficiency dictate, because it's getting more expensive to own a car, keep up a house, mow a lawn, etc.

I'm all for people doing whatever they want to do, living wherever they want to live - just don't make other people pay for it.

I think the simplest way to look at it is suburban sprawl is slowing/stopping because the era of cheap motoring is becoming a thing of the past. Without cheap energy the suburban/exurban paradigm doesnt make sense anymore. Cities with good density stand ready to gain much from this.

[NOLAmike]

Originally Posted by greenparrot

Comapring New Orleans to Texas cities is apples & oranges. Much of the growth of New Orleans happened substantially before the interstate system & subsequent highway growth. The opposite can be said for Dallas & Houston. The area between New Orleans & Kenner is a heavily traveled & important highway. I don't see why helping traffic flows along that stretch is somehow not a good thing. Speaking of laughing stocks, what was that area before the recent road improvements of the last few years? Coming to dead stops during non rush hour times.

I still don't get the bias against "sprawl". Sure, I get it to a certain extent, but it's unrealistic to think you are going to grow a city without some sprawl. It's just not what people...who pay the bills... really want. Now how that sprawl happens is a fair debate. I'm sure if JP had it to do over again, they would do a lot of things differently.

I agree, much of the interstate system was built after the initial growth of New Orleans. Once 1-10 was built there was a lot of movement from the city to the burbs. When I was talking about the poor condition of the roads I wasn't referring to the highways, but many of the arteries run through the city. If you can improve these roads you make a case for distributing traffic across many channels as opposed to one highway. Much of the time development and investment spreads along infrastructure improvements. We can see this by the construction of the St. Charles streetcar line and subsequent neighborhood growth and other streetcar burbs and then later on with the interstate and development of Jefferson Parish and New Orleans East. I was just suggesting making different investments to see the kind of returns many of us hope for, which is a stronger core as opposed to increased growth in the suburbs.

As for the bias against the suburbs, it has to do with increased reliance on vehicles (the vehicles themselves aren't the cause for concern, just the lack of mobility options including decreased walkability, diminished public transit and overall reliance on artery roads as opposed to a grid structure which is difficult to maneuver on a bicycle, I know from experience growing up in Metairie).

When I mentioned both Texas and Blitzen's comments I was referring to outcomes of investment in infrastructure and specifically brought up Texas because of others' comments on how nice their highways were. Vancouver has no highways into the city center and are repeatedly in Mercer's top 3 for quality of life index. I don't have all the answers, but I was just suggesting that it seems like a waste of money compared to other projects we could be spending on

[greenparrot]

Originally Posted by Blitzen

I'm sorry to contradict you, but it was bureaucrats who determined how cities grew after 1945, not the people. The 1945 GI Bill gave down payments and loans to soldiers returning from the war, but only on homes on lots that weren't connected to one another. This caused suburbs all over the country to boom, and left denser inner city cores abandoned.

Here in New Orleans, the areas around St. Claude, 7th Ward, Storyville, CBD (along Loyola Avenue), Tulane/Gravier (along Claiborne on both sides) were filled with dense blocks of connected townhouses that were left abandoned. Then in the 60s/70s they were bulldozed into what we have today. The same story is repeated around the country.

People are looking back towards downtowns as necessity and efficiency dictate, because it's getting more expensive to own a car, keep up a house, mow a lawn, etc.

I'm all for people doing whatever they want to do, living wherever they want to live - just don't make other people pay for it.

First the GI bill was voted on by congressmen....elected representatives who were doing something the people I'm sure generally agreed on.

2nd..part of the equation is that many people just don't wan to live within dense blocks of connected townhouses...get over it. I'm all for the alternative if that's what people like though. It adds diversity to a community.

Finally, I'm not sure what you mean by "making other people pay for it". The people in the suburbs pay taxes too I think. At least in this area...probabably a lot more than urbanites.

[jowens]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Woah, we're getting a Five Guys and a Pei Wei? That's great! I will be frequent customers at both places for sure. Bud's Broiler tastes like Wendy's with better bbq sauce... but Five Guys is a real hamburger. Pei Wei is halfway between Panda Express and PF Chang's, like a Panera Bread that serves decent, tasty Chinese food.

I knew about Five Guys opening stores in B.R. Lafayette and Nola; had heard about Pei Wei opening in NOLA. If so, this is the first one in Louisiana. BTW P.F. Chang's is the parent company of Pei Wei, which I'm a big fan of both.

[tennis1400]

Well people love PF CHANGS and I thought the Pei Wei menu looked a bit similar to PF Changs. Im interested to see how the Winn Dixie is done.

[rcp11889]

I'm confused...where did it say that Five Guys and Pei Wei was opening up in NOLA?

[ardecila]

Both chains are shown in Mid-City League's site plan for the development.

[IceCream]

[QUOTE=greenparrot;5308607]First the GI bill was voted on by congressmen....elected representatives who were doing something the people I'm sure generally agreed on.QUOTE]

One of the biggest topics in economics since the Great Depression is government intervention and unintended consequences.

With the GI Bill the government was doing "a good thing" by giving low cost loans to vets to go buy houses and start families, but the government is incapable, inept, and far too often driven by campaign cash by developers (in this case).

Had they fully understood that what they were doing would ravage the economies of urban cores they might not have ever have done it OR they wouldn't have had all the strings attached which essentially forced them to buy in the suburbs.

If they could have used the loans to buy any house / townhouse / whatever you still would have had suburban sprawl bc that was "the american dream" but I'm sure it wouldn't have been the explosion that it was.

Very similar situation to the late 90's and 2000's when "the American dream" came into play again and the gov't decided that they should do everything in their power to make mortgages affordable and available to everyone (regardless of credit risk) and look what the unintended consequence was:

A MAJOR housing crisis bc developers WAAAY overbuilt and home prices tumbled... So, I would argue that there are no absolutes but politicians definitely have their hand in how cities and burbs are developed. Just as Mitch is pushing to get rid of the raised I-10 from Canal to Elysian Fields.

That should have a big impact...and thankfully a positive one.

[greenparrot]

[QUOTE=IceCream;5309296]

Originally Posted by greenparrot

First the GI bill was voted on by congressmen....elected representatives who were doing something the people I'm sure generally agreed on.QUOTE]

One of the biggest topics in economics since the Great Depression is government intervention and unintended consequences.

With the GI Bill the government was doing "a good thing" by giving low cost loans to vets to go buy houses and start families, but the government is incapable, inept, and far too often driven by campaign cash by developers (in this case).

Had they fully understood that what they were doing would ravage the economies of urban cores they might not have ever have done it OR they wouldn't have had all the strings attached which essentially forced them to buy in the suburbs.

If they could have used the loans to buy any house / townhouse / whatever you still would have had suburban sprawl bc that was "the american dream" but I'm sure it wouldn't have been the explosion that it was.

Very similar situation to the late 90's and 2000's when "the American dream" came into play again and the gov't decided that they should do everything in their power to make mortgages affordable and available to everyone (regardless of credit risk) and look what the unintended consequence was:

A MAJOR housing crisis bc developers WAAAY overbuilt and home prices tumbled... So, I would argue that there are no absolutes but politicians definitely have their hand in how cities and burbs are developed. Just as Mitch is pushing to get rid of the raised I-10 from Canal to Elysian Fields.

That should have a big impact...and thankfully a positive one.

I'm not sure the community reinvestment act was that much of an unintended consequence.

I hear what you are saying but I'm not sure NO would look much different now anyway.

[IceCream]

Well, I actually wasn't even referencing the CRA.

I'm thinking more of just the unofficial push from the White House (during Clinton, Bush, etc) to get Fannie and Freddie to significantly lower their standards and thus buy up all this crap mortgage debt. If the banks can lend to bad borrowers and are guaranteed to be able to sell the loan immediately to F&F and thus collect all the fees without any risk...why wouldn't they?

Wouldn't you? It's guaranteed profits! Then F&F bundled them into mortgage backed securities (MBS) and sold them off to investors / investment banks, etc...

There's a great news article i used to have tacked up on my office corkboard from 1999-ish saying how great this was to extend the American dream to so many, BUT that if X, Y, and Z circumstances ever happened that it could blow up in our faces...and guess what happened less than 10 years later...

That's kind of a side note, my point in general was that politicians do have control to direct the development of communities and cities whether you like it or not. Sure the free market has a say,but currently it's the gov't that controls the infrastructure so the free market has to build around whatever infrastructure is laid out by the politicians. If politicians build out sprawling interstates what do you think the developers will do? They'll sprawl out as well. If politicians encourage the use of smaller thoroughfares through urban areas and discourage wide arteries into and out of downtown...what do you think would happen? Developers wouldn't build these ridiculous communities on the northshore bc it would be suuuch a pain to make that commute.

[IceCream]

Goooood news for South Market District, or whatever they're calling it....



http://neworleanscitybusiness.com New Orleans CityBusiness
Apartment rentals soar in Historic District, sag in Algiers, Kenner

by David Muller, Staff Writer

Published: June 9th, 2011

The closer apartments in the New Orleans area are to retail centers and the jobs of people who rent them, the more likely it is they will be occupied.

That’s the gist of two reports on the metro’s multi-family housing market that show a strong overall occupancy rate of more than 90 percent. The growth of rental tenants in the Historic District of New Orleans, from Uptown to the Central Business District, is offsetting growing vacancy numbers in other areas.

“The historic center is going gangbusters,” Larry Schedler said. “The fact is when they build product there, it sells.”

According to the latest Greater New Orleans Multi-Family Report from Larry G. Schedler and Associates, the area’s occupancy rate is strong at 91 percent, an increase of 1 percent from the fall and a 3 percent rise from a year ago. Schedler’s report, released earlier this month, surveyed 126 properties with 29,921 total units.

Figures from a soon-to-be released University of New Orleans study will show a similar rate for 2010, with 91.4 percent occupancy, up from 89 percent in 2009.

The occupancy rates in strong areas are only expected to remain stable, as just six apartment projects are under construction in the metro area. Three are in St. Tammany Parish, and three in the Historic District of New Orleans — The Maritime, Saratoga Lofts and the National Rice Mill Lofts — are in various stages of development.

“There are only about 770 units total under construction,” said Tammy Esponge, executive director of the Apartment Association of Greater New Orleans..............

[Blitzen]

Originally Posted by IceCream

If politicians encourage the use of smaller thoroughfares through urban areas and discourage wide arteries into and out of downtown...what do you think would happen? Developers wouldn't build these ridiculous communities on the northshore bc it would be suuuch a pain to make that commute.

That's exactly what I was talking about. When I said "taking money from some people," the best example is the $800 million dollar new Twin Span to Slidell, paid for by everyone to benefit a very few. Everyone would like a big backyard, but people everywhere else paid for those commuters to be able to have their big backyards and commute into work every day.

A better example is drainage. There's just as much rainfall per square mile in the French Quarter as there is in New Orleans East, but it costs a lot more per person to drain NOE because it's less dense. Everyone is paying for the suburban's big, inefficient lifestyle. In fact, the FQ residents pay a lot more in property taxes. It's a form of welfare to the suburbanites. Make people pay their fair share, and over time you'll see healthier downtowns, and less sprawl - as was the trend pre-1945.

Sorry I didn't mean for any of this to become political, but it is relevant to the big picture of city development.

[greenparrot]

Originally Posted by Blitzen

That's exactly what I was talking about. When I said "taking money from some people," the best example is the $800 million dollar new Twin Span to Slidell, paid for by everyone to benefit a very few. Everyone would like a big backyard, but people everywhere else paid for those commuters to be able to have their big backyards and commute into work every day.

A better example is drainage. There's just as much rainfall per square mile in the French Quarter as there is in New Orleans East, but it costs a lot more per person to drain NOE because it's less dense. Everyone is paying for the suburban's big, inefficient lifestyle. In fact, the FQ residents pay a lot more in property taxes. It's a form of welfare to the suburbanites. Make people pay their fair share, and over time you'll see healthier downtowns, and less sprawl - as was the trend pre-1945.

Sorry I didn't mean for any of this to become political, but it is relevant to the big picture of city development.

You are kidding right? So you're saying I-10 or a major interstate should not be going through or very near NO? It was fixed just to appease the Slidell people? Do you realize how many millions of people don't live in downtown cores who pay taxes that I assume went to FEMA or whoever to fix the twin spans?

To the extent anyone in the FQ pays more taxes is a function of the value of their property.....just like someone in the dense 8th ward pays little property taxes. The taxes are not jacked up for the FQ residents to pay drainage in NOE. I'm sure the people in Lakeview would like to pay less taxes to fund a police force basicall needed mostly for the rest of the city much more than them. See...you can play this both ways.

Look...let's face it. You would still have Metairie, Mandeville, Kenner, etc. even if most of the areas which used to house New Orleanians were habitable today. You are always at least going to have highways connecting cities and towns and communities will crop up along the way. You think we can cram a million plus people within the confines of NO?

My bottom line is I don't want some unaccountable beaurocrat engaging in social engineering. It's bad enough for politiians but at leat they have to be accountable to the voters

[SlidellWx]

Seeing as the twin span bridge was basically destroyed by Katrina...I think the new bridge is a perfectly fine investment. Truck traffic has to have an easy exit out of the city to core markets like Atlanta.

[NOLAmike]

Originally Posted by SlidellWx

Seeing as the twin span bridge was basically destroyed by Katrina...I think the new bridge is a perfectly fine investment. Truck traffic has to have an easy exit out of the city to core markets like Atlanta.

I also think the the new bridge was a good investment. It makes sense to have a good highway system, although I think disagreement tends to come along on whether or not these highways should go right through a city's downtown or not, but that is a different discussion. I think in the case of the twin spans their benefits outweigh any negative effects they may impose.

[Blitzen]

Originally Posted by greenparrot

You are kidding right? So you're saying I-10 or a major interstate should not be going through or very near NO? It was fixed just to appease the Slidell people? Do you realize how many millions of people don't live in downtown cores who pay taxes that I assume went to FEMA or whoever to fix the twin spans?

No, no, no, no, no. Sorry I guess I didn't explain what I was saying well enough. The new bridge is great.

The issue I had was that the money for the new bridge came 100% from a grant from the Department of Transportation, out the U.S. Treasury's general fund. Roads and interstates should be built with money exclusively from the gasoline tax and tolls. That way, only the people who use them pay for them. That will lead to smarter, more efficient growth; and will not take tax money from poor people who don't have a car and use the streetcar or bus everyday.

We should not have government subsidizing public transportation's biggest competition, the highways. That's one of the reasons public transportation became unprofitable since the 1940s, when all of these interstates were built.

What we have right now is government needing to subsidize public transportation, because the same government is also subsidizing highways. (Just like how government spends millions on programs for people to stop smoking, but also spends millions to subsidize tobacco farmers.) Their right hand doesn't know what their left hand is doing, and it leads to bad outcomes.

[Blitzen]

http://www.nola.com/arts/index.ssf/2...d_says_sa.html

The article says Brennan will take over the half of the building added in 1962, and the rest will stay a theatre. Maybe this will bring new people into see a show, that otherwise wouldn't have. Also, I like the idea of more activity around Jackson Square.

Maybe with the addition of the Rampart Streetcar Line, we can see more locals coming into the quarter for dinner, drinks, or to see a play.

Now maybe the pieces are in place for someone to take my idea of turning the Municipal Auditorium into a movie theater.

[urbanwatcher]

''Now maybe the pieces are in place for someone to take my idea of turning the Municipal Auditorium into a movie theater.''

Thats a great idea,but what about the Joy?

[ardecila]

Neither of them will make successful movie theaters. They are part of an obsolete business model... moviegoers will drive 20 or 30 miles to get to a multiplex theater, because they won't have to wait around to see a given movie. There's always another showing starting on some screen. Plus, even if it is a long wait for the next showing, you can choose from any of 10-15 other movies to see.

Some enterprising businessmen have tried to chop up the old albatross theaters into smaller screens, but that usually gives poorly-designed auditoriums and destroys and historic finishes on the inside.

If we do get a downtown movie theater (and we need one; Canal Place ain't cutting it) it will be a large megaplex, with 8-12 screens, probably integrated with a larger development. This would actually be an excellent tenant for the Power Plant area.

[Blitzen]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Some enterprising businessmen have tried to chop up the old albatross theaters into smaller screens, but that usually gives poorly-designed auditoriums and destroys and historic finishes on the inside.

If we do get a downtown movie theater (and we need one; Canal Place ain't cutting it) it will be a large megaplex, with 8-12 screens, probably integrated with a larger development. This would actually be an excellent tenant for the Power Plant area.

You're definitely right about the Power Plant being perfect, and the Joy being too small, but I think you should reconsider the Municipal Auditorium. The building is roughly 300' x 350' compared to the Elmwood Palace, which is 170' x 500'. If my math is correct, the auditorium is roughly 20% bigger than the Elmwood Palace in area. I think it would be big enough for a 20 screen theater, if it were totally gutted and cut up. Also, no one would lose sleep for tearing out the interior fixtures to the auditorium, as they have been replaced though numerous renovations. If I had $20-million laying around, I'd be proposing it.