Whitmore Lake, MI

Rizzo · #1 Posted **Apr 21, 2008, 8:07 AM**

My classmates and I put together this proposal for a transit oriented development in Whitmore Lake, MI. The project was for my grad physical planning studio. We got a lot of positive feedback from the mayor and developer. Although we might have to change the lot to a parking structure. Currently the site is an abandoned factory. We plan for this to be completed in multiple phases, although the closeups you see just below will be done in phase I. I've focused on the work I've done specifically below. I'll post more of my classmates' as well as more closeups later.

Whitmore Lake is located several miles north of Ann Arbor, MI which is 38 miles west of Detroit. A new commuter line will connect northern communities with Ann Arbor by next year. The city of Whitmore Lake is interested in a transit oriented development that would have retail and residential, although not limited to these uses. We also added senior housing, a park, and a hotel.

Overall view

Market

Retail Arcade and commuter rail station in the distance

Street scene

Back retail entrances alongside loading entrances. Double sided retail was a challenge, but we worked out the details.

IntotheWest · #2 Posted **Apr 21, 2008, 2:13 PM**

Looks very promising! Very nice!

Do you have any site plan overviews - or maps of this? It's a little hard to tell how it all fits together from these pictures. Also, just wondering if there are any ped pass throughs between the two sides of the retail (or, are the blocks short?).

Also, are all the roads already existing (from the abandoned factory)?

I do like the scale, but from the angles can the sidewalks be wider (looking at picture #2 in particular).

[SP]Neo · #3 Posted **Apr 21, 2008, 2:41 PM**

nice work! how many people worked on this?

mikeR · #4 Posted **Apr 21, 2008, 9:47 PM**

very cool looks like somewhere I would like to walk around

Austin55 · #5 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 12:08 AM**

holy cow thats great! My parking request, and I'm sure you already know this, but put the parking along the edge. Putting in the middle ruins the whole feel of the area, and be sure to include loads of flora, but that tough to to in SU. Finnaly, IMO it would look better with a vertical focalpoint, such as a midrise or clocktower, church, or something. Is there any entertainment ? Cause theatres, librarys,etc would draw some extra attention to the area.

Can't wait to see more!

Patrick · #6 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 12:35 AM**

Holy Crap! That looka great, love the whole urban main street feel.

Dac150 · #7 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 12:56 AM**

Wow, just by looking at that I can appreciate the amount of time and dedication that went into constructing that. The detail level is enough to match the blue-prints of any architect. Very well done, well planned, and well thought out. I hope to see some of your work again.

Aleks · #8 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 2:04 AM**

Yeah, looks great. Did you design the inside of each building as well? I'd be more impressed than I already am. Anyways, I love it. The whole thing has a very community feel to it. The thing I like most of the small round-about, but it'd be nice to see a column rise up from the middle. Something that would make the citizens proud and give them a little logo of their own.

I love the Market Building and I'd like to see more of it.

verticalextropy · #9 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 2:14 AM**

wow! this pretty much raises our standards on detail! very well done!

Rizzo · #10 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 2:28 AM**

Thanks everyone!

Intothewest - I'll post a siteplan that gives an idea of how the sites (and surrounding areas) are situated. Also, the sidewalks at the corners are way too wide. The problem is that traffic turnaround, which we intend to revise. It would make the sidewalks more average sized.

Currently, there are no roads on the factory site, just parking

[sp]Neo - There was three of us total. And we also did 99% of the work ourselves. The lamp posts and trees were from the Google Warehouse

austin55 - I definitely agree with you. I hate the parking in the center, although we need a ton of parking to service the train station and retail. We actually wanted to orient each "L" of retail toward the park, but then decided to push it toward the train station because that was more pedestrian. It would be nice to put it by the park, but beyond the park is actually a high speed road, and we felt it was important that motorists see over the park, over the parking lot showing the whole spread of retail. Personally, I prefer that it be filled in with something, creating more city blocks, but the developer actually liked the way we had it. The only thing is, that lot must now be a parking structure, possibly underground.

Aleks - we have a water tower from the old factory that might be symbolic. We are trying to decided whether to move it (the developer said we could!

) to the roundabout since the fountain is kind of cliche in these types of developments. It's a really nice tower, and painted dark colors it would look somewhat historic

treras93 · #11 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 2:33 AM**

I am amazed by the detail in this city. its ridiculous! very, very well planned and built

Awesome

Also 2 questions:

1. Is this an actual proposal or is it just for your class?

2. You said it was a challenge building double side retail. Why is that?

Aleks · #12 Posted **Apr 22, 2008, 2:45 AM**

It sounds like it could work. How tall is the water tower? Is it a round water tower, a cylindrical one, does it have a sloped roof? You have to decide on all of the things. If it's too big it will look overpowering and block too much sun and if it's too small then it will looks very weak compared to it's surroundings.

Have you tried placing a model of it in the round-about?

Peter · #13 Posted **Apr 24, 2008, 4:06 AM**

I have never seen an urban SketchUp compilation as detailed as this! It must have taken months. The realism is spectacular!

I love everything, especially the traffic circle.

Some renderings would be excellent!

Is this a real planned community or just a class project? Did you model this all on your own? Did you have blueprints to look at, or is this all your own work? You mentioned other classmates. What is their role in this? So many questions, but I'm curious because it's just too damn good!

Rizzo · #14 Posted **Apr 26, 2008, 7:35 AM**

A lot of it is my own work. I'll be very specific when I show future screenshots in this thread to credit which group members did what.

This is somewhat of a real project. We presented it to a real developer and owner of the site, city officials and planners. They may borrow whatever ideas they choose from the project. But mainly, it is but a class project. However, you never know. I've seen class projects at our university become real.

Don't worry though, more images coming soon. I'm currently moving to a new apartment right now so I've been a bit busy.

I will probably post individual buildings up on 3d warehouse as well in the near future.

FYI, it took 350 collective hours by our group to construct this model, and you haven't even seen all of it. Since the site has terrain, it took awhile to model the hills in sketchup.

Also another to keep in mind is that I use sketchup professionally along with 3ds max at the architecture firm I work for during summers. Everyday I'm modeling stuff so creating buildings goes fairly quickly when you've done it over and over a billion times.

I wish I could share the joy in creating these wonderful 3d cities you all make, but after using the program for 8 hours every work day, I just want to chill and watch tv when I get home!

Mocholate · #15 Posted **Apr 28, 2008, 9:15 AM**

Holy cool !

please render !

Peter · #16 Posted **Apr 28, 2008, 9:08 PM**

^
|
I agree Mo.
This needs to be rendered.
It would be lifelike.

Hayward, you answered all my questions and more, thanks. I will definately take a look at any that go in the 3D Warehouse. And I don't blame you for not wanting to use SketchUp when you get home since you use it at your job. I would be the same way.

Rizzo · #17 Posted **Apr 29, 2008, 8:20 AM**

We tried rendering it in Max but it crashed due to memory issues. I could take it to a rendering farm at my university for free, but I felt the project needed a higher level of completion ( more trees, streetscape stuff, etc) to justify some money shots. Although, I should render a few closeups of street scenes for my portfolio.

When I put all the buildings up on the warehouse, you can render some of the buildings and mess around with them if you like. I've oriented all the faces outward (no blue faces) to avoid any errors.

Aleks · #18 Posted **Apr 29, 2008, 10:17 PM**

Sounds great. It's gonna be a big file though. What's the current size?