A Case Study for Packard Plant Redevlopment

[hybridy]

Only half as large[[acreage), but a very relevant case study for the naysayers.

love the similar gateways:
http://goo.gl/maps/2PPkf
http://goo.gl/maps/j9NS0

After operating for over 150 years the Pabst Brewery closed
in 1996 leaving a seven block area of downtown Milwaukee vacant. For over a
decade historic structures deteriorated until real estate developer and
philanthropist Joseph J. Zilber purchased the complex in August
2006.

This historic complex covers over 20 acres and six and one-half
city blocks. It contains over a dozen historic buildings ranging from a 6,000
s.f. German Methodist church [[1872) to the 250,000 square foot historic Bottling
Building [[1900).

It is continuing to redevelope into a new sustainable mixed-use development including:
-office space
-senior apartments
-lofts
-restaurants
-boutique hotel
-parking deck

http://www.thebrewerymke.com/index.htm

[davewindsor]

Apples to oranges.

According to the US Bureau of Labor statistics, the unemployment rate in Milwaukee is 10.6% [[as of July 2013), which is lower than Chicago's 11.2% and a lot lower than Detroit.

[bailey]

Only half as large[[acreage), but a very relevant case study for the naysayers.

love the similar gateways:
http://goo.gl/maps/2PPkf
http://goo.gl/maps/j9NS0

After operating for over 150 years the Pabst Brewery closed
in 1996 leaving a seven block area of downtown Milwaukee vacant. For over a
decade historic structures deteriorated until real estate developer and
philanthropist Joseph J. Zilber purchased the complex in August
2006.

This historic complex covers over 20 acres and six and one-half
city blocks. It contains over a dozen historic buildings ranging from a 6,000
s.f. German Methodist church [[1872) to the 250,000 square foot historic Bottling
Building [[1900).

It is continuing to redevelope into a new sustainable mixed-use development including:
-office space
-senior apartments
-lofts
-restaurants
-boutique hotel
-parking deck

http://www.thebrewerymke.com/index.htm

I'd be with you if it the Packard were in the same type of location as that development. Packard is way too isolated from the CBD.

[Gistok]

The Pabst site is more reminiscent of the Parke Davis & Co. site along the east riverfront, which later became Stroh River Place.... today River Place.

It's unfortunate that the Packard site has been closed for 57 years... thus making a renovation even less likely, in its' much more ruinous state....

[scottn55]

This might be a better example... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_City_Mall

[Hypestyles]

I hope something useful is actually done with it that totally transforms the area into something else and has no more reminders of the blight.

[56packman]

Gistok--the Packard plant has not been closed for 57 years. From 1956 until the City of Detroit siege of 1999 it was a business incubator/storage facility, at least 1/3 of it was occupied for this 43 year period. It was actually maintained during this period.

[ghettopalmetto]

Gistok--the Packard plant has not been closed for 57 years. From 1956 until the City of Detroit siege of 1999 it was a business incubator/storage facility, at least 1/3 of it was occupied for this 43 year period. It was actually maintained during this period.

Packman, I think you know better than this. Any Packard Plant redevelopment [[like all renovation/rehabilitation/restoration projects in Detroit) would fall under the Corollary to Skipper's Rule.

Skipper's Rule stated, "I'll believe it when I see it." The Corollary states that, no matter how realistic a renovation/rehabilitation/restoration project, there will always be an excuse for abandoning the idea, usually rooted in the myriad ways Detroit is different and unique from every other city on earth. These excuses range from "The building is old and outdated [[Dinosaur Excuse) to "structurally unsound and/or economically unviable" [[George Jackson Excuse) to "Yeah, but that project in Milwaukee is on a street with a different name!" [[Making Shit Up Excuse).

Remember, this is Detroit, where the Laws of Economic Development are TOTALLY DIFFERENT than anywhere else on God's Green Earth.

[Gistok]

56packman.... I was going from my personal experience... I remember as a tyke seeing the plant in the 60s... empty and "appearing" abandoned. But you're right. Chock up another nail in the coffin of Detroit [[after Rivertown) from the Archer administration...

Ghettopalmetto.... I think you are describing "Barker's Law"... which states "Murphy was an optimist"...

[steve from virginia]

Packard plant rehab/reconstruction:

- It certainly can be done,

- It would cost a lot of money; + $5-600 million just for the basics; demolition, trash-cleanup, roofs, windows, doors, structure repairs, paint, mechanical, elevators, utilities ...

- Doing so would add a lot to a part of the city that needs help,

- Just cleaning up the site and keeping out scrappers would be a big leap forward [[and would cost + $5 million by itself).

- The structure is largely sound but the site is cluttered with decrepit, half-demolished sheds and other 'junk structures' along with thousands of tons of trash,

- It has good circulation within the site and potential for tram service downtown and elsewhere,

- It can be used for housing, art- and performance spaces, workshops, retail, as a business incubator, etc. It's big enough for + 5,000 full-time residents if put together properly.

- Packard as a self-contained city-within-a-city: keep the cars out. Bikes and peds only.

[Honky Tonk]

There are some nice photos here:

http://motorcitymuckraker.com/2013/1...packard-plant/

[bailey]

Packman, I think you know better than this. Any Packard Plant redevelopment [[like all renovation/rehabilitation/restoration projects in Detroit) would fall under the Corollary to Skipper's Rule.

Skipper's Rule stated, "I'll believe it when I see it." The Corollary states that, no matter how realistic a renovation/rehabilitation/restoration project, there will always be an excuse for abandoning the idea, usually rooted in the myriad ways Detroit is different and unique from every other city on earth. These excuses range from "The building is old and outdated [[Dinosaur Excuse) to "structurally unsound and/or economically unviable" [[George Jackson Excuse) to "Yeah, but that project in Milwaukee is on a street with a different name!" [[Making Shit Up Excuse).

Remember, this is Detroit, where the Laws of Economic Development are TOTALLY DIFFERENT than anywhere else on God's Green Earth.

You say this....or variant of it repeatedly... and, frankly, it's ridiculous. Detroit IS totally different than most anywhere in the US at least. It's the largest, poorest, city with the largest unemployment rate of any large city, the most people walking around functionally illiterate of any large city, it lost 25% of it's population in the last decade ... basically detroit tops out every,single list of negative quality of life factors of anywhere in US and probably anywhere the developed world. Detroit IS different.

Oh yea, and its Bankrupt...the largest city to ever do so.

You know what is not different? The laws of supply and demand. There is a vast supply of bombed out neglected buildings in the city and something near zero demand for them.

the packard is 35 acres, the opening bid is 21k. Shit man, if we're all just idiots letting this opportunity pass us up, why aren't YOU buying it and showing us how stupid we all are? 21K? ... you could put that on a credit card.

There is NOT. ONE. PART. of that Chicago crackpot's plan for the packard plant that is even remotely in the realm of realistic. No bank is going to finance it. No one other than someone totally unaware of the details will invest in it [[as was shown by the fact he couldn't raise the bare minimum in seed money for his pipe dream). No person is going to pay a premium price to live there.

Can it be done? Of course it CAN be done. ANYTHING can be done. SHOULD something be done? I'd like to see it. WILL it be done? Not if anyone is doing it for any purpose other than charity.

There is no demand for it, thus there will be no redevelopment of the property.

Pretending the laws of supply and demand are not applicable to Detroit doesn't make your point.

Pretending this: "After operating for over 150 years the Pabst Brewery closed
in 1996 leaving a seven block area of downtown Milwaukee vacant." is an irrelevant distinction compared to the Packard makes you look stupid.

[ghettopalmetto]

You say this....or variant of it repeatedly... and, frankly, it's ridiculous. Detroit IS totally different than most anywhere in the US at least. It's the largest, poorest, city with the largest unemployment rate of any large city, the most people walking around functionally illiterate of any large city ... basically detroit tops out every,single. list of negative quality of life factors of anywhere in US and probably anywhere the developed world. Detroit IS different.

Oh yea, and its Bankrupt...the largest city to ever do so.

You know what is not different? The laws of supply and demand. There is a vast supply of bombed out neglected buildings in the city and something near zero demand for them.

the packard is 35 acres, the opening bid is 21k. Shit man, if we're all just idiots letting this opportunity pass us up, why aren't YOU buying it and showing us how stupid we all are? 21K? ... you could put that on a credit card.

There is NOT. ONE. PART. of that Chicago crackpot's plan for the packard plant that is even remotely in the realm of realistic. No bank is going to finance it. No one other than someone totally unaware of the details will invest in it [[as was shown by the fact he couldn't raise the bare minimum in seed money for his pipe dream). No person is going to pay a premium price to live there.

Can it be done? Of course it CAN be done. ANYTHING can be done. SHOULD something be done? I'd like to see it. WILL it be done? Not if anyone is doing it for any purpose other than charity.

There is no demand for it, thus there will be no redevelopment of the property.

Pretending the laws of supply and demand are not applicable to Detroit doesn't make your point.

Well, I'm not sure what literacy rates have to do with reveloping buildings [[vis-a-vis the standard practice of using vast sums of public money to demolish them). But here's what I do know:

The City of Detroit is not a developer. The Court of Public Opinion is not a developer. If a developer can germinate an idea, obtain financing, and make it happen, this kind of thing should be encouraged. It should be encouraged even more so if it makes use of existing infrastructure and takes advantage of Detroit's incredible history. You keep talking about "put-up-or-shut-up" when it comes to financing projects. But when people do that, you ballyhoo them for taking such a risk. Which is it?

Do you hold the City of Detroit to the same standard, when they spend millions to deal with "blight" that will "create spinoff development"? Instead of encouraging redevelopment, everyone on God's Green Earth, including some people in positions of real power like George Jackson, will find every reason to work AGAINST someone if their last name is not Ilitch or Karmanos or Gilbert. And then throw more millions of public dollars into utter destruction of Detroit's fabric and history and sense of place.

No demand? Have you seen what has happened downtown and in Midtown? You don't think that new demand can be created by producing quality environments? You don't think that all of those well-paid locally-raised graduates from U of M and MSU, who normally flee to Chicago and elsewhere, would give Detroit a chance if they could find people who make clever use of space [[as they do in other cities)?

This is just more Feel Sorry For Detroit Rhetoric, bailey, and it's what keeps Detroit from achieving a single damned thing. Maybe Detroit is bankrupt because it hasn't learned how to increase it's freaking tax base, or to keep from throwing money at destruction of its real property value, or to dump wheelbarrows of cash into large Projects that don't produce a ROI.

At the end of the day, it's not your decision to make. It's not your risk. It's up to the developer, the bankers, the accountants, the brokers, the contractors--you know, professionals who do this kind of thing for money--to decide what is and is not feasible. What you're doing, however, is erecting a giant billboard that says, "We Don't Want You Here". And that's not really a terrific way to attract investment.

[Hermod]

I forget the name the "law" was attributed to, but I do remember the quote:

"Nothing is impossible to the man who does not have to do the work."

[ghettopalmetto]

I forget the name the "law" was attributed to, but I do remember the quote:

"Nothing is impossible to the man who does not have to do the work."

On the other hand, I'm sure we all remember the multiple threads that proclaimed what a disaster--financial and otherwise--the Book-Cadillac redevelopment would be. How it was stupid, and impossible, and had rotted away for decades, and no one could ever pull together the financing.

Remember that?

Is it something in the water, or is there no institutional memory in Detroit?
Tear down an old building? New development!
Subsidies for stadiums? Spinoff development!
Rehab an old building? Impossible!

Other cities faced similar "impossible" situations...some of those cities are not too far from Detroit. The difference is, they MOVED, while Detroit sat on its ass and made excuses. And like it or not, people are now doing in Detroit what folks like you have long-ago deemed "impossible".

[professorscott]

On the other hand, I'm sure we all remember the multiple threads that proclaimed what a disaster--financial and otherwise--the Book-Cadillac redevelopment would be. How it was stupid, and impossible, and had rotted away for decades, and no one could ever pull together the financing.

I do remember that, and I agree with some of what you've said on this thread. The most relevant counterargument is that the Book Cadillac is a short walk to the CBD and the Packard plant is not.

Redevelopment in Detroit - like abandonment - is going to happen neighborhood by neighborhood, and it's going to be a lot easier to get financing to redevelop in a place near where redevelopment is already happening. So I suspect the underused land between midtown and downtown will redevelop now at an increasing pace, and development will spread out along and from Woodward and East Jefferson.

My biggest concern is that the Packard location is surrounded by other large-scale abandonment. East Grand Boulevard is so bereft of activity that DDOT simply stopped sending buses up and down it, a couple years ago, after something like 90 years of service. It's just not near enough to anything else to make it an attractive place to develop.

Being an optimist, in spite of everything, I think it will redevelop, just not very soon. But of course, I hope I'm wrong.

[DetroitPlanner]

On the other hand, I'm sure we all remember the multiple threads that proclaimed what a disaster--financial and otherwise--the Book-Cadillac redevelopment would be. How it was stupid, and impossible, and had rotted away for decades, and no one could ever pull together the financing.

Remember that?

The Book Cadillac has not exactly been a financial success. The Condo portion never realized its full potential and has mostly been a failure from a financial perspective. The Developer has been very slow at paying back the City for what the City has put into it.
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...efault-notice#
http://www.freep.com/article/20130901/NEWS01/309010056/
http://www.mlive.com/detroit-river/i...in_troubl.html

I would not hang my hat on that especially with what Prof Scott points out, the neighborhood is in very bad shape and again we are talking about a project that Dwarfs the Book Cadillac in size and scope.

[ghettopalmetto]

The Book Cadillac has not exactly been a financial success. The Condo portion never realized its full potential and has mostly been a failure from a financial perspective. The Developer has been very slow at paying back the City for what the City has put into it.
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article...efault-notice#
http://www.freep.com/article/20130901/NEWS01/309010056/
http://www.mlive.com/detroit-river/i...in_troubl.html

I would not hang my hat on that especially with what Prof Scott points out, the neighborhood is in very bad shape and again we are talking about a project that Dwarfs the Book Cadillac in size and scope.

We also had a massive recession in 2008, and employment [[especially in Detroit) has yet to recover. That hampers condo purchases quite a bit. That's not to say that the current paradigm is permanent.

If a redevelopment the size of the Packard Plant could take place, it can be a catalyst for additional redevelopment on surrounding parcels and blocks. I don't know that all redevelopment needs to be contiguous--this is a bit limiting. After all, Southwest Detroit is one of the more vibrant neighborhoods in the city, and it's not adjacent to downtown. Corktown falls into the same paradigm [[It's hardly an easy walk from the CBD.) Cleveland's downtrodden blue-collar Collinwood neighborhood [[hardly surrounded by gentrification), I think, shoots down the "need" for contiguous redevelopment between neighborhoods: http://www.cleveland.com/entertainme...ance_unde.html

Maybe a Packard Plant redevelopment isn't feasible at all. Maybe only a small part is feasible. I don't know. The only people who do know are the developers and bean counters. A few short years ago, however, some may have thought the idea of a Whole Foods Market in Detroit to be completely insane. So let's not blow the feet off this idea just yet.

It's like Henry Ford said, "Think you can, think you can't. Either way, you'll be right."

[Baselinepunk]

Out of all of the demo money coming to Detroit lately, I am super surprised that some fund couldn't be used to bring the majority of the plant down, and save what can be saved.

The Packard, in many ways, is very reflective of what Detroit is now. Once that demon is exorcised, things will be better.

[ghettopalmetto]

Out of all of the demo money coming to Detroit lately, I am super surprised that some fund couldn't be used to bring the majority of the plant down, and save what can be saved.

The Packard, in many ways, is very reflective of what Detroit is now. Once that demon is exorcised, things will be better.

Yeah, they said that in 1998 too, just before the Hudsons building was demolished. Demons exorcised yet?

There's this idea called "Chasing the Dragon".... Apparently, it hasn't caught traction in Detroit.

[Hermod]

"The first 90% of the project will require 90% of the resources available. The last 10% of the project will require another 90% of the resources."

"Nature will always side with the hidden flaw."

[DetroitPlanner]

If a redevelopment the size of the Packard Plant could take place, it can be a catalyst for additional redevelopment on surrounding parcels and blocks. I don't know that all redevelopment needs to be contiguous--this is a bit limiting. After all, Southwest Detroit is one of the more vibrant neighborhoods in the city, and it's not adjacent to downtown. Corktown falls into the same paradigm [[It's hardly an easy walk from the CBD.) Cleveland's downtrodden blue-collar Collinwood neighborhood [[hardly surrounded by gentrification), I think, shoots down the "need" for contiguous redevelopment between neighborhoods: http://www.cleveland.com/entertainme...ance_unde.html

This is Collingwood a few blocks from Waterloo. https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Colli...=12,359.6,,0,0

It hardly looks comparable to the area around the Packard Plant. There was good bones in the area to begin the development off of. What you are supporting is the exact opposite.

[Baselinepunk]

"Yeah, they said that in 1998 too, just before the Hudsons building was demolished. Demons exorcised yet?"


Detroit has a lot of demons, if you didn't realize. Some of them have made poor choices, ie Hudsons. Some of them are physical reminders that have been transformed into evil things. Getting rid of the demons that plague this area is not easy because eliminating them at such a geologic pace, once one demon is gone another takes it's place.

The demons are do not always have physical presence; rather, they are within ourselves as well.

A step in the right direction is to get rid of as many demons as possible in the shortest amount of time. We don't have to tear down structures to get rid of them, there just has to be a change in mindset to one that does not approve and will not tolerate, what is collapsing around them.

In short, this area needs to lose the thought of how cool it is to have the city dismantled around them. I know more than a few really good people that view the urban decay as art. That's where we need to start first. Rats running around children playing is not art; it's a health hazard and unfair to the child.

[iheartthed]

Detroit is fucking crazy for tearing down any building that gets as much press as the Packard Plant, even if it is "bad press." If Detroit could pull off a redevelopment of that building then the rest of the country might start taking the region seriously again...

[ghettopalmetto]

This is Collingwood a few blocks from Waterloo. https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Colli...=12,359.6,,0,0

It hardly looks comparable to the area around the Packard Plant. There was good bones in the area to begin the development off of. What you are supporting is the exact opposite.

This leads me to ask a question: For what kind of conditions, pray tell, is Detroit waiting?

First, a developer can't redevelop the Packard plant because it's not contiguous with the CBD. Now the area of the Packard plant doesn't have "good bones". Never mind that Cleveland--as well as most other cities--isn't hellbent on turning its neighborhoods into small clusters of prairie homes.

People complain that Detroit doesn't have enough jobs, that people are poor, that there isn't good housing stock. Did anyone stop to think that a Packard plant redevelopment could provide these things??? Given the size of the site, I would think that the scope of such a redevelopment could be its own stable neighborhood, and improve the desirability of the surrounding areas. I know it isn't as fun and magical as building a $600 million ice rink and parkingplex, but hey, if someone wants to invest a buck in Detroit--what do you have to lose??? Maybe you can use your professional background, DetroitPlanner, and educate us all as to what conditions are necessary for a developer to satisfy the Court of Public Opinion before they dare invest a dollar in your fair city.

How much longer are investors supposed to wait before conditions are absolutely perfect? Seems to me, this is another move of the goalposts. But, as I've stated above, Detroiters will find any damn excuse to NOT do something, and that, more than anything else, explains the status quo.