Land near Temple Bar mysteriously bought up

**esp1986** · October-21-10, 09:28 AM

http://detnews.com/article/20101021/...usly-bought-up

More fuel for the arena fire... also mentions Taubman wanting to build a mall near the new arena [[hopefully an open air mall)... this is getting even better!!

**mogo** · October-21-10, 10:29 AM

I agree more with the views of this editorial. If it's a mall in form of Twelve Oaks or Somerset, then I think it will end any chance of further progress in that area. Open air malls are what suburbs construct in order to try to create an identity where there is none.

What's wrong with buildings that look like the ones you see in a normal city? Every time Flint fixes up one of their downtown buildings, someone fills it with an original business. I'd rather go that route.

**rb336** · October-21-10, 10:35 AM

Speculation sure is fun -- an arena/mall combo? could be cool. the one bit about the light rail mentioned in the article isn't on target from what I know - the major facility for that is supposedly around baltimore/woodward by the Amtrack line

**rjk** · October-21-10, 10:52 AM

"Then Mellish died.
Since Boukas never knew whom Mellish represented, he doesn't know whom to contact. Now he is left wondering where he stands."

If this was legit wouldn't the big wheel behind all this replace the dead person with a live one and continue on?

Maybe this Mellish guy was looking for a free drink.

It almost sounds like a script from Detroit 187.
"Disappearing Broker"
Plot: Local county executive offs broker to hopefully prevent sale and eventual move of sports team.

**esp1986** · October-21-10, 10:55 AM

Originally Posted by mogo

I agree more with the views of this editorial. If it's a mall in form of Twelve Oaks or Somerset, then I think it will end any chance of further progress in that area. Open air malls are what suburbs construct in order to try to create an identity where there is none.

What's wrong with buildings that look like the ones you see in a normal city? Every time Flint fixes up one of their downtown buildings, someone fills it with an original business. I'd rather go that route.

While I would love to see an open air mall with "city" buildings [[perhaps using the old Eddystone), I wouldn't be opposed to something reminiscent of the 'Water Tower' in Chicago. It it 8 or 9 stories, closed in, but it is straight up, with 9 or 10 stores per floor. My biggest complaint to suburban malls is that they are too spread out and too fragmented. As long as there arent 10 different 'sections' like Twelve Oaks or what used to be Great Lakes Crossing, I am fine with it.

**esp1986** · October-21-10, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by rjk

"Then Mellish died.

Since Boukas never knew whom Mellish represented, he doesn't know whom to contact. Now he is left wondering where he stands."

If this was legit wouldn't the big wheel behind all this replace the dead person with a live one and continue on?

Maybe this Mellish guy was looking for a free drink.

It almost sounds like a script from Detroit 187.
"Disappearing Broker"

Plot: Local county executive offs broker to hopefully prevent sale and eventual move of sports team.

hahahahahahaha... now that's funny

**iheartthed** · October-21-10, 11:03 AM

Originally Posted by esp1986

While I would love to see an open air mall with "city" buildings [[perhaps using the old Eddystone), I wouldn't be opposed to something reminiscent of the 'Water Tower' in Chicago. It it 8 or 9 stories, closed in, but it is straight up, with 9 or 10 stores per floor. My biggest complaint to suburban malls is that they are too spread out and too fragmented. As long as there arent 10 different 'sections' like Twelve Oaks or what used to be Great Lakes Crossing, I am fine with it.

It would be nice if Taubman could do something like Soho NYC in that area and use the existing buildings to create a shopping district. I know that their projects would need dedicated parking, so I don't know how that would work, but I guess there are enough empty lots around there to construct several small parking structures...

**mogo** · October-21-10, 11:07 AM

Originally Posted by esp1986

While I would love to see an open air mall with "city" buildings [[perhaps using the old Eddystone), I wouldn't be opposed to something reminiscent of the 'Water Tower' in Chicago. It it 8 or 9 stories, closed in, but it is straight up, with 9 or 10 stores per floor. My biggest complaint to suburban malls is that they are too spread out and too fragmented. As long as there arent 10 different 'sections' like Twelve Oaks or what used to be Great Lakes Crossing, I am fine with it.

Yeah, I'd be content with something like the Water Tower because it doesn't look like a mall when you walk past it. Birmingham had a city plan prepared in the 90's that was completely focused on creating a walkable city. Malls like Twelve oaks and Somerset kill that concept.

**iheartthed** · October-21-10, 11:43 AM

Originally Posted by mogo

I agree more with the views of this editorial. If it's a mall in form of Twelve Oaks or Somerset, then I think it will end any chance of further progress in that area. Open air malls are what suburbs construct in order to try to create an identity where there is none.

What's wrong with buildings that look like the ones you see in a normal city? Every time Flint fixes up one of their downtown buildings, someone fills it with an original business. I'd rather go that route.

That editorial is spot on. Especially this part:

Hopefully, Boukas’ theory is incorrect. Detroit doesn’t need a mall. Detroit needs to get busy being a city again, instead of trying to be a giant suburb on the site of a once great city.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with suburbs. People like them and they serve a purpose. If the M-59 corridor is your thing then by all means enjoy Partridge Creek.

But people also like cities and urbanity. No one moves to Chicago or New York for the malls. Rust-belt cities that have revitalized their downtowns, Pittsburgh for instance, did so with urban-scale development instead of more parking lots and shopping malls.

Some people look at Detroit and see the potential to be like Pittsburgh or Chicago. Detroit’s leadership class too often believes Detroit best hope is to be like Troy. That’s a misguided and myopic view.

I agree wholeheartedly with every word that I just quoted, even though some may have the perception that I'm anti-suburb. I think that suburban development does serve a useful function, but I think that the Detroit area is much too saturated with suburban development, and by contrast under served by urban development, for its own good.

It is clear from the city's historical density maps that Detroit's massive population loss is at least in part due to the neglect of its urban infrastructure, and by extension high density neighborhoods were no longer viable. You absolutely will not fix Detroit without correcting or amending the policies that allowed this to happen.

I'm pro-transit not because I think trains are cool, but because I know that transit is the backbone to a functional and dense core. I'm pro-preservation not because I like old buildings, but because I see that your development strategy must be extremely flawed for so many old and historical buildings to be essentially worthless.

**R8RBOB** · October-21-10, 11:58 AM

Turn that area into a Nicollet Mall type of environment.We don't need no stinkin' Somerset-type mall.

**esp1986** · October-21-10, 11:59 AM

Originally Posted by iheartthed

It would be nice if Taubman could do something like Soho NYC in that area and use the existing buildings to create a shopping district. I know that their projects would need dedicated parking, so I don't know how that would work, but I guess there are enough empty lots around there to construct several small parking structures...

Only problem is that there are only a few salvagable buildings in that area, but I would love to see them saved and incorporated into a new development.

**EastsideAl** · October-21-10, 12:00 PM

I couldn't agree more with Jeff Wattrick's editorial or with iheartthed. Detroit needs to get back as quickly as possible to being a functional CITY again, and all future development should be undertaken with that goal in mind. This notion some folks around here seem to have that the best that can be hoped for is that Detroit become some sort of cut-rate Troy [[more parking please!) is terribly misguided. All I can say is that they need to get out more, beyond this metro area, and have a look at what other cities have done to preserve and enhance their urban-ness.

It would be tragic if we backtracked now and really built something like a mall in the lower Cass Corridor. We already have more than enough anti-urban life-sucking developments in this city, with the blank, inward-focused, monolithic casinos being very notable culprits.

**rjk** · October-21-10, 12:11 PM

Does anyone honestly think that a mall will be built in that area next to an arena? Taubman would laugh at the idea.

I don't know this bar owner, but after reading this article I'd question everthing he says. This guy was in contact with a mysterious and now dead broker and we're suppose to believe he has info on Taubman's next big move?

**Danny** · October-21-10, 12:24 PM

I know who this mysterious buyer to the Temple Bar: [[wisper) Mike Illitch.

**hybridy** · October-21-10, 01:40 PM

Originally Posted by iheartthed

It would be nice if Taubman could do something like Soho NYC in that area and use the existing buildings to create a shopping district. I know that their projects would need dedicated parking, so I don't know how that would work, but I guess there are enough empty lots around there to construct several small parking structures...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Avenue_Mall

milwaukee did this in the 80's and while fantastically successful at the beginning ie local offerings...the suburban malls eventually offered all the same amenities and tons of free parking thereby killing grand ave

**softailrider** · October-21-10, 01:43 PM

Originally Posted by rjk

Does anyone honestly think that a mall will be built in that area next to an arena? Taubman would laugh at the idea.

I don't know this bar owner, but after reading this article I'd question everthing he says. This guy was in contact with a mysterious and now dead broker and we're suppose to believe he has info on Taubman's next big move?

I totally agree, there's nobody in their right mind who would build a mall in that area. Even if the economic climate was good it wouldn't happen. You can even get a decent grocery store to open up around there.

**drjeff** · October-21-10, 01:50 PM

Does anyone even build traditional enclosed malls any more? Seems more likely to be open air, if anything.

**Detroitnerd** · October-21-10, 01:55 PM

Originally Posted by drjeff

Does anyone even build traditional enclosed malls any more? Seems more likely to be open air, if anything.

I don't know. Detroit's leadership always seems willing to gamble that -- for some mysterious reason -- the year is still 1965.

**iheartthed** · October-21-10, 02:44 PM

Originally Posted by drjeff

Does anyone even build traditional enclosed malls any more? Seems more likely to be open air, if anything.

I don't think one has been built anywhere in the U.S. since 2006.

**Jason** · October-21-10, 03:35 PM

Actually, I think an urban mall, like Toronto's Eaton Center could be good.

Right now, I think the problem with retail in Detroit is management type problems/perceptions [[shady owners, too high of rents, etc.) as well as crime problems. If it's a Taubman mall, that would give stores confidence. And being an enclosed mall, it would give stores and shoppers confidence about the crime problems.

Since it would be such a big development, it would instantly get destination shopping status. Apparently Eaton Center in Toronto is Toronto's #1 tourist destination [[which is a good thing, since people go to museums or the CN Tower to look at stuff, they go to malls to spend $$$). If its combined with the new arena, the arena would give the mall exposure to tens and tens of thousands of people who might not otherwise give it a chance.

I think most of the existing retail in midtown is trendy boutique stuff which wouldn't locate in a mall anyway, and if the mall generated a shopping base for midtown it would help retail in general.

**Gistok** · October-21-10, 03:37 PM

One of Mike Ilitch's pet projects never really got off the ground in the 1990s. That was to have an "Agora" [[Greek/Macedonian for "open marketplace") on Columbia Ave between the Fox and State Theatres.

Perhaps he plans to use that concept in an arena complex somehow....

**jt1** · October-21-10, 03:40 PM

Originally Posted by Gistok

One of Mike Ilitch's pet projects never really got off the ground in the 1990s. That was to have an "Agora" [[Greek/Macedonian for "open marketplace") on Columbia Ave between the Fox and State Theatres.

Perhaps he plans to use that concept in an arena complex somehow....

I like the end result - a public street just arbitrarily blocked off with a fence. It's very Maroun like of him.

Blarf · October-21-10, 04:48 PM

Originally Posted by Jason

Actually, I think an urban mall, like Toronto's Eaton Center could be good.

Right now, I think the problem with retail in Detroit is management type problems/perceptions [[shady owners, too high of rents, etc.) as well as crime problems. If it's a Taubman mall, that would give stores confidence. And being an enclosed mall, it would give stores and shoppers confidence about the crime problems.

Since it would be such a big development, it would instantly get destination shopping status. Apparently Eaton Center in Toronto is Toronto's #1 tourist destination [[which is a good thing, since people go to museums or the CN Tower to look at stuff, they go to malls to spend $$$). If its combined with the new arena, the arena would give the mall exposure to tens and tens of thousands of people who might not otherwise give it a chance.

I think most of the existing retail in midtown is trendy boutique stuff which wouldn't locate in a mall anyway, and if the mall generated a shopping base for midtown it would help retail in general.

The only difference is Toronto is a thriving city with excellent mass transit, and Detroit is a dump.

**Pcm** · October-21-10, 04:59 PM

Didn't Taubman make most his fortune building strip malls?

**wolverine** · October-21-10, 06:18 PM

Originally Posted by esp1986

While I would love to see an open air mall with "city" buildings [[perhaps using the old Eddystone), I wouldn't be opposed to something reminiscent of the 'Water Tower' in Chicago. It it 8 or 9 stories, closed in, but it is straight up, with 9 or 10 stores per floor. My biggest complaint to suburban malls is that they are too spread out and too fragmented. As long as there arent 10 different 'sections' like Twelve Oaks or what used to be Great Lakes Crossing, I am fine with it.

Actually Water Tower place can never be done again in America. [[Ironic I'm eating dinner and posting from there right now

)

These types of malls need "street pressure" to push shoppers up numerous floors of a highrise urban mall. Often-times shoppers find accessing the top floors inconvenient, when they can enter a street level store in much less. time. The reason why WTP worked is because Michigan Ave was already a very busy street and there is high demand for additional retail space. You have plenty of land along Woodward, so there's no need to concentrate all that shopping into one small space.

Chicago place was a similar mall and it failed miserablly. In fact, most of the stores left and moved to other downtown shopping malls that were more linear and no higher than 5 floors. A similar thing happened with Manhattan Mall in NYC...though still open, but a completely different format now. The only reason why WTP survived against new malls downtown is because people know the name. I could say Northbridge Place, 900 North, and B37, and few outsiders know what I'm talking about despite that they are newer malls and just as succesful.

You could also incorporate the Eddystone possibly. The photo below shows the McGraw Hill building which was a city historic landmark. Mall developers tore it down anyway. But they rebuilt a replica and it came out okay, except for the horrible mis-alignment of floors with windows.

If you want to see an example of something that might work, check out the giant downtown mall they are building in Salt Lake City.