Major COBO Renovations Announced This Morning

[stinkytofu]

This looks great. Who knows what the end result will be, but if it looks anything like the fly-through, this should be tremendous - I'm impressed.

[WALD0123]

Very impressed as well. Opening up Cobo to the city and the river and thereby making a monolith more congruent with the urban space is a huge step in the right direction. And I agree that Detroit did not need to go over 1 million square feet to compete with Chicago and Vegas. Now if we can figure out a plan for the other hockey-based, shut off, monolith next door...

[401don]

Looks great. I'm surprised they're turning the arena into a massive 40,000 sq. ft. banquet hall though. Will this really get utilized enough?

[drjeff]

I would bet there will be ways to divide into smaller spaces as well as they can do on the convention floor.

[drjeff]

The big advantage Cobo has is that it's in the middle of downtown. The Chicago convention center, while huge, is in a horrible location. There's nowhere to stay and nothing to do nearby.

[stinkytofu]

Looks great. I'm surprised they're turning the arena into a massive 40,000 sq. ft. banquet hall though. Will this really get utilized enough?

Good question - but that looks like it will be an awesome spot for a wedding reception.

[Hypestyles]

... where will funding come from, will they invite corporate/private investors?

before someone starts uplifting the 'takeover' angle again, the management team is still intact as is?

[R8RBOB]

. Now if we can figure out a plan for the other hockey-based, shut off, monolith next door...

I had the same question. I like the plan for Cobo but the question of Joe Louis Arena still remains. I would have liked for the Cobo board to somehow make used of the hotel that is right across from Cobo.

[SWMAP]

Enabling legislation allows only to borrow [[bonds) $279 M for capital improvements. not enough to do Cobo and also build across the street, according to the capital plan this morning.

Management all new: SMG manages the facility. Caterer new: Centerplate. Authority still has ownership for 30 years and they did the hiring.

[p1acebo]

I had the same question. I like the plan for Cobo but the question of Joe Louis Arena still remains. I would have liked for the Cobo board to somehow make used of the hotel that is right across from Cobo.

+1 to that, it would be one less empty building put to use.

[tkelly1986]

I may be in the minority here, but I hate the riverfront ballrooms as is [[built over the service drive - aka Steve Yzerman drive). Though I know this won't happen, I wish they would tear those down, opening up some additional green space or at least not crowd the river. If they wanted to replace them, build up on part of the parking lot [[double deck part of Cobo).While they're at it, why not put a parking garage up there too.

[MSUguy]

I love it, it really addresses the big gripes that people had about Cobo in not taking advantage of the river.

[wolverine]

VERY impressive. No longer will COBO be a huge embarrassment. The proposed renovations looks stellar.

[Detroitnerd]

It's a nice design, but I wonder if we are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into saturating a market that already has a fixed number of event planners.

[Gistok]

WOW!!!

On several of the old DYes threads about Cobo I always complained that to tear down Cobo Arena [[and build anew) was a massive waste of scarce dollars.... that they should relocate the ballrooms to the arena space and add windows to open it to downtown and the riverfront....

[DetroitHabitater]

An upgraded faster people mover too! Haha

[stinkytofu]

It's a nice design, but I wonder if we are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into saturating a market that already has a fixed number of event planners.

Isn't the idea to draw conventions that are currently going to other similarly sized cities due to their better convention centers?

[rhythmc]

I love the renderings and hope funding can be secured to make this happen. I wish that something could have been done with JLA so that the convention space could be increased to the scale of Chicago's. No matter how nice the facility, if it is not large enough, the various exhibitions will still complain about space in the future.

[Gistok]

... and on one of those threads I showed this image of California's Catalinia Islands round Casino Building's main ballroom as an inspiration for Detroit...

[stinkytofu]

^^^

Those crazy colors remind me of what the Fountain Ballroom at the Masonic looks like when it's all lit up.

[Detroitnerd]

Isn't the idea to draw conventions that are currently going to other similarly sized cities due to their better convention centers?

For the exhibition center, yes. But so many institutions are trying to reinvent themselves as locations for galas or fundraisers or conferences, I wonder about the "breakout" rooms and other places that will compete with, say, the new conference facilities at the DIA. Won't we have a lot of people chasing the same dollars that go to mid-size/smaller events with these new smaller rooms at Cobo?

Don't get me wrong. I like the redesign. I just wonder about building all these new small spaces when we already have plenty of small/mid-size venues.

And, frankly, what I'd like to see more of is anything that will create street life, or encourage smaller businesses to fill up downtown. And this is not a frivolous complaint. We've seen 30-40 years now during which billions have been poured into making these big-block developments that are often self-contained, almost like an airport, where drive into a parking structure and needn't leave for any reason [[Millinder Center, Renaissance Center, Cobo, JLA, Greektown, MGM, etc.), even to the point where they build tubeways so you needn't walk on the street. How about finally trying to support some street-level, mom-and-pop stuff for a change? Just sayin'.

Anyway, I must admit, it looks better in the rendering.

[tkelly1986]

The People Mover brings up another discussion, but one that can tie in to this. When Joe Louis is torn down, why would it still have to circumvent Cobo and the former Joe? Why not cut that section out of the people mover and connect with the track going up cass [[by continuing down Lenard in to the center) . This will cut a great deal of time out of the People Mover trip and eleminate a soon to be obsolete station.

[Detroitnerd]

The People Mover brings up another discussion, but one that can tie in to this. When Joe Louis is torn down, why would it still have to circumvent Cobo and the former Joe? Why not cut that section out of the people mover and connect with the track going up cass [[by continuing down Lenard in to the center) . This will cut a great deal of time out of the People Mover trip and eleminate a soon to be obsolete station.

How about extending the riverfront park, but platting out some new city blocks behind there with a transit stop? Can you see some Transit Oriented Development happening back there?

[rbdetsport]

or use all of that property to expand the exhibition hall of cobo; therefore, garnering two stops for the building.

[Gistok]

The People Mover brings up another discussion, but one that can tie in to this. When Joe Louis is torn down, why would it still have to circumvent Cobo and the former Joe? Why not cut that section out of the people mover and connect with the track going up cass [[by continuing down Lenard in to the center) . This will cut a great deal of time out of the People Mover trip and eleminate a soon to be obsolete station.

You'd probably piss off a lot of folks in the 3 riverfront apartment towers... they're connected by skyway to the JLA station. Also, reconfiguring the PM route within Cobo to curve to Larned... $$$... and that would involve relocating the station inside Cobo.

Besides costing a ton of money to implement, one of the highlights of the PM is the scenic view of the river along Cobo's waterfront.

I don't think it's worth the 2 extra minutes it would shave off of the 15 minute loop.