Cambridge Commons

The view from across North Avenue of the soon-to-be complete residence hall.

New UWM Residence Hall
Location: Intersection of North Avenue and Cambridge Avenue along the river
Size: 700 beds
Opening: late August/early September 2010

The building will bring 700 students to the neighborhood, as well as introducing another coffee shop (The Grind) to the area. The UWM Real Estate Foundation will move their offices to the building. We’ve profiled Cambridge Commons extensively here before.

Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital

Rendering of the new Columbia St. Mary's hospital

Combing the operations of Columbia Hospital (Maryland and Kenwood) and St. Mary’s Hospital (existing site) in a new $417 million facility.
Location: Eastern end of North Avenue
Opening: October 2010

Columbia St. Mary’s is combining their two namesake East Side operations into one modern facility with the goal of saving $19 million annually. The new hospital will introduce a number of new potential customers to North Avenue area businesses.

Latitude Apartments

Latitude Apartments under construction on Kenilworth and Farwell.

Originally proposed by New Land Enterprises, the approved project was ultimately sold to Dermond Property Investments before construction. Construction is nearing completion on the apartment building.
Location: Southwest corner of the intersection of Kenilworth Place and Farwell Avenue
Opening: August 2010
Size: 90 units (71 one-bedroom, 19 studios)

The apartment will include 90 residential units and 7,500 square-feet of retail space.  It includes 90 parking spaces for residents, as well an additional 14 spaces for the retail tenant.

Park Lafayette

Park Lafayette before completion.

Condos turned apartments
Location: Northeast corner of the intersection of Lafayette Place and Prospect Avenue)
Opening: Now
Size: 281 Units

After a significant amount of turmoil around it’s near-empty opening as condos last summer, this project appears headed for better days. Over 70 units are now occupied, primarily as rentals, and a steady stream of moving trucks can be spotted entering the building. Additionally, there is now a fair amount of foot and car traffic going in-and-out of the towers. Well Warren Barr and Amalgamated Bank are likely going to lose a lot of money on the project, but Mallory Properties appears poised to buy the property and run the buildings mainly as apartments.

St. John’s on the Lake – The Expansion

The Expansion under construction at St. John's on the Lake.

Massive expansion of  the St. John’s on the Lake housing facility.
Location: 1840 N. Prospect Avenue (block south of Kane Place)
Opening: Early 2011
Size: 88 units starting at 1,140 square-feet

The Expansion at St. John’s on the Lake will include a number of different service offerings including independent living, assisted living, and skilled nursing care.  The Expansion was almost entirely pre-sold before construction started. The property tax loophole for developments like this has been closed.

1. The construction of the towers was finished.  There isn’t construction equipment or fences blocking the roads. Makes walking, biking, and driving near the project just a little bit easier.  It also allows people to move in, who spend money at local businesses and serve as eyes on the street.  Perhaps most importantly for the City of Milwaukee, it allows them to assess the building at a much higher amount.  For an example of how this could be worse, look at The Residences on Water on the corner of Juneau and Water.  That building is being fought over in court while it sits with fences around it blocking the sidewalk and parking.
2. Both towers were built at the same time.  It’s likely if only one tower was built, that only one would be ever built.  You would have fewer empty units certainly, which would maybe marginally help property values in the area, but at the same time the nation is a massive recession centered around the housing area so things would be terrible regardless, best if the city gets something out of it in return.  What is that the city gets? Density. Park Lafayette is 292 units on a rather small lot, that’s future customers for businesses in the area.  While the construction of Park Lafayette isn’t encouraging development in the area right now, in the long-term those units will fill, the residents will spend a lot of money at local businesses, and overall the building will generate a lot of positive externalities for the city.
3. Two-hundred empty units in an urban, dense development is much better than 200+ empty single-family homes in a suburb.  Empty houses are at risk for theft (copper wire, etc) and possess a security risk by eliminating eyes on the street.  If you’re going to have 200 empty units, a high rise tower is probably the best configuration possible.
4. The construction was entirely privately financed.  The City of Milwaukee didn’t have to contribute any public money to make this project happen. Yes, the project dumped a lot of empty units on the housing market, but it’s hard to say the City of Milwaukee should have done something to prohibit an outsider investing money in the city.
5. The large development pushed the ceiling for the neighborhood upward.  One more large building only serves to dampen public opposition to the next tall building proposed for the area.
6. There is hope.  Mandel Group, Garrison Partners, and Schmocke & Associates were able to come in and turn around The Pointe on the River.  Unit sales just crossed the 50% threshold.  Now, Park Lafayette is almost twice the size of The Pointe on the River, so a turn-around in a year is unlikely, but over the next few years new management and an improving economy should make things improve drastically.
7. The units aren’t being unloaded on the market as apartments.  This makes projects like The Moderne (almost all apartments) make more sense despite the glut of condos on the market.  Mandel’s new ONE at The North End is within one unit of being full, and other apartment buildings around downtown and the lower East Side are near full.
8. The bank wants Bob Monnat of the Mandel Group to be the court appointed receiver.  If there is to be light at the end of the tunnel, bringing in the most successful development team in town is a great start. The sales competency that Monnat and the rest of the Mandel Group has will certainly lead to a fairly-priced, fully-occupied building much faster than almost any other developer or sales team in town could deliver.

So while it’s certainly a shame that the 200+ empty units might be negatively affecting prices of units in the area, things could be much worse.  Long-term things still look good for the neighborhood.  In the short term it’s hard to say that any development project that has been brought forward has been stalled because of the excess units at Park Lafayette.

There are two key elements to the issue.  The first is the response from Peter Renner’s firm.  The second is the question of the actual architectural value of the building.

In the case of the first issue, Peter Renner’s firm issued a response via email to an article by Tom Bamberger in Milwaukee Magazine (not yet available online).  The email sent out to an undisclosed number of individuals, but presumably went to every future BreakWater resident as part of a “BreakWater Condominiums Weekly Update.”  The email that was sent out was addressed from Sales staff member Chris Corley, but Renner himself should be held personally responsible until he issues an apology.  Furthermore, it would be shocking if Renner himself didn’t have involvement in the authoring of the email with the amount of architectural detail included.

A rebuttal to a printed column that criticizes your development is completely fair, and that’s not at all where the issue is.  The problem is the way the rebuttal was authored, and the personal attack it included.

The email, which I have posted in its entirety as a PDF, attacks architecture critics in the city calling them hypocrites.  Renner then moves along to attack Park Lafayette comparing it to something you would find in the Soviet Union.  It follows that up with an attack the UWM School of Architecture and Urban Planning.

The final and most egregious insult Renner issued was at columnist Tom Bamberger, exposing his address unnecessarily (with the only point of posting photos of his home and mocking his home), marginalizing his financial well-being, and randomly criticizing his photography skills.

A response from Renner was certainly not uncalled for, but the way this response was written certainly was.

The second question is over the architectural value of the building.  Bamberger was rather harsh in his criticism of the BreakWater, but when you’re building something that is visible from more than a mile away you’re not going to please everyone.

Do I personally think the building is a great architectural addition to the skyline?  It’s okay, nothing special.  There is a better question to be asked though.  Does every building that adds to the skyline have to be approved by the architectural community as a quality addition?  I say no, although I’m sure others would certainly disagree.

Milwaukee is blessed with a number of beautiful buildings from Milwaukee City Hall to “the Calatrava.”  There are also a lot of bland buildings that are still assets to the urban fabric.  The massing of the BreakWater will certainly prevent it from ever blending in with others around it, but it will certainly will not distract from Milwaukee’s best architectural assets.

The inside of the building is a different story from the outside.  The quality of the construction as far as we can tell (from past Renner projects and tours of the BreakWater) should make the BreakWater a great place to live for years to come.  Renner has a history of delivering quality units that have historically had high resale prices.

From an urbanist’s perspective the development is pretty sound, it interacts with the street pretty well, and brings a substantial amount of residents into downtown Milwaukee.  Unfortunately it’s not a mixed-use development, but there are a substantial amount of commercial buildings in the area.  Another real positive is that it elevated the height of the neighborhood, which should help future developers build high-density buildings in the area.

If I was Peter Renner I would have issued a response to my customers in response to Bamberger that said “look at my track record.”  Nothing more was needed.

The project itself has approximately 292 households per acre which should only add to the Eastside’s already buzzing vibrancy. And although not affordable units per se the majority of the units in the building start in the 200′s allowing for a wider range of buyers to enter the market than many of the other developments in Milwaukee currently.

To follow this development I’ve started a flickr set, Park Lafayette that I will update with new pictures to keep track of the progress.

Articles
Condo towers win funds
The high-rise guy

City of Milwaukee Department of City Development Documentation
Detailed Planned Development:Renaissant’s Park Lafayette