After today’s news, nationally 2010 might go down as the year of high-speed rail, but here in Milwaukee it just might be the year of the Park East. By looking at the economy and listening to all of the talk of doom and gloom one would think this isn’t very likely, but it sure seems that momentum is building in the Park East corridor.

Would Milwaukee be better off with the Park East Freeway spur intact? No. Has development been slow so far? Yes. Is that a problem? Only if you have a short-term perspective on the future of Milwaukee.

Regardless of what neighborhood it is, the development of new apartments is a growing trend in Milwaukee. Currently there are two prominent projects vying for City of Milwaukee financial support in one form or another, the Bookends and The Moderne. Outside of the two proposed towers there are numerous other projects at various stages around urban Milwaukee.

UrbanMilwaukee.com was recently taken behind the construction fence for a tour of the first building, ONE, to be complete in the Mandel Group’s The North End project. We toured only the residential units in the building, although there will street-level retail space completed in the coming months along Water Street.

Oconomowoc-based Pabst Farms, yet another development named after what the bulldozers destroy, is not limiting itself to simply encouraging commercial and residential sprawl anymore. In a move that I can only interpret as desperation (in the face of the growing trend of industrial firms relocating to the Menomonee Valley), Pabst Farms developers Developers Diversified Realty Corp of Cleveland is set to begin the construction on the first of three speculative industrial buildings.

Dick Lincoln from the Mandel Group presented resolution 071618 which is the job training program portion of The North End development that receives funding from TIF No. 48. He explained that it would be “a little bit different than traditional workforce development” in that in focuses more on mentoring and coaching of emerging businesses [...]

For most of the past year Mandel Group’s $185 million The North End development consisted of demolition and remediation. A historic winter, a fire, and significant environmental issues may have slowed progress at the site but signs of actual construction can now be seen. Along the Milwaukee River a portion of a new [...]

Building Rubble
Originally uploaded by compujeramey

The remains of the concrete from the Pfister & Vogel Tannery are being ground up over the next month. The resulting rubble will be reused and recycled to build the foundation for the North End development on the site.
To accomplish the task the Mandel Group has brought in a 13-foot tall, [...]

Park East Square sign
Originally uploaded by repowers

The first phase of the development of Park East Square appears ready to begin. On Friday, Milwaukee County announced that they had completed the sale (read: RSC & Associates LLC exercised their option to purchase) of a 2.1 acre parcel of land at the western edge of the Pick [...]

From time to time Urban Milwaukee will feature a collection of links we think are worth your time to read, but don’t merit us spending the time to fully summarize and insert our viewpoints yet.

"Neighbors fed up with vandals, lack of patrols" – A story of chaos and vandalism ensuing in a northwestern Milwaukee neighborhood [...]