Bucks Vetting Bids For New Hotels

Rendering of the Deer District. Rendering by Eppstein Uhen Architects.

The real estate arm of the Milwaukee Bucks is vetting 14 different hotel proposals for land it controls around Fiserv Forum.

The team received the responses to a request for proposals (RFP) it issued for a site on W. Juneau Ave. between N. Vel R. Phillips Ave. and N. 5th St. and the former Bradley Center site reported the Milwaukee Business Journal.

The Bucks’ RFP requests a hotel from 175 to 200 rooms and another with 250 or more rooms. “We’re thrilled with the submissions,” Bucks president Peter Feigin told reporter Nick Williams.

The team previously selected Royal Capital Group to develop an apartment building alongside the new arena parking garage. That building will open this summer.

The team could break ground on the hotels after the Democratic National Convention. The sites are expected to be used for convention logistics before and during the July 2020 event.

The developments are part of a master plan that team prepared with Eppstein Uhen Architects for the approximately 11 acres of land it controls around the arena.

March 2019 Renderings

Original Plans

Foxconn Plans Building for Fii Division

Technology manufacturer Foxconn has issued a RFP for a Mount Pleasant building for its Foxconn Industrial Internet (Fii) subsidiary. The business unit, launched in 2015, focuses on automation and networking systems for manufacturing.

“That RFP includes no details on the project beyond its future location in the area south of Braun Road and east of Interstate 94 in Mount Pleasant,” wrote reporter Sean Ryan. A Mount Pleasant official told Ryan that no plans have been filed with the village.

Construction work on the foundation for a manufacturing facility is underway. The smaller-than-promised building comes as Foxconn has switched from a Generation 10.5 LCD manufacturing campus to what it says will be a smaller Generation 6 campus. Foxconn has promised other buildings on the site by the end of 2020.

Westown Moves to 310W

The Westown Association, a business improvement district for the west side of Downtown, has relocated to the recently renovated 310W office building. The organization is occupying a 2,930-square-foot rentable space at the top of the 14-story building. It was previously located at 633 W. Wisconsin Ave.

New York-based Time Equities Inc. acquired the 578,000-square-foot building at 310 W. Wisconsin Ave. in December 2017 for $19.5 million and set about formalizing a plan to reinvigorate the aging property. The purchase is part of a $30 million investment that includes new lighting, rehabbing 15 elevators and 52 bathrooms, rebuilding the 14-story atrium and creating a host of modern tenant amenities including a coworking space, fitness center and shared conference rooms.

For more about the building’s redevelopment, see our coverage from June.

Northridge Mall Owners Lose Appeal, Court Could Be Next

The fight over the future of Northridge Mall has been cleared to head to court, exactly where some officials predicted it might go when the city issued a raze order to the long-closed mall in April. The city’s Standards and Appeals Commission rejected mall owner U.S. Black Spruce Enterprise Group’s appeal of the order on Thursday, allowing the ownership group to file a suit in Milwaukee County Circuit Court.

“Black Spruce wants to be a team player with the city, it’s just disappointing the city doesn’t want to seem to participate in any sort of further discussions and they remain committed to tearing it down,” said the firm’s attorney Eric Hatchell following the hearing. “We’ll let the legal process play out, and we’ll continue from here.”

The China-based firm released redevelopment plans in May, but city officials have insisted those are the same plans the firm issued years ago. “I wasn’t surprised because I fully anticipated them to say they wanted to do something,” said Alderwoman Chantia Lewis in an interview. “However, we continue to see vandalism and their lack of investment.”

Plan Renderings

Northridge Mall Today

Milwaukee Pretzel Company Moving To Bigger Riverwest Facility

Milwaukee Pretzel Co., led by husband and wife team Matt and Katie Wessel, is moving to a bigger facility. The soft pretzel manufacturer will move to a 30,000-square-foot facility at 3745 N. Richards St.

The move represents a substantial upgrade from its current 7,000-square-foot space at 3950 N. Holton St. It plans to make the move in spring 2020.

“The idea with the move isn’t necessarily to grow any faster than we’re currently growing because our growth has been fairly rapid for us,” Matt Wessel told BizTimes. “It’s just to be able to accommodate that rate of growth for years and years to come.”

Wessel told Arthur Thomas that the company’s growth has come from word-of-mouth and targeted outreach efforts towards taprooms and restaurant chains “with a brewpub feel.”

833 East 90 Percent Leased

A little over three years after it opened, the 18-story, 358,000-square-foot office building at 833 E. Michigan St. is almost completely leased. Developed by Irgens Partners, the building recently landed staffing services company Insight Global as a tenant, as Ryan reported. The company is leasing 8,600 square feet and anchor tenant Godfrey & Kahn recently added 9,542 square feet to its lease.

Brokerage firm Colliers International told Ryan that negotiations are underway for two other leases totaling 10,000 square feet.

“We’re seeing a lot of activity on our Class A products, particularly Downtown, as clients continue to see a flight to quality,” said Collier’s Mike Wanezek.

Stay at Sybaris During the DNC

The Milwaukee Business Journal published a report Wednesday that available hotel rooms for the DNC were few and far between, including only one left at the romantically-themed Sybaris hotel. Milwaukee Record did a little digging and found that many more rooms, complete with pools, remain.

“So what’s going on here?” wrote Matt Wild on Thursday. “As part of our daily routine, we called the Mequon Sybaris for some answers. Turns out that, yes, just one room remains—if you only check the listings on Expedia.com. Dig deeper and/or make your reservation from Sybaris directly, and you’ll find at least one available room in each of the five different suite styles. For a three-night stay, prices range from $547 (Country Whirlpool) to $1,847 (Chalet Swimming Pool). Oh, and you can totally get those strawberries and a massage candle for $35!”

So if you want to stay in Mequon next summer, rooms are available.

Clarke Square Apartments Rise

A new apartment complex is rising along S. 24th St. in the city’s Clarke Square neighborhood.

The 40-unit complex, formed by two three-story buildings separated by Clarke Square Park, will include 10 units for young adults who turned 18 and are aging out of foster care. See the construction progress.

Plan Connects Third Ward to Downtown, Revitalizes Pompeii Square

A $3.9 million plan from the Department of City Development promises to create a better pedestrian connection between Downtown and the Historic Third Ward along N. Broadway as well as revitalize the oft-overlooked Pompeii Square memorial on N. Jackson St.

“If you walk that stretch right now, it’s pretty barren,” said DCD economic development specialist Dan Casanova at a hearing of the Redevelopment Authority of the City of Milwaukee (RACM) board Thursday.

A new plan from the DCD and J. Jeffers & Co. would leverage increased property tax revenue from the development of the Huron Building to add substantial streetscaping to N. Broadway and E. Clybourn St. and lighting under the elevated freeway at a cost of $3.8 million. An additional $100,000 would be allocated to Pompeii Square.

Read our pieces about the Broadway connection or Pompeii Square plans.

Ribbon Cutting Celebrates SEVEN04 Place, Developer Brandon Rule

Developer Brandon Rule was joined by friends, family and a long list of project partners as he celebrated the opening of his first project, SEVEN04 Place, on Friday morning. The four-story, 60-unit apartment building brings 51 new affordable apartments to Walker’s Point. Learn more.

South Wing of Humboldt Gardens Raised

The heavily damaged south wing of the former Humboldt Gardens Schlitz tavern at 2249 N. Humboldt Ave. was demolished Tuesday by the city.

The move was undertaken even though two developers are planning to redevelop the rest of the structure. The city demolished the 375-square-foot addition as part of securing the structure before the developers take ownership, assuming they secure financing for the project.

A large portion of the wing’s brick facade collapsed in a wind storm in 2010 and was never fully repaired.

Developers Todd Hutchison and Kyle Mack are working to convert the former brewery-tied house into three condominiums. Learn more.

Commission Approves Komatsu Design

Komatsu Mining secured design approval for its nearly 60-acre, $285 million South Harbor Campus proposal from the City Plan Commission on Monday afternoon.

The Tokyo-based industrial conglomerate hopes to relocate its mining division, best known for its P&H brand of mining shovels, from the suburb of West Milwaukee to the city site by 2022.

The commissioners okayed plans for a three-story, 176,000-square-foot office building, training center, museum and two-story automation lab as well as a 430,000-square-foot, three-story manufacturing facility. Both buildings would be built along E. Greenfield Ave. on a site near the Inner Harbor.

The commissioners also expressed concerns with certain design elements. Read on.

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