Ithacating in Cornell Heights

1. Going to take advantage of this light week to go through some of the photo stash. I thought of doing a Poet’s Landing update, but because LeChase is mostly working on site clearing/prep and excavation at this point, and given the snow on the ground, it didn’t seem like there was a whole lot to be gained from making a unique update. But, rest assured, it’s still underway, there’s just not a whole lot to see at the moment. Once the snow melts off, the slab foundations work should be visible, and there might even be some framing going up by mid-winter. The six new apartment buildings and their 48 units should be ready by the fall of 2017.

2. 107 South Albany in the city is another one that doesn’t merit its own post just yet, but work should be taking place at some point soon. The building permits have been filed with the city for the 6-unit, 9-bedroom renovation and addition to the rear of the existing building, and from peering inside the existing windows, there’s the impression that interior demolition work could be underway – could explain the broken window on the second floor at least. There was no excavation work yet in the backyard, where the new wing will go. The Site Plan Review document says July 2016 to August 2017. Maybe there will be something to talk about by the next round of downtown updates.

3. Some folks might remember Phoenix Books, the hard-to-miss barn bookstore off of 366 as one approached Ithaca from Dryden. The store closed last year after 30 years of business, and the barn itself is about a century old. Now the property at 1608 Dryden Road is for sale. The barn, a small outbuilding, and 29.3 acres for $229,900. According to the Zillow posting, a sale is already pending.

4. From sales to sold. An industrial property in the Inlet Corridor of Ithaca town has exchanged hands. The property is at 142 Ithaca Beer Drive, next door to the growing brewery and restaurant. According to the listing with Pyramid Brokerage, the property consists of “Two commercial buildings totaling 6,812SF on 2.79 acres at south end and just off of Ithaca’s Elmira Road (NYS Route 13) commercial corridor. Ideal for combo of office (812SF) and industrial/warehouse (6,000SF) with lots of room to expand. All municipal services. Warehouse building has high ceilings, concrete floors, 2 overhead doors and more. Great opportunity for light industrial/manufacturing with array of flex space.”

The Iacovellis used it to house their construction equipment, and had it on the market for $409,000. It sold for just under that, a reasonable $400,000, to Greentree Garden Supply, which has operations a stone’s throw away from the property. Greentree makes their own soil products (potting soils, soil formula), so that may be a potential future use of the warehouse they just picked up. Good for them; they seem to be thriving as well as their garden plants.

5. Here’s a cool idea – the Lansing School District is planning to build an outdoor classroom as part of $4.95 million in renovations. Cassandra Negley has the full story at the Times. The renovations were approved by a landslide 240-32 vote, which was helped by the fact that the project will be funded with grants and money from the school district’s reserve (rainy day) fund – no additional cost will be assumed by the taxpayers. In advocating for the project, school district staff noted that it would provide for “multi-sensory experiences”, a useful asset during the instruction of natural and environmental science topics, and cited studies that showed students performed better academically when given the opportunity to have classes in outdoor spaces. The space would be used as covered play space during recesses.

6. Going off into hand-waving territory here. Enter at your own risk.

You might have heard in the news this week that New York State, even though it added 104,500 jobs over the past year, is estimated to have recorded a population loss of about 1,800 people. That’s not a good thing for a number of reasons, but it’s a more acute issue upstate. New York City issued building permits for 101,705 residential units from 2013-2015, with another 13,000-14,000 estimated this year, and the city, just the boroughs and not even counting the suburbs, makes up nearly all the population growth (375,272 through July 2015, vs. 367,179 as the total gain for the state from 2010- July 2016). Upstate continues to hemorrhage people to other states. Not a surprise to anyone who’s travelled outside of Ithaca, Saratoga or the few other bright spots. What can we expect for Ithaca in a bad piece of news for Upstate?

Here are some off-the-cuff tallies for population growth. Ithaca’s estimated to be 30,788 as of July 2015, up 774 since 2010. The estimates due out early next year cover July 1, 2015 to July 1, 2016.  What opened in that time frame?

By my count, Stone Quarry (82 beds), the Lofts at Six Mile Creek (66 beds), 804 East State (18 beds), 707 East Seneca (18 beds), 206 Taughannock (10 beds), the Lehigh Valley House condos (6 units, will assume county average 1.7 occupants per unit, for 10 residents), 116 Catherine Street (17 beds), and the 140 College Avenue (12 bed addition). Allow another half dozen or so units with a dozen beds total, for accessory apartments or new single-family homes. Only one of these projects replaced existing housing units – a one-bedroom bungalow came down for 804 East State. The gross gain is about 244 people, if we assume the standard of one person per bedroom or studio unit.

Now let’s do some subtractions. Hughes Hall closed on Cornell’s campus. -47 off the bat, for 197. Now, the math can’t easily accommodate those who had a household member move in/be born, or move out/pass on. But trends suggest a 2% decrease per decade, so we’ll treat it as negligible. So, my baseline prediction for the 2016 estimate is 30,981.

Just thinking offhand of the projects that have opened since July 1, 2016, expect at least 210 more for the July 1, 2017 estimate, and 670 in 2018, because that’s when Collegetown Terrace phase III (344 bedrooms), Novarr’s townhouses (net gain ~60 bedrooms), 210 Hancock (90 bedrooms) and Todd Fox’s latest trio (net gain ~110 bedrooms) are included in the figures. These drive-by numbers are based just on what’s underway, or approved and financed. The 2017, or more particularly the 2018 numbers could go up. So roughly, 30,981 in 2016, 31,191 in 2017, and 31,861 by July 1, 2018, assuming no major catastrophes and that the local economy’s growth and residential vacancy rate is consistent.

For the record, the purely mental figure I use for a 2020 census is 32,500. That would consider Harold’s Square (146 bedrooms), City Centre (250 bedrooms), the first phase of Chain Works (80+ bedrooms), as well as other proposals that may arise in the next year or two and open before April 1, 2020, the official census date. I do not factor in any new Cornell North Campus dorms in the estimate, since the new dorms will initially function as temporary replacements for existing space that will be concurrently closed and renovated.

Now, when thinking about the town of Ithaca, things get really weird because of Maplewood – a loss of 370-380 beds. The town doesn’t have any large multifamily underway – my partially-imputed count from permit reports gives about five newly-occupied duplex units and 20 or so homes for the July 2015 – June 2016 period, and the 10 Belle Sherman townhouses. That’s probably 100-120 beds total. The town of Ithaca will likely show a decrease in population in the 2016 census estimate because of the Maplewood closure, and it will be bad optics because there’s all this talk of affordable housing issues, and seeing a decline in population in the news will inspire a negative kneejerk reaction – either “if it’s going down do we really need housing”, or “hey, it’s going down, then why are the rents so damned high”. Have that talking point ready, Ithaca town board.

For the 2017 count/2018 release, the partially-educated guess is an increase of 150 given Brookdale, but the 872 new Maplewood residents won’t come into count until the 2018-19 estimation period, at which point we’re pretty much at the next census. I’m thinking around 21,500 for 2020 (from 19,930 in 2010), if the current trends continue and major housing projects are completed.