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News Tidbits 8/20/16: Another Campus Coming?

20 08 2016

Fairly quiet week, but still a few things going on-

1. The Journal’s Nick Reynolds followed up on the pile-driving underway at the 210 Hancock site in Ithaca’s North Side neighborhood. Admittedly, no one wants to live next to a site while hearing and feeling the bang of the pile-driver against the piles being inserted into the ground. Thankfully, this phase of the affordable housing project should be wrapped up by the end of the month. Lecesse Construction’s subcontractor, Ferraro Piling and Shoring of rural Erie County, is inserting 10-15 piles per day between the hours of 8 AM and 4 PM, and about 170 piles will be used in the project. Not fun for the neighbors, but this too shall pass.

2. The town of Ithaca’s planning board had their close look at the Sleep Inn proposal for Elmira Road. They were not impressed. The primary complaints were that it was a one-sided design (meaning the front received significantly more cosmetic attention than the rear and sides), that it was big and that it was ugly.

The architect of the 70-room hotel, Joe Turnowchyk of HEX 9 Architects, responded with “all corporate hotels are basically ugly”, which isn’t the kind of response that will be well-received. It was followed with “[He thinks] that if they’re going to put more money into the front of the building, they shouldn’t need to address the rear”, which isn’t a good response either, because the rear faces the Black Diamond Trail.

Outsider looking in, one interpretation of the board’s commentary is that the stone and brick is fine, but they want less of a slab and more articulation – the recently-opened 64-room Best Western Plus in Cortlandville comes to mind. The massing is broken up, and architectural details and brickwork add visual interest, giving it aesthetic appeal even though the road is 40 or 45 MPH over there. The minutes note a comparison to an Arizona Sleep Inn to show what can be done with Choice Hotels brands. Anyway, the decision was tabled, with a revised design presentation planned for a September meeting.

3. New to the market this week – a duplex and five-unit mobile home park in Varna being marketed for “development potential”. The site is a one acre parcel at 10 Freese Road in Varna, touted as “perfect for townhouses or apartments”. Since the late 1980s, the “Wayside Mobile Home Park” has been the property of Ithaca attorney Ray Schlather, who was an ardent opponent of West End density and waterfront rezoning a few years back.

Zoning is Varna Hamlet Traditional District (VHTD), and it gets a little weird density-wise – per the guidelines, and being one acre, a developer could do four single-family homes, six townhouses, six condos, or three rental apartments, max 30% lot coverage. If LEED Certified, add 2 S-F homes, 2 townhouses, 1 condo, or 4 apartment units respectively. Lastly, there’s a redevelopment bonus, which honestly appears to be at the town’s discretion. If awarded, add another home, 2 townhouses, condo or 4 apartments. So in theory, max build-out for a green redevelopment is either 7 single-family houses, 10 townhouses, eight condos or eleven rental apartments on that acre of land. No idea what happens if they’re combos thereof.

Anyway, the property is being offered at $219,000, just a little over the $192,500 tax assessment.

4. So this is intriguing – the city of Ithaca Common Council will be taking a vote next Wednesday to take $150,000 from the $500,000 Capital Project fund to relocate and build a new Fire station #9, and fund two consolidation studies. One would consolidate the city hall, the Central Fire Station, Station No. 9, and Police HQ into a government campus at the site of the Central Fire Station at 310 West Green Street; the second is to study a centralized facility shared by water/sewer and streets/facilities. There’s a lot that need to be considered as part of the government campus study, which would likely involve buying neighboring properties, or building skyward. Also worth noting, the fire station parking lot is part of the Downtown West historic district. Anyway, look for a lot more discussion if the money is awarded and the study gets underway.

5. This week’s eye candy. Folks on Orchard Place asked for more detailed renders of the proposed two-family home at 123 Eddy Street, and here they are. Medium yellow Hardie board with white trim was the original plan. It appears that after the original drawing was submitted, the roof was realigned and one of the west-facing (front) second-floor windows was removed.

Note that this is just the planning board lot subdivision approval – although a single two-family home is typically too small to trigger planning board’s site plan review qualifications, the design still has to be approved by the ILPC and the Board of Zoning Appeals.

6. Case in point – If you live in Fall Creek, you might notice a new two-family house in the coming months. The Stavropoulos family, owners of the State Street Diner, just purchased the house for sale at 1001 North Aurora Street (above asking price, which is, for better or worse, quite common in Fall Creek) and plans to replace it with a duplex. Tompkins Trust gave them a $400,000 construction loan on the 18th. It’s a little different from the Stavropoulos’ typical M.O., which is to buy an existing house and do major renovations, as they did at 318-320 Pleasant Street and 514 Linn Street. This one looks like it will be a completely new build. No BZA, ILPC or Planning Board approval is required here, just staff level approval from the city.

7. Somewhat interesting Planning Board meeting next Tuesday. Here’s what in the bullpen:

1. Agenda Review 6:00
2. Privilege of the Floor 6:01
3. Subdivision Review 6:20

A. 123 & 125 Eddy St. (shown above)
Applicant: Nick Lambrou
Actions: Declaration of Lead Agency PUBLIC HEARING Determination of Environmental Significance Recommendation to BZA

4. Site Plan Review 6:40
A. Project: Mixed-Use Building (Harold’s Square)
Location: 123-139 E. State St. (The Commons)
Applicant: David Lubin for L Enterprises, LLC
Actions: Consideration of Project Changes

So I wrote about these changes for the Voice. The Planning Board resolution calls for modifications to the new design. The board mandates glass block for the elevator shaft on the north and lower west facades, restoration of the terra cotta cap and vertical bands on the Commons-facing facade, and restoring a deleted window from the East facade above the Sage Building. Could really used some updated renders right about now.

B. Project: Mixed-Use Building — Collegetown Crossing 6:55
Location: 307 College Ave.
Applicant: Scott Whitham for
Actions: Consideration of Project Changes (Landscape)

Project Description: Some slight tweaks here to the pedestrian walkway, mostly changes “simplifying and altering materials for the landscape”. The curvy benches are now straight, and the trees were eliminated in favor of shrubs because of concerns of branches extending onto the fire station’s property.

C. Project: Apartment Building 7:05
Location: 201 College Ave.
Applicant: Noah Demarest, STREAM Collaborative, for Visum Development Group
Actions: Consideration of Amended Negative Declaration of Environmental Significance, Request for Zoning Interpretation & Appeal Consideration of Final Site Plan Approval

Dunno what to say about this one at this point, since this is unfamiliar territory for everyone involved. We’ll see what happens.

D. SKETCH PLAN: 607 S. Aurora St. 7:35

The new project of the month is for 607 South Aurora Street on South Hill. It’s a single-family home on a 0.7 acre lot owned by Lou Cassaniti, the hot dog vendor on the Commons, but rumor mill says the applicant is Charlie O’Connor of Modern Living Rentals. Zoning is R-2a, which is detached single-family and duplex. Semi-educated guess, given lot size, zoning and rumored developer, the plans are small-scale infill, maybe subdividing the existing lot to build a duplex or two.

4. Zoning Appeals 7:50

5. Old/New Business 7:55

A. Chain Works District Redevelopment Project DGEIS: Special Planning Board Meeting, August 30, 2016, 6:00 p.m. to Review Comments/Responses
B. Maguire/Carpenter Business Park Temp. Mandatory Planned Unit Development (PUD): Public Information Session, Wednesday, August 31, 2016, 6:00 p.m., Common Council Chambers

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Tags: 210 hancock, affordable housing, collegetown, construction, east hill, harold's square, inhs, inlet valley, ithaca, news, sleep inn, south hill, varna
Categories : affordable housing, collegetown, construction, general housing, hotels, ithaca, news, student housing, Tompkins County

News Tidbits 8/13/16: The Forward Advance

13 08 2016

1. In the news, Neil Golder’s lawsuit against the planning board and the 201 College project was dismissed on technicality. The Tompkins County State Supreme Court decided that since the lawsuit was based on preliminary site plan approval and not final site plan approval, the project was subject to further changes and that it wasn’t appropriate for the court to hear this case at this time. So in other words, Neil will probably file his lawsuit again if/when final approval is granted, since changes between preliminary and final are unlikely to be significant. The scorched earth approach will likely continue.

It’s going to be a couple of weeks before that happens. In what the Times described as “an odd move”, the project is heading before the BZA for a zoning interpretation. Even the city’s planning department director, JoAnn Cornish, thinks it was a strange move on the board’s part, and one that kind of upends her department’s authority since they had looked at the facade length and decided it fit the zoning. More about the planning board’s (John Schroeder’s) odd decision and reasoning here.

2. Looks like there’s a twist in Tompkins County’s plans to redevelop the NYS DOT site on the Ithaca waterfront. The DOT is no longer looking at moving to Enterprise Drive in Dryden, even though they bought the land there in 2005. Now they’re looking at a site along Warren Road up by the airport. So close to the airport, in fact, they apparently needed the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to sign off on it. The FAA has agreed to a location and the DOT is working out a long-term property lease. The cost of moving is now estimated at $11-$12 million, slightly less than the $14 million estimated for the Dryden location in the Fisher Associates study, but estimates being as they are, it would be prudent to keep an eye on those projections.

3. The Dryden town planning board recently reviewed plans to convert the former Stevens Furniture at 2085 Dryden Road into an auction house specializing in books. The 10,000 SF would be renovated with no substantial exterior modifications. It’s a fairly small, unobtrusive plan, and by itself not much of a write-up.

However, this project is being proposed by Danby’s David Hall. The same David Hall who wanted to create the Summit Enterprise Center on Danby’s Gunderman Road, and led to all sorts of rancor among town residents and officials. His company, National Book Auctions, was to be one of the tenants of the business center. Danby’s planning board notes are online up to June only, so the question is, is the Danby plan still moving forward and this is a case of filling a pressing need, or is the Summit project done and out?

4. For this week’s eye candy, here’s the first image of the two-family home that Collegetown landlord Nick Lambrou wants to build at 123 Eddy Street. Jagat Sharma is the architect. The land is currently a double lot with 125 Eddy, and at present it’s part of the lawn. A planned subdivision would create a building lot on which Lambrou could put up the home. As part of the East Hill Historic District, the design has to pass ILPC muster, and at a glance, the projecting window bays (not sure they meet the definition of bay windows?), porch and comparably-pitched roof should help.

Note the lack of a garage. The street is up to 13 feet below the houses on that block, and there are no off-street parking spaces planned for either of the 3-bedroom units. The BZA would have to grant a zoning variance for a deficiency of two spaces.

5. Tiny Timbers and the Evergreen Townhouses were both up for review by the town of Dryden’s Planning Board. Tiny Timbers once again had only a few minor quibbles among board members, who voted to approve the sketch plan and send it to the Dryden ZBA. The Evergreen Townhouses had much more resistance, but the PUD concept was approved with some stipulations on fleshing out the project further before it may continue in the process. In Dryden, the town board gives final approval to project proposals, so both of these are moving along, but not fully approved just yet. In the meanwhile, Tiny Timbers is finishing construction on prototype #2.

6. Someone’s had a busy week. On Wednesday, a Rochester-based LLC picked up the Chateau Claire Apartments, a ca. 1960 64-unit apartment complex in the village of Lansing, for $5.3 million. The same day, a second Rochester-based LLC picked up the adjacent 37,400 SF shopping center for $1.3 million. The properties are collectively assessed at just under $6 million, so the purchase price seems pretty reasonable for a decent if not especially desirable stretch of property.

With a little digging, it turns out under the LLCs, the sellers were the same for both, and the buyers the same for both. The sellers were the Goldberg family who owned Bishop’s of Ithaca, a home improvement store. After enjoying success with growing Bishop’s into a small chain, Stan Goldberg turned to development and was a major local developer from the ’60s through the early ’90s. He sold Bishops to his employees in 2003, and passed away last year. The buyer was Park Grove Realty, a startup real estate firm out of Rochester staffed by former Conifer LLC employees and making waves for proposing a 140-unit apartment complex on Bomax Drive two miles away. A little piece of old Ithaca fades, and a newcomer makes their first foray into the region.

Park Grove has taken out a $1.14 million construction loan to renovate the Chateau Claire units – kitchen and bathroom remodeling, washer-and-dryer installations, roof repair, new balconies, gutters, landscaping and lighting.

7. And the other big sale(s) of the week, also from Wednesday – Ithaca Downtown Associates LLC, the Patel family, finally purchased the properties for the 131-room Hilton Canopy hotel project. $1.8 million to the IURA for the parking lots at 320-324 East State Street, and $2.05 million to local landlord Joe Daley for the parking lots on the former Strand property at 310-312 East State Street. This marks a big step in moving the 77,800 SF, $20+ million project forward.

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Tags: 201 college, canopy hilton, collegetown, construction (planned) news, downtown ithaca, ithaca, lansing, NYS DOT site, tiny timbers, varna, waterfront
Categories : collegetown, construction (planned), hotels, ithaca, news, student housing, Tompkins County

News Tidbits 8/6/16: Big Ideas and Small Additions

6 08 2016

1. Some of you might remember that Chemung Canal Trust Company was embroiled in a legal battle with Ithaca Renting (Jason Fane) over the terms of their lease of 12,000 SF on the first floor of Bank Tower on the Commons. Welp, the courts have issued their decision, and it looks like Chemung Canal lost. The Elmira-based bank had to revise their quarterly earnings report after losing the dispute with their former landlord. The terms of the payout have yet to be determined, but Fane was seeking $4 million, which is in the same ballpark as the cost of Fane’s renovation of the top floors into 32 apartments. CCTC is still looking into an appeal.

2. It hasn’t been a secret that the price of real estate in Collegetown is getting enormously expensive. First John Novarr dropped $5.3 million on 215 College Avenue. Then Todd Fox forked over $2.65 million in June for 201 College Avenue. Now it’s Novarr’s turn again, handing over $4.75 million on the 2nd for 119, 121 and 125 College Avenue (or more specifically, an LLC filed to an address used by Novarr for his many LLCs). The three houses are collectively worth about $1.655 million, per the county assessor. Here’s a tip for readers – if you’re looking at a built property that’s recently sold, if it was purchased for more than double the existing tax assessment, the property was most likely sold based on its development potential. Less than that but still well above assessment, and it’s more likely major renovations/gentrification/Fall Creek/not being torn down.

Anyway, we already have an idea what’s planned – Novarr wants to do 50-60 units of faculty townhouses on the site, a 3-4 story, $10 million project.

3. The other big sale this week (using that term subjectively, since someone just paid $1.25 million for a Cayuga Heights mansion) was 1015 Dryden Road out in Varna. Modern Living Rentals (Todd Fox/Charlie O’Connor) has had this 5-unit rental property on the market for a little while now, initially for $650,000, then $599,000. The buyer “Finger Lakes Wrestling Club Inc.”, agreed to purchase the property on August 2nd for $555,000. MLR purchased the property for $425,000 in 2014. The wrestling club is listed as a non-profit serving youth training and competing in wrestling, and their plans for the property are unknown – the sale comes with plans for a pair of duplexes (4 units total), and the triplex designed by STREAM Collaborative shown above. I’ve heard of non-profits renting out real estate assets to fund their endeavors, so maybe that’s the plan.

109_dearborn

109_dearborn_v2

4. A pair of housing newsbits. Per the ILPC, the former Paleontological Research Institute at 109 Dearborn is ready for its next phase of renovation into a rather swanky two-family residence. Background on the property from last August here. Long story short, it’s a gut renovation of a non-contributing structure of a historic district, the commission didn’t have much to say when it presented last year. This time around, the applicant wants to trade out the lower-level shingles for stucco, and the west entrance bump-out has been eliminated; anecdotal evidence says the ILPC won’t be excited, but it’s probably acceptable, since non-contributing buildings generally have an easier go with the commission.

A little further south on East Hill, local landlord Nick Lambrou wants to subdivide the large lot of 125 Eddy Street in order to build a new two-family residence. Jagat Sharma is the architect-of-record for the proposed 123 Eddy Street, which is a part of the East Hill Historic District and would have to go through ILPC approval. It will also need to pay a visit to the BZA because it’s proposed without parking (although the CPOZ was removed last year, an East Hill property still requires a parking space every 3 bedrooms) and will need a variance. Offhand, the Planning Board likely won’t be roped in on this one, since one-and-two family homes usually only need to be approved by planning department staff. Lambrou and Sharma are frequent contributors, and have faced the ILPC together before, for the reconstruction of 202 Eddy Street after it was destroyed by a fire in early 2014. The focus right now is just getting the subdivision approved, the ILPC presentation and vote will come at a later date.

5. STREAM Collaborative sent out their bi-annual newsletter, and there are a couple of interesting pieces worth re-sharing. There were brief items about the “Urban Cottage” at 228 West Spencer, Tiny Timbers and 409 College Avenue, as well as some info about 215-221 West Spencer. STREAM writes that Ed Cope has broken ground on the STREAM-designed 12-unit, 26-bedroom condominium complex. This must have been fairly recent, as the hillside was undisturbed during a site check a couple weeks ago. Anecdotally, a condo project in Ithaca needs 50% pre-sales (i.e. 6 units) in order to secure a construction loan, but there isn’t any loan on file with the county yet, so I can’t say with any certainty what the funding arrangement looks like. On the fully revamped webpage are some nifty interior renders, including the image above. Anyone interested in the 1-3 bedroom condos can contact Ed Cope at PPM’s website here.

Also in the newsletter was an image from the latest set of Form Ithaca charrettes. “Buttermilk Village”, a working title for the South Hill neighborhood plan. The render above is looking northeast from the intersection of 96B and East King Road, with Ithaca College’s Circle Apartments to the upper left. Among the design features are a walkable town square, 2-4 story buildings, complete streets, and mixed uses with less dense residential further from the main roads. Some of the businesses like Sam Peter and Dolce Delight are in there to give that sense of familiarity. Most of this land is owned by Evan Monkemeyer, who’s still fuming from the College Crossings debacle. But rumor has it he’s working with another developer on a plan. It would be quite a feather in Form Ithaca’s cap if it looked something like this.

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Tags: collegetown, construction (planned), cornell heights, downtown ithaca, form ithaca, general housing, ithaca, jason fane, south hill
Categories : construction (planned), general housing, ithaca, news, student housing, urban planning

News Tidbits 7/30/16: The Unfortunate Surprise

30 07 2016

1. Pretty much everyone was caught off guard by the planning board’s decision to send 201 College Avenue to the Board of Zoning Appeals on a previously-undiscussed zoning technicality. The issue has to deal with facade height in connection to the length of a continuous wall – the argument being pushed by board member John Schroeder is that, since there are primary walls on College Avenue and Bool Street, the H-shaped proposal isn’t technically valid and the deep indentation actually has to be two separate buildings, one slightly shorter than the other since the site is on a slope. This was the subject of a prolonged and heated debate, since the code’s pretty ambiguous in that regard, and (as shown below) the design elements shown in the form district booklet demonstrate buildings with architectural indents/setbacks.

If recollection serves correctly, something similar came up in a previous discussion two years ago with 327 Eddy Street. The project fills the entirety of a sloped lot, but there was a hazy interpretation regarding one’s definition of floors and height where one could have called it 8 floors, so it had to be clarified and it became the average proposed height for cases with a sloped parcel. In this instance, there was one primary wall, on Eddy Street, which is why there’s just enough wiggle room left that a clarification request, however targeted it may be, is legally valid. The board agreed 4-3 to let the BZA issue a determination on 201 College, which could come anywhere from August 23rd to September 6th. That means a late September approval is maybe the best bet. That’s probably too late for an August 2017 opening, so whether or not the project would move forward (which could be immediately or in summer 2017 for a 2018 opening) if given approval is another question.

There is one other thing that is worrying from an impartiality standpoint. John Schroeder and Neil Golder served together as Collegetown’s Common Council reps in the 1990s. Although Schroeder’s not the biggest fan of Collegetown development, he hasn’t raised this much of a concern over other projects, and Neil has been very, very active in his outreach. There could be an argument that he should have recused himself from the decision-making process, or at least have formally acknowledged his longstanding professional relationship with the project’s primary opponent.

2. Also from the Planning Board meeting, further discussion of the Trebloc project. Those following the IJ’s Nick Reynolds’ Twitter know that there was some talk about big changes with a lot of wonk talk, and this is what it has to do with. My thanks to my colleague Mike Smith for his notes.

Basically, Newman Development is floating a few different approaches to the site layout. One calls for a plaza area on State Street (the “accordion” approach”), one calls for green space (the “courtyard” approach), and the third actually breaks it up into two separate buildings. In these theoretical layouts, the square footage and number of units is kept roughly equal. All three also keep at least some emphasis on the corner facing the Commons, because that’s where the concentration of activity is, and that’s what’s going to appeal the most to first-floor retail/commercial tenants.

Each approach comes with pros and cons. The “accordion” approach opens up the sidewalk, but it opens away from the Commons (i.e. not appealing to pedestrians or retailers) and makes unit design tricky. The “courtyard” approach has public-ish green space, but it would be in unappealing, constant shadow – even if the building were just a few floors, the low angle of the sun in the cooler part of the year would keep light from reaching the courtyard. The two building approach offers an alley that could be interesting, but would likely not see much use since there’s very little activity towards that block of Green Street. Given the flaws in each, the inclination is to stay with the current “fish hook” shape, but the developers wanted to hear the planning board’s thought before committing to a layout.

Planning Board responses ran the gamut. A few members supported the State courtyard option, or stepping back the portion on State Street but building taller portions on Green if there’s a need to compensate (zoning’s 120 feet, so there’s perhaps two floors they could feasibly do that with, like an 11-story/9-story/7-story step down, without having to make a trip to the BZA and throwing additional, funding-jeopardizing uncertainty in there). One board member asked about a courtyard on the roof. The project will be pursuing tax abatements, with the hope that with those, density and smaller units, they can appeal to the middle of the rental market.

3. Thanks to Dan Veaner over at the Lansing Star, here’s a render and a site plan for the proposed Lansing Apartments / Parkgrove Apartments project for Bomax Drive in the village. The 19.46-acre property is currently owned by Cornell and is zoned to be part of its office/tech park. James Fahy Design Associates of Rochester is doing the design for the proposed 14-building, 140 unit project, and Park Grove LLC of Rochester is the developer, in tandem with retired Cornell Real Estate director and Lansing resident Tom Livigne.

According to the Star, “1,000 square foot one-bedroom apartments are anticipated to rent in the $1,300 to $1,400 range, 1,350 to 1,400 square foot two-bedroom apartments at around $1,600 to $1,700, and three-bedroom apartments up to 1,400 square feet would rent between $1,800 and $1,900.” The village of Lansing has to approve a zoning change from business to high-density residential in order for the project to move forward.

It’s a very auto-centric, premium-middle market project. For an area concerned about affordability and trying to move towards walkability and traditional neighborhoods, this really doesn’t seem like the most appropriate plan. It’s nothing against Livigne and Park Grove LLC, but I’m very critical of these kind of projects for just those reasons.

4. It’s been a while since it’s last been discussed, but the 31-unit Amabel Project by New Earth Living’s Sue Cosentini has been approved by the state attorney general to start marketing units. According to a December presentation, the net-zero homes will range from 1600-2100 SF and market in the $385,000-$425,000 range. While that is a rather high price range, some of that cost would be paid off via energy savings, which could be up to a few thousand dollars per year compared to comparably-sized and priced older homes on the market, and other possible savings exist with water recycling and low-maintenance exterior materials. So the sales pitch becomes something of acknowledging the high up-front costs, but explaining the long-term savings.

5. The first of two state funding grants to not this week. Cayuga Addiction Recovery Services (CARS) has received a $1 million grant for a new 25-bed adult residential facility. The new facility will be built on the Trumansburg campus, which if these notes are correct, is actually two facilities, and this new one will be built adjacent to a 60-bed facility on Mecklenburg Road, near the county line a couple miles to the southwest of Trumansburg. An undisclosed number of jobs are expected to be created.

Founded in a Cornell U. fraternity house in 1972, CARS provides treatment, counseling, skills training and support services to help clients overcome addictions and rebuild lives. The current facility was opened in 2004.

Image Courtesy of Lansing Star

6. Also in state grants, Ithaca-Tompkins Regional Airport received $619,935 to build a flight academy building for the East Hill Flying Club. The new facility is expected to be built in the next 2 to 3 years. When the EHFC has moved in to their new digs, the existing hangar will be offered up to rent to other tenants. The new building will offer more instructional space, the ability to engage in training for twin-engine aircraft, and what the flying academy née club hopes will include state-of-the-art flying simulators.

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Tags: 201 college, 201 college avenue, airport, amabel, City Centre, collegetown, downtown ithaca, general housing, ithaca, lansing, news, student housing, suburbia, trumansburg
Categories : collegetown, construction (planned), general housing, ithaca, news, student housing, Tompkins County

Collegetown Terrace Construction Update, 7/2016

19 07 2016

Things are moving along steadily at the Collegetown Terrace site off East State Street. Building 7 snakes it way through the site, with work progressing from west to east. Furthest east, the concrete for the parking area is still being poured and cured.

A little further west towards the middle, the enclosed and finished parking area gives way to steel interior stud walls and unsheathed plywood, with only the lower floors in the middle section, but the steel stud walls and plywood have been built to the full height of the building (fully framed up) in the westernmost part.

The frame of a new skybridge has been installed between buildings 5 and 7, connecting near the elevator shaft/stairwell. Some Paradigm windows have already been fitted into the exterior. Eventually, the exterior will be sheathed, and then the exterior facade materials can be applied. It would honestly not be a surprise if the whole building is fully framed before the first snow flies.

Welliver‘s the general contractor for Novarr-Mackesey’s 247-unit project.

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Tags: collegetown, collegetown terrace, construction, construction (planned), ithaca, photos, student housing
Categories : collegetown, construction, construction (planned), ithaca, photos, student housing

205 Dryden (Dryden South) Construction Update, 7/2016

11 07 2016

There were a lot more photos that did not make it into today’s Ithaca Voice piece. Developer and former Kraftee’s proprietor Patrick Kraft was kind enough to give a tour of the building as it goes through the furious final stretch of construction. On the outside, the decorative crown has been built out, and the housewrap and gypsum board will eventually be face with tan brick. On the inside, the lower the floor one is on, the further along the work is; a few brief descriptions are interspersed in the photos below.

Also, here’s some material from the interview with Kraft that didn’t make the final cut for the article. Definitely worth a read though.

Q: Are you concerned or excited about the Breazzano Center?

PK: Construction-wise, their impact is limited, they do their thing, we do ours. These [contractor] guys work together all the time. It hasn’t been much of a problem, our working relationship is pretty good. And Jagat [Sharma], he’s done a tremendous job, he’s a good guy. Jagat suggested doing a concrete building, and it turned out really well for us. These units are being furnished by Sam Peter, they met with Jagat, everything will match and be coordinated, even the lobby. Rich woods, the color scheme, stainless steel appliances, Most of the landlords around here are good guys, if I have a question they make time.

Q: During the 201 College debate, we saw a number of older residents express concerns about too much density in Collegetown, and too many students. Are the recent developments good or bad? What would you say to assuage the concerns of residents in Belle Sherman?

PK: I think there are a lot of positives to density, it centralizes the college students, and if you can do that, you get them out of the periphery, and higher density in the core could help get students out of Outer Collegetown and return homes to families and non-students. I have a friend who works at the Johnson, who lives just a block from Eddy Street. incoming faculty want walkability. People would have been incredulous ten years ago, but you know, people want to leave their car at home sometimes. I think that’s a good thing.

Q: With this new apartment building, have there been any issues or challenges? Or has everything been fairly smooth sailing?

PK: We’ve had our hiccups. The city does its inspections and has its variances, it’s not like we’re building a McDonald’s where every store looks alike. We haven’t had any major problems, just scheduling can be a major problem at times. I had to pay NYSEG to move the power lines, that was a 10-week delay.

According to Kraft, it was Jagat Sharma who insisted on reinforced concrete construction. This allowed the construction team to be flexible; handy for the structural tweaks (additional reinforcing) here in the light well, below the rough window openings. Kraft had nothing but praise for Sharma, even going as far as to say he gets an unfair rep because many of his buildings use CMU block in their exterior finish.

Most of the sheetrock has been hung in the second floor units. Kraft also had a lot of compliments for LeChase, the general contractor. He noted occasional problems like a bad concrete pour (which LeChase redid at their own expense), but otherwise they’ve been doing good work and have adhered to the schedule quite well.

Originally, there were small light shafts in the east face, but those were removed when the Breazzano Center was being finalized next door. The two buildings will stand just two inches apart.

Sixth floor, rear unit view – Kraft said it was favorite view.

Doing work in the elevator shaft

Steel interior stud walls on the sixth floor

Framed closet spaces on the fourth floor

A tub fitting on the third floor

The brickwork on the backside is a little further along than the front, but the general appearances will be the same.

Members of the construction crew in the first-floor commercial space.

The basement area, which will have a trash/recycling room, a tenant gym and storage.

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Tags: collegetown, construction, dryden south, ithaca, photos, student housing
Categories : collegetown, construction, ithaca, news, student housing

News Tidbits 7/2/16: Not the (City Centre) of Attention

2 07 2016

1. Let’s start this off with the big news of the week – the proposal for 201 College Avenue was approved by the Planning Board. The debate was spirited, to put it most politely; catty, to use the official write-up in the Voice; and in the follow-up phone call I had with my editor, who attended the meeting with a Voice summer intern, she described it by saying “both sides were pretty awful”. I am sympathetic to Neil’s predicament, although I think it’s also a fairly unique case; I hope some sort of arrangement with the solar panels is worked out.

The observations regarding age and view of the project is actually pretty similar to a conversation the Journal’s Nick Reynolds and I had on Twitter about the City Centre project – older Ithacans often have starkly different views on density and urban development than younger residents, who tend to be more pro-density and pro-urban infill/growth. The young aren’t naive and more so than the old are obsolete; but they are products of different times. Today’s older Ithacans are the same ones who were frowned upon by the old Ithacans of their youth (the Silent Generation and the Greatest Generation), who were much more politically conservative and made up the large majority of the city’s Republicans from when Ithaca was once a contested city, and the Boomers were moving in and tilting it leftward. A sociologist could probably make a good research paper studying Ithaca’s generational views of urban environments.

Anyway, construction on this project is supposed to start in short order; funding has already been secured, and Binghamton-based W. H. Lane Inc. will be the general contractor for the $6 million project.

2. Meanwhile, City Centre’s sketch plan was also reviewed at the Planning Board meeting. The initial reaction seems muted, gauging from Nick Reynolds’ Twitter and the lack of comment from my Voice colleagues.

According to the sketch plan submission, the vast majority of units (240 of the 255) will be studios (120) ranging from 457-563 SF, and one-bedrooms (120) ranging from 580-754 SF. The other 15 will be two-bedroom units, eight 914 SF units and seven 1,370 SF units. All units are market-rate, with target demographics including young professionals and downsizing empty nesters. Students are allowed, though the units won’t be marketed to them. Ground floor retail will be 10,700 SF at the corner of State and Aurora. 7,220 SF fronting State Street will be “Leasing/Club Space” for building and tenant functions. The 71-space parking garage will be accessed via East Green Street, car share membership will be included in the rent, and there will be indoor bike racks.

With the mild initial reaction noted, we’ll see how the project details shape up as the summer progresses, and the board potentially launches formal project review (Declaration of Lead Agency) as soon as late July.

3. Hitting the market this week is a potential opportunity for the deep-pocketed investor/developer. The property is 2248 North Triphammer Road in the village of Lansing. The sale consists of two parcels totaling 3.42 acres – a 1.53 acre parcel with a 2,728 SF M&T Bank branch built in 1992 and holding a long-term triple-net (NNN) lease; the other, an undeveloped 1.89 acre parcel to the rear that the listing notes could be developed out into 13 housing units. The price for the pair is $2,125,000.

A triple-net lease means the tenant pays everything – insurance, maintenance and real estate taxes (formally, net insurance, net maitenance and net real estate taxes on the leased asset – the three nets). Because of this, the rent is substantially lower than it otherwise might be. There are certain cases where a landowner might want to do triple-net – like when they’re a tax-exempt entity leasing out to a for-profit company. A quick check of the records shows the properties are owned by Cornell, and were acquired in 1953 and 1960. What the property has been to Cornell is a fairly safe investment (though with a lot of fine print to determine who pays for things like if a tornado hits or the foundation cracks), generating a modest amount of rent and functioning like an inflation-protected bond, but guaranteed by the lessee rather than the government. All the better when the tenant is stable and signed on for the long-term, as is the case here.

The county has the bank parcel assessed at $635,000, the undeveloped parcel at $140,000. Lansing village zoning has Commercial High Traffic for the bank property, and High Density Residential for the vacant parcel. HDR zoning requires 6,000 SF of land per dwelling unit in a 35′ tall multi-unit building, and 1.89 acres = 82,215 SF, so that’s where the 13 units comes from. For comparison’s sake, single family is 12,000 SF, and duplexes 15,000 SF (or, doing the math, one could in theory carve out six home lots, or 5 duplex lots for 10 units, though with lot setbacks, the property’s triangular shape probably lowers those figures).

4. On the other end of the sales process, the former Maine’s supermarket has been sold. The six year-old, 26,146 SF building at 100 Commercial Avenue in the city of Ithaca was purchased for $4,150,000 on Thursday the 30th, by Illinois-based Agracel Inc., well above its $3.1 million assessment. Agracel is an industrial space and warehouse developer, fitting for a property once described as a “food and party warehouse”. The former Maine’s appears to be a little on the small side compared to the rest of their portfolio, but there is the possibility of expansion, or even a teardown and rebuild if they really felt the need.

Readers may recall that Maine’s closed its Ithaca store in February, which along with a closing in suburban Rochester reduced its stores from six to four.

5. Work on the new Storage Squad facility has begun on the 1400 Block of Dryden Road east of Varna. Right now, the focus is on site clearing; the house was used by local fire departments for training exercises, and will come down in a controlled burn later this summer. The 79,000 SF storage facility should be ready for use by February 2017. One full time and a few part-time jobs will be created.

And for the record, I think that’s my middle finger.

6. So this is curious. The city recently uploaded a couple of older documents detailing development plans off of Floral Avenue on the southern tip of Ithaca’s West Hill neighborhood.

The first dates from Febraury 1992, and is a filing to create a 27-lot cluster subdivision on 4.15 acres at 452 Floral Avenue. The paperwork indicates that the intent was affordable housing, by a company named House Craft Builders. The city’s then-Planning Director, H. Matthys Van Cort, wrote a recommendation for negative declaration of environmental significance, and the project was approved in June 1992, but it never moved forward, and 452 remains vacant land today. It appears House Craft was dissolved in 2012; the officer was an architect for Ecovillage who has since retired and moved out of state.

The second is a subdivision requested by INHS in 1987. The filing requested 236 Floral Road be split into two parcels, with the intent of renovating a decrepit 236 into a for-sale affordable single-family home, and build a new house on 224. This was approved, and eventually, 236 was renovated and transferred to its owner in 1996, and 224 was built in 1994.

Now, as interesting as this all is, the city doesn’t upload decades-old subdivision files just to amuse nerds. The $64,000 question is, why were they uploaded now?

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Tags: 201 college, 201 college avenue, affordable housing, City Centre, collegetown, Cornell, downtown ithaca, dryden, general housing, industrial, lansing, student housing, suburbia, warehouse, west hill
Categories : affordable housing, collegetown, construction (planned), Cornell, general housing, ithaca, news, student housing, Tompkins County

News tidbits 6/26/16: The Odd Time Out

26 06 2016

1. In what was ostensibly the biggest news of the week, Newman Development Group (NDG) of Vestal announced plans for the Trebloc site in downtown Ithaca. “City Centre” includes nine floors total, with roughly 250 apartments from studios to 2-bedrooms, about 10,000 SF (square feet) of retail space, 3,200 SF of amenities like a business center, and an underground garage of 70 spaces (the site is zoned CBD-120, which has no parking requirement). Readers might recall that Texas-based student housing developer Campus Advantage had proposed the State Street Triangle project, but their purchase option was not renewed by the owner of Trebloc.

Looking at their portfolio, Ithaca is NDG’s odd market out – most of their projects involve suburban retail centers and chain hotels, with shopping plazas from coast to coast. A smaller division, NDG Student Living, focuses on acquiring and building student housing, with their most recent projects in Binghamton and Oneonta. Ithaca seems to be the only metro where they’ve built general housing; earlier this decade, they worked with local businessman Bryan Warren on the Seneca Way mixed-use project on the east end of downtown.

The gut reaction to Newman as a developer is that, although they’re not very accustomed to urban mixed-use, there is one market where they do know what they’re doing, and that would be Ithaca’s.

Let’s just start right off the bat with one big difference between NDG and CA – the way the news was broken. CA was caught off-guard when the Journal’s David Hill broke the news of a 120-foot building a few days before the Planning Board meeting. NDG, working with local consultant Scott Whitham, emailed the same press release to each of the three major news organizations in Ithaca, which gave them the upper hand on the way information was delivered. The Times ran their copy first with almost no additional details, the Voice came a little later in the afternoon with more details such as unit total and retail space, and the Journal’s version came in the evening with even more details, such as the 70-space underground garage, and plans for the project to pursue CIITAP, the city’s property tax abatement program.

We’ll see what happens next week. The garage, not removing the turn lane, the general housing focus as opposed to students, and an initial design by Humphreys and Partners Architects that doesn’t repulse people are all cards that NDG holds that CA didn’t. But, there will still be sizable opposition. Playing your cards correctly is just as important to a winning hand as having them.

2. It looks like Gimme! Coffee is percolating something new out in Trumansburg. Through an LLC, the local coffee chain picked up 25-27 West Main Street for $350,000 on the 20th. The building is the former Independent Order of Odd Fellows Temple, a fraternal organization which established a chapter in Trumansburg in 1839, with ties to an older fraternal organization going further back to 1818. The 19th century temple is now about 1,700 SF of retail space, and 3 apartments totaling 3,300 SF on the upper floors; recent tenants have included Life’s So Sweet Chocolates and a barber shop.

Ithaca also had a location, first in downtown, and then on West Hill from the late 1920s. The older location was demolished to build the county library in the 1960s, while the West Hill location is a mix of uses today, one of which is the Museum of the Earth.

Gimme! has had a 1,200 SF shop at nearby 7 East Main Street since 2002, but they rent the space from Interlaken businessman Ben Guthrie. Logical guess here would be, they like Trumansburg, they wanted to buy a space and stay near where they are now, this opportunity came up down the street and they went for it. The sale price on 25-27 W Main is a substantial climb from the $288,000 it sold for in June 2010; I guess they call Trumansburg “little Ithaca” for a reason.

3. So, documents filed with the 201 College project this week were quite intriguing. First off, no action was taken at the zoning board meeting, but the developer of 201 College modified the project so that it no longer needs the setback variance or the entryways design variance. The planters were shrunk down in order to keep the sidewalk 12′ wide as requested by the Planning Board. Some additional 3-D drawings were also sent along, and site elevations and utilities plan here.

One of the images sent along was a “future context” file of potential nearby projects in the next couple of years. This document likely stems from the Planning Board debate of just what is likely to get developed in the vicinity over the next 5 years or so. There are four massings, merely following what zoning allows.

302-306 College Avenue – “Avenue 302”, by the Avramis family. Two buildings, one of six floors, one four, possibly in the 2017-2019 timeframe. Nothing formal has been discussed since the 2014 sketch plan, but the houses currently there are leased through May 2017.

215 College Avenue – A Novarr project. All that is publicly known at this stage is that Novarr wants to start construction in Summer 2017. Zoning allows 5 floors.

202 College Avenue – 202, 204, 206 and 210 College Avenue are all Novarr properties (there is no 208), as is the adjacent 118 Cook Street, which is not included in the massing outline. The College Avenue parcels allow 5 floors, 118 Cook 4. There hasn’t been any news with these properties lately.

119-125 College Avenue – three houses (there is no 123) owned by an Endicott-based landlord. I had to put out some inquiries on these houses, and there may be a sale in the works, although nothing’s on file with the county yet. These are CR-4, allowing 4 floors, but they could be tough to redevelop because these houses are seen as potentially historic resources.

Anyway, a vote on the project’s approvals is set for Tuesday. Neil Golder has created a group called “Save the Soul of Collegetown” to stage a rally in front of city hall that evening and try and halt the plans, but the last I checked on Facebook, three of the five people going were reporters.

4. Going more into briefs now, the Amici House funding plan for building a housing facility for 23 at-risk youth, and a second structure for five head-start classrooms and 42 students, was approved by the county this week. Once the sale is finalized, expect the official plans to be presented to city officials not long thereafter. Once those are approved, additional grant applications can be filed and hopefully, construction will be completed no later than 2018. According to the county’s press release, the Amici plan will create about 25 living wage jobs.

5. Starting on the 27th, Gannett Health Services will begin to transition over to the new addition, while work begins on renovating the older wings of Cornell’s healthcare facility. This marks the rough completion of phase one, and the halfway point for the $55 million project. The Gannett webpage says the whole facility will be known as “Cornell Health” upon completion.

6. Back in November, Ithaca’s second ward saw a competitive election between candidates Ducson Nguyen and Sean Gannon. One of the big differences between the two was on development – Nguyen advocated for urban development in downtown, and Gannon thought there was too much building going on and it needed to be slowed down. Nguyen won by a hefty margin on election night.

A building loan agreement was inked next week to build a new duplex (two-unit semi-detached house) behind an existing property at 512-514 West Green Street. $330,000, Ithaca’s Carina Construction will be the contractor (expect a Simplex modular duplex). The property is bisected by zoning, with the rear falling into the State Street development corridor, so no parking is required for the new rear duplex. At a glance, it looks like a winning plan – it will be modest-sized, it’s in a walkable area, and it supplies much-needed housing. The Ciaschi family is developing the units.

The property also happens to be next door to Mr. Gannon. I’m sure he will be all kinds of amused.

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Tags: 201 college, 201 college avenue, 215 college avenue, 302-306 college avenue, amici house, City Centre, collegetown, Cornell, downtown ithaca, gannett, gannett health center, ithaca, Southside, tompkins county, trumansburg
Categories : affordable housing, collegetown, construction (planned), Cornell, general housing, ithaca, student housing, Tompkins County

205 Dryden Road (Dryden South) Construction Update, 6/2016

21 06 2016

With occupancy expected by August, the trio of Collegetown midrises are moving at a pretty fast clip. 205 Dryden (Dryden South) has topped out, and construction crews are installing exterior steel stud walls and building out the structural frames for the projecting bay windows. Some light-colored brick can be seen on the pillars at the front entrance, and eventually it’ll expand to cover the front elevation, with limestone accents providing some visual interest. The interior light well seen from College and Dryden and the roof cap will be faced with colored metal panels in a shade similar to the limestone and brick. These photos are a week and a half old at this point, and since they were taken, the exterior stud walls have been sheathed with gypsum panels and Tyvek.

The building will have 10 4-bedroom suites, and according to the website, only one suite is left (5th floor, $1350/person), with rooms “for singles and small groups also available”.

A quick side note here – although the address when proposed was 205 Dryden, the address being used in the marketing materials is 207 Dryden. Either one is permitted, as the new Breazzano Center going up next door is 209-215 Dryden.

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Tags: collegetown, construction, dryden south, ithaca, photos, student housing
Categories : collegetown, construction, ithaca, photos, student housing

307 College Avenue (Collegetown Crossing) Construction Update, 6/2016

20 06 2016

307 College isn’t too far from completion at this point. The angles where with CMU dominates the exterior look nearly finished from the outside. Some of the windows are in on the front side – the projecting section, currently covered in Tyvek housewrap, will be mostly faced with dark brick, similar to the brick used on the rear CR-4 portion. The bare expanses will be a glass curtain wall, and a lighter brick will be used on the sides and for the cornice. Traditional scaffolding needs a certain amount of space and time to be set up and taken down, so given the dense environment and summer deadline of the Collegetown Crossing project, mast climbing work platforms are used being for the bricklaying and other exterior facade work.

Greenstar’s new grocery location on the first floor should be opening August 17th, right around when the first tenants start moving into the apartments. It sounds like it will be a soft opening, with an actual Grand Opening celebration planned for some date in September. A render of the interior of the new Greenstar location, designed by architect Pam Wooster, is included below. Greenstar plans to employ 14 at the new location, and include a cafe/to-go space to complement its full-service grocery (some of the items, like those in the deli, won’t be prepared on site due to space constraints; they will be prepared at their central kitchen and brought in daily). There hasn’t been any news on tenants for the smaller two commercial spaces facing the pocket park.