Omaha Forums

I am not sure that would work in Omaha. Everyone feels like they need their car and have to park within 1-2 blocks. Iowa City is a college town where the younger people being much more active.

The thing would be that if one of the four blocks was a parking garage (with ground level retail). You could exit the garage right at the central intersection of the four blocks. Then everything would be close.

Whatever is put here needs lots of residential units. You can't have Midtown, The Old Market, Capital Street, and North Downtown all as Entertainment Districts for visitors to the area. It needs a strong base of neighborhood residents.

What about a name for this 4 block area? I kind of like "Lot B"

What about a name for this 4 block area? I kind of like "Lot B"

I don't, makes it sound like a secondary option if "Lot A" doesn't work out.

I agree, Lot B is too generic and nondescript. I'd rather leave the days of the big parking lots behind us for good.

How about The NODE.....which stands for NOrth Downtown Entertainment district.

People don't seem to like N O D O much anymore...so this is an evolution of that with a nod to the past name for the transitional area.

I think the main emphasis for the area should still be Entertainment with the big venues that are already there, but adding in a lot of new residential will definitely help with making it a more 24/7/365 area.

I've mentioned it before, but I think "The Sporting District" would be a really good one. To the vast majority of the city it would simply be the district between the sporting venues. To people with a little knowledge of Omaha history would know the nod to a wild time in our history. I doubt developers would want their project tied to a former prostitution and gambling district though, even if it was a century ago.

Cass St Commons, or just The Commons...

It shouldn't sound like any other district in any other city. There never seems to be any desire in Omaha to do anything original.

I guarantee it ends up something like "MECA's Northe Downtowne Rivere Plazae and Shoppes open June 10th to June 28th"

As a reminder, here are some screenshots of what the city was thinking back in 2008:





I pretty much agree with this plan. Hotel on the northeast block, entertainment and perhaps some residences on the northwest block. However, these two buildings should also be L shaped, so that they form a plaza facing the stadium, which could be used to create something like the Railyard in Lincoln. The two south blocks should be more residential in feel, but they would need more parking due to the L shaped buildings perhaps not being ideal for garages. Ground floor retail on all of them, of course, with the north buildings having two levels on the parts that face the plaza.

Also, put in a statue of Rosenblatt in the plaza, for good measure.

I understand the location, but the last thing this should be is an entertainment district. We've got another one starting up on the Shamrock site and the Old Market is just about 8 blocks south. These things easily start cannibalizing each other and you end up with 50% vacancy in all the developments. This needs to be the development where as-of-yet-undelivered services are finally easily accessible downtown/north downtown. Assuming the grocery store goes in on the old Civic site, my ideal lot would be:

- Parking garage
- Urban Target
- Gas station/convenience store
- Residential building that has ground floor offices for things like a dentist, chiropractor, vet, etc..

NEDodger wrote:I understand the location, but the last thing this should be is an entertainment district. We've got another one starting up on the Shamrock site and the Old Market is just about 8 blocks south. These things easily start cannibalizing each other and you end up with 50% vacancy in all the developments. This needs to be the development where as-of-yet-undelivered services are finally easily accessible downtown/north downtown. Assuming the grocery store goes in on the old Civic site, my ideal lot would be:

- Parking garage
- Urban Target
- Gas station/convenience store
- Residential building that has ground floor offices for things like a dentist, chiropractor, vet, etc..

I don't disagree with you but there is no way this is not primarily an entertainment district. With all the money that could be made in the CWS, before and after other sporting events or concerts. They way you could get things like the dentist and chiropractor's offices is second floor office space in the buildings, I think the ground floor retail will be to valuable. A urban Target would be great but I imagine a CVS or Walgreens is more likely.

Residential, Residential, and more Residential is the key to this being more than a CWS destination.

Joe_Sovereign wrote:

iamjacobm wrote:

Joe_Sovereign wrote:It would only take one large parking garage to more than replace all of the parking in lot B. If you rebuilt the street grid but left the streets as pedestrian only it would create a really unique public space. Ground level restaurants and bars with patios opening up on to the pedestrian walkway would create a exciting atmosphere during events like concerts, or conventions and of course the CWS. I have seen pedestrian spaces like this that have bar and restaurant patios as islands in the middle of the pedestrian only street.

East Fourth in Cleveland is a good example, but with historic buildings.

The garage behind PacLife in Aksarben has roughly the same amount of stalls as Lot B currently does just to show the scale of garage minimum needed.

I was thinking something along the lines of the Iowa City Pedestrian Mall. 1 block would be a parking garage with ground level retail and a private green space on top for corporate events, weddings, etc. The other three blocks would be broken up into individual parcels where individual developers would build individual buildings. Definitely not each block as a single uniform building. Ground level retail and 3 floor minimum for each building.



I LOVE this building. This is what should be done at Crossroads. If not there, then I'd like to see it downtown.

Iowa City Pedestrian Mall

This is what the Iowa City Ped Mall looks like from above. This kind of density on Lot B might be above best case scenario but it shows what could be possible on that much land.

The situation is certainly different as Downtown Iowa City is already very dense and touches directly to the University of Iowa Campus. The University has 32,000 students and thousands of staff in downtown Iowa City and 170 years for the city and University to develop together.

Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

I'd like to see us reach out to Cordish, just to see what they would propose.

Greg

Pass.

Not saying we have to go with them, just want to see what their vision would be. It's been interesting watching their latest project in St. Louis. Seems to have some similarities to ours (outside New Busch).

Greg

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

MadMartin8 wrote:

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

I have seen the city provide an environmental report and soil testing results among other things in some of the other RFPs that that have released. Could be in the process of that.

iamjacobm wrote:

MadMartin8 wrote:

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

I have seen the city provide an environmental report and soil testing results among other things in some of the other RFPs that that have released. Could be in the process of that.

Ah, that makes sense. Good news though.


I just hope we don't have to wait 4+ years between announcement of the winning bid and construction on this one.

iamjacobm wrote:

MadMartin8 wrote:

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

I have seen the city provide an environmental report and soil testing results among other things in some of the other RFPs that that have released. Could be in the process of that.

Doing that before RFP can significantly reduce project timelines, and keep costs down, as it reduces some of the risk and uncertainty a contractor is taking on. If they have full Geo and environmental reports, they can pretty much get started on design right away.

Seth wrote:

iamjacobm wrote:

MadMartin8 wrote:

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

I have seen the city provide an environmental report and soil testing results among other things in some of the other RFPs that that have released. Could be in the process of that.

Doing that before RFP can significantly reduce project timelines, and keep costs down, as it reduces some of the risk and uncertainty a contractor is taking on. If they have full Geo and environmental reports, they can pretty much get started on design right away.

MadMartin8 wrote:

iamjacobm wrote:

MadMartin8 wrote:

ItsAllAboutMe wrote:Soil drilling/sampling in progress at Lot B

Hm, that's interesting... Are things progressing faster than we think?

I have seen the city provide an environmental report and soil testing results among other things in some of the other RFPs that that have released. Could be in the process of that.

I just hope we don't have to wait 4+ years between announcement of the winning bid and construction on this one.

I wouldn't be shocked to see action here before HDR.

Interesting...why do you think this would proceed faster?

I think HDR still has a few years left on their current lease?

Its amazing how 1 project (shamrock) was seemingly the only spark it took to ignite this boom we are starting to see. There could be 5 or more going at the same time. THAT will be impressive to see in the coming years.

I think it is more a sign of the economy in Omaha, not a spark by one development or another. I wonder what the record number of cranes at one time in downtown has been?

Coyote wrote:I think it is more a sign of the economy in Omaha, not a spark by one development or another. I wonder what the record number of cranes at one time in downtown has been?

I agree. Projects this big can stand on their own. Now if a couple 5 floor stick built apartments get proposed in the next 6 months on some smaller NDT lots I think that could be considered a response to anchor developments like Capitol and The Yard developments.

daveoma wrote:Interesting...why do you think this would proceed faster?

No promises. Just heard some confidence that this won't be another Capitol District timeline.

Well that would be great news to add to the excitement most of us are already feeling in regards to all of the other projects that are starting construction.

Coyote wrote:I think it is more a sign of the economy in Omaha, not a spark by one development or another.

Also agree. It's more of a coincidence that activity is picking up again now that Shamrock has finally started. These kind of projects are typically in the works for months or years before more than a few people ever know they are going to happen. It would be nice if development spread like wildfire, but that is just not the case, usually. It is possible that someone sitting on a fence trying to decide whether to proceed with a project could be encouraged by other development coming to fruition, if it would help support their development. I'll give you that, but it would more likely be the smaller infill projects.

Little steps. MECA says they are going to need 1200 new parking stalls if this is developed. The wording sounded a little like they might consider a garage on this site as well as Lot D.

iamjacobm wrote:Little steps. MECA says they are going to need 1200 new parking stalls if this is developed. The wording sounded a little like they might consider a garage on this site as well as Lot D.

Bout time they have another garage.

So basically they just put a number to the stall count, it was known since day 0 that parking would have to be augmented there was even a parking facility in the concept render.

If they build a garage on lot D then they won't be able to expand the convention center...right?

Depends how far north they build the garage...

Didn't Meca say they'd only ever expand it out to Meca Drive if they did? Or am I making that up...

OmahaJaysCU wrote:Didn't Meca say they'd only ever expand it out to Meca Drive if they did? Or am I making that up...

That's how I remember it too.

Coyote wrote:Depends how far north they build the garage...

image.jpg

They gonna wipe out that stretch of 480 while they're at it??

RNcyanide wrote:They gonna wipe out that stretch of 480 while they're at it??

That image got me really excited that MECA might be pushing for taking down 480, but it looks like it's just a parking map from the td ameritrade park website and they just left out the interstate to reduce clutter.

http://www.tdameritradeparkomaha.com/Di ... rking.aspx

Dundeemaha wrote:

RNcyanide wrote:They gonna wipe out that stretch of 480 while they're at it??

That image got me really excited that MECA might be pushing for taking down 480, but it looks like it's just a parking map from the td ameritrade park website and they just left out the interstate to reduce clutter.

http://www.tdameritradeparkomaha.com/Di ... rking.aspx

Yeah that was what I was thinking too.