Sioux City Photo Tour

LarryDavidSon · Post by **LarryDavidSon** » Wed Apr 07, 2004 9:27 pm

I am actually starting to find quite a few neat Sioux City area photos, specifically of architecture, which I thought deserved its own thread. Here we go...

The Sioux City Arts Center...

An office building in the Dunes...

Sioux City's premiere downtown office space: Terra Centre

The Floyd monument...

The new Sioux City Hall

The stunning Orpheum Theater...

The 10,000 seat Tyson Events Center located downtown and adjacent to the Municipal Auditorium...

Great West Casualty HQ in South Sioux City, Nebraska...

The new Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center located on the Riverfront downtown.

Veteran's Memorial Bridge (the link between Sioux City and South Sioux City)...

The 4th Street District (a 14 screen theater is coming this summer)

eomaha · Post by **eomaha** » Thu Apr 08, 2004 3:05 am

Any photos of the building Nustyle is renovating? (Ryan, seems like you posted this once?)

LarryDavidSon · Post by **LarryDavidSon** » Thu Apr 08, 2004 3:15 am

Yeah....you are talking about Sioux City Central High School also called "Castle on the Hill."

sokkerdewd · Post by **sokkerdewd** » Thu Apr 08, 2004 7:11 pm

Wow- I had no idea that there was this much construction activity going on up there after so many years of stagnation...it's really coming along. Thanks for posting!

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Thu Apr 08, 2004 9:28 pm

I am impressed with Sioux City. I am especially impressed that they are building a 14-screen theatre downtown.

Nice shots of a city I've never visited (but so close to Omaha)!

LarryDavidSon · Post by **LarryDavidSon** » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:32 am

sokkerdewd wrote:Wow- I had no idea that there was this much construction activity going on up there after so many years of stagnation...it's really coming along. Thanks for posting!

This is a basic timeline of major development in SC IA...

Late 1970s-1984..."downtown urban renewal"
--Destruction of dozens of Sioux City's most prominant architectural structures
--Pedestrian Mall built downtown
--multi-level JCPenney constructed
--three large city parking decks created
--Large scale skywalk system created connecting 8-10 blocks.
--2-screen Riviera theater built on pedestrian mall
--MidWest Gas(MidAmerican) HQ built (modernist, utiliartian arch.)
--Terra Centre built on site on site of failed proposal for a Brandeis department store
--Hilton hotel (70s utilitarian design)
-- Younkers vacates flagship store for smaller, modern store.

--General Growth property Southern Hills Mall is built amid massive protests and fights with the city in the southeastern corner of the city (anchors of Target, Sears, Younkers, small cinema)

1989
--Sioux City's uninspired convention center is opened after tearing down some of the city's richest architecture. The CC is built in the middle of 4th Street and blocks access across downtown of its signature street.

80s-90s
--Riverfront redevelopment plans start taking shape.

1994-1995
--Sioux City's new Arts Center opens with a dynamic design and prominant location

1995-2002
--Sioux City builds a new City Hall using materials as well as design elements so well, many can not tell the new building is not old.
--Plans take shape to develop lower 4th Street (Sioux City's red light district) into a district filled with restaurants, apartments, and shops similar to the old market.
--Sioux City raises over $10 million to renovate the Orpheum Theater.
--Sioux City builds a multi-model transportation center/parking deck with storefront retail on its ground level.
--Tyson Events Center opens with a 10,000 seat arena.
--Plans take shape to reopen 4th Street doing away with the pedestrian mall.
--Central High School is slated for a planned renovation into apartments.
--14-screen cinema planned connecting central downtown to the 4th Street district.

2002+ "surburban retail explosion"
Spurred by completion of Hwy 20 bypass with connecting Hwy 75 N to I-29
--Hwy 20 and Sunnybrook (Target Greatlands, Lowes, coming soon: electronics store, more restaurants)
--Marketplace redevelopment (Sioux City's first shopping mall to be raised and replaced with "lifestyle center")
--Hwy 20 and Lakeport (Southern Hills Mall additions: B&N, JCPenney, Scheels)
--I-29 and Singing Hills (Wal-Mart SS, 2 new car dealers, currently fastest growing retail area)
--Floyd and Outer Drive (Wal-Mart SS, restaurants)
--Hwy 20 and Sergeant Rd. area (500,000 sq. feet of retail coming soon)
--Hwy 75 near I-29 (Home Depot and big box center-- project in limbo)
--Hwy 77 in SSC Nebraska (Wal-Mart SS)

DMRyan · Post by **DMRyan** » Sun Apr 11, 2004 11:18 pm

Hey, thanks for all the great info Larry! SC is a somewhat sizable city that really doesn't get much recognition. I'll have to check out everything new sometime this summer or fall.

sokkerdewd · Post by **sokkerdewd** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:03 pm

3 Superwalmarts under construction for a city that size!!! Wow...this company really is digging in.

Thanks for posting all of the developments. It sounds like Southern Hills Mall is similar to Coral Ridge in Iowa City, minus the Dillards and Best Buy stores. Quite impressive!

eomaha · Post by **eomaha** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:16 pm

Wow... I didn't notice that... that is a bunch... I thought we had alot.

All the while... California is turning them away.

LarryDavidSon · Post by **LarryDavidSon** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 5:36 am

On the Wal-Mart Supercenters...
2 built and opened in 2003
1 on the way in South Sioux (currently just a Wal-Mart) --- this one faces opposition as people think it will run the South Sioux Hy Vee out of business.

Southern Hills Mall is another underachieving story. It is only recently they have begun to turn things around and are somewhat booming. In the 90s during the Gateway growth, they did literally nothing and watched a lot of Sioux Citians frequently go to Sioux Falls and Omaha. They are becoming a bigger regional force now, as is Sioux City as a whole.
Currently the anchors are:
Carmike 12-screen (stadiums added a few years back)
Scheels (prototype store built in 2002)
B&N (opened last month)
Younkers (proposed major expansion)
Sears (renovated last year)
JCPenney (under construction of former Target site)

Southern Hills still lacks some of the majors like Old Navy, Abercrombie and Limited/Express(replaced with Gap years back) but hopefully that will change as they have majorly strengthened their anchors. The interior has not been updated since it was built in 1980!!! It doesn't look outdated as it might sound, but Oak View Mall-- this ain't!!

Golden Eagle · Post by **Golden Eagle** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 6:36 pm

Southern Hills Mall isn't that great. Though there is some nice retail developing in south Sioux City. That old high school/castle-like building is now apartments, I think. We drive past it on Jackson Street on our way to the tennis courts.

They just opened a bunch of stores off of Hamilton (by SD border) that I think is what LarryDavidSon referred to as the Marketplace.

The downtown is fantastic, and I love how a city of that size could embrace the concept of adaptive re-use that many cities with over a million people have had difficulty performing.

OPlaya · Post by **OPlaya** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 12:02 am

Wow I remember being up there a few years back and I couldn't stand the odor in downtown. I did like going into the red light district there. Too bad Omaha doesn't have one haha.

MTO · Post by **MTO** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 12:09 am

Wow spectacular pictures!
They have all the right stuff in all the right places

OPlaya · Post by **OPlaya** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 5:16 pm

Hmm I'm not impressed with the brown look of that place.

formeromahan · Post by **formeromahan** » Tue Dec 05, 2006 1:24 am

http://www.loopnet.com/xNet/Looplink/Pr ... TID=cormac Does anyone Know if the first site plan is accurate? It lists several retailers for the outer buildings.

guy4omaha · Post by **guy4omaha** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 3:59 am

Great photos. Thanks. I have always appreciated Sioux City. I have always thought it has a nice downtown and rather vertical downtown for a city its size. I will be driving through SC on my way to and back from Marshall MN Sunday. Hopefully, I will have a little time to do a little downtown sidetrip.

Coyote · Post by **Coyote** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 4:16 am

Speaking of Sioux City - I heard a rumor that they are thinking of re-routing interstate traffic through the city. How accurate are these rumors? Where would the new route be?

Ingersoll1978 · Post by **Ingersoll1978** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 6:40 am

Coyote wrote:Speaking of Sioux City - I heard a rumor that they are thinking of re-routing interstate traffic through the city. How accurate are these rumors? Where would the new route be?

Doesn't it already go through the city?

Uffda · Post by **Uffda** » Thu Dec 07, 2006 7:12 pm

I-29 runs along the Missouri river on the south/west side of Sioux City --- it kind of bypasses the major areas.

Stargazer · Post by **Stargazer** » Sat Dec 09, 2006 6:00 pm

I don't know much about Sioux City, but I do know it runs right along downtown (a fairly scenic drive)... but then, I suppose the 'major' parts of Sioux City are now in it's own suburbs somewhere.

Golden Eagle · Post by **Golden Eagle** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 4:23 am

Heh. We bring the family down and play basketball in the above posted Tyson Center ... there's a family recreation center in there most days, just walk up, pay the kind lady so much, and then there's balls in the closet, and there's the arena set up with basketball hoops and there are nets for anything else you want to play ... for those who can't make it into the big leagues, you can play ball with your kids in the Tyson Center when the sports teams in Sioux City aren't using it.

The downtown has gotten more magnificent, or it might just be me ... I discovered 4th Street this time around. Woweee ... well streetscaped, active, great big historic buildings that have been well-restored, and some not so that look just as cool if not then neater, and the movie theatre looks fantastic ...

We got a free popcorn b/c my sister's rewards card hit a certain amount of notoriety (We got away from the kids to see the Good Shephard if you must know, a really interesting movie, though it had no climax per se.)

There's some new upscale restaurant (it looked akin to a Cheesecake Factory though not quite, and I am familiar with Sioux City's demographics, what little there is, for a town as great and urban) that was open on Hamilton, just south of my sister's place.

I doubt they would reroute I 29 into Sioux City. Sioux City is far too dense and hilly for them to clear an interstate path.

the1wags · Post by **the1wags** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:42 pm

They are NOT rerouting I29 through the city, it will pretty much stay on its existing alignment but with a major overhaul.

http://iowadot.gov/i29/index.htm

Golden Eagle · Post by **Golden Eagle** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 1:42 am

Won't this benefit sprawl in Sioux City? Honestly, that town gets by just fine without I 29 ... I seriously think I 129 is more important than I 29. It skirts the western edge of the town, it's not an important roadway in the scheme of things in Sioux City. It doesn't "connect".

Uffda · Post by **Uffda** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 2:55 pm

where is the I 129 on the map? i travel that way alot and have never seen it. I 29 is a pass through for sioux city ---- would have been nice if they had moved the Morrell Meat packing plant (sits right along I29 as you enter sioux city from south) elsewhere long ago.

the1wags · Post by **the1wags** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 6:42 pm

You lost me somewhere Golden Eagle. I fail to see how I-29's makeover will contribute to sprawl at all. Its the major N-S route through the metro and goes right past downtown, so I don't see how it "gets by fine without" I29 considering its been there since the 60's. Also I-129 goes around the EAST side of the city, past the major shopping areas and alot of the sprawl areas.

Golden Eagle · Post by **Golden Eagle** » Fri Dec 29, 2006 7:54 am

Yes, but when you say that I 29 has been there since the 60s, almost all of Sioux City was built before the 60s. The way that Sioux City is laid out does not utilize the interstate. It utilizes inner city streets like Jackson, Piece, Hamilton, 11th, etc, etc... Sioux City's more suburban areas are all well east and north of I 29.

In order for I 29 to serve a vital role in real commuting trends, it must connect point A and point B. It goes through downtown, but it's not convenient to anything else important in Sioux City. Widening it only encourages development, rather than serving current needs. I think if developments needs to be encouraged, better land use between Floyd Blvd and Lewis Blvd is imperative, and that it should just keep growing out to the east, where there's a new loop already, pretty landscapes, and decent infrastructure, not to mention growth already.

the1wags · Post by **the1wags** » Fri Dec 29, 2006 3:01 pm

I've got a pretty good handle on Sioux City traffic patterns, I grew up 30 miles east of there, and your claim that I-29 isn't used by other than those passing through is way off base. Sure people from north of DT are using streets like Jackson and Pierce to get downtown, but then what? People DT aren't driving down Morningside Ave to get from there to the Southern Hills mall. They go down I29 and then east on I129 and get off there.

The major reason I29 is getting redone is because the design is terrible with accident prone areas all over the place, and a real need for an additional lane because of traffic counts, not for development.

kpp001 · Post by **kpp001** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 5:38 pm

Great thread here, so sorry to see it die. Anyhow, this is the sort of stuff I want on my website. Anyone is welcome to check it out at http://www.siouxciety.com

More photos of Sioux City would be appreciated, they made the city look more beautiful than it is. hehe.