The Jacksonville Landing: What Should It Be?

[simms3]

The problem is if these are chains,  they have their architecture formula and that certainly is not it.  Secondly, you can't really make an architectural statement or cover up a 5-8 story multifamily building from the outparcels alone.  Thirdly, if they are local restaurateurs, then Sleiman would be silly to invest that much money in the architecture of a risky business that could fail, and the restaurateur most certainly won't have that money.

The main building that Sleiman constructs needs to be good looking and use quality materials, but it won't.  I am absolutely not in favor of demolishing the existing structure when I absolutely believe it can be improved as is.  I am not convinced that Toney needs to make the kind of profit he so wants on PUBLIC waterfront land he leases from the city that he clearly thinks he might get with a large apartment development on the site.  His proposal belongs near SJTC in my opinion.  I want Sleiman to do well and he clearly hasn't yet.  But I thought his Landing play was always more about legacy than sheer quick profit, and I think he's seeing it now as a potential rainmaker.  I strongly oppose his proposals.

[finehoe]

People tend to discount how an iconic, architecturally unique structure can in and of itself become a destination (see the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain as a great example).  If something like the pictures jaxjaguar posted were to be built at the Landing, it would have more potential to draw both tourists and locals downtown than any docked warship, aquarium or revamped convention center would.

That being said, I won't be holding my breath. 

[CG7]

Jaxjaguars pictures look alot like Khan's idea for the Jags practice facility. It would be great if the Landing could incorporate some form of this architecture along with the practice fields to tie the whole riverfront area together. We might be on to something here people.

[UNFurbanist]

Again the main building is a place holder of sorts for a final design. Not saying it will be radical like the above images (which I love) but at the meeting they were saying it will be more iconic. Also at the meeting, which I take it no one on this forum bothered to go to before dumping all of their hate on this, they mentioned adding tons of other elements that aren't represented in this one picture.
Like giant shades similar to these for example:


There were many very inspiring pictures to the side from the other projects they have tackled in other cities. Trust me, they are trying to make this a destination that everyone in Jax will want to visit along with all tourists from out of town. They talked about a LED lit path that connects to the Main st. bridge. The stage might include a scaled down element similar to the one at millennium park in Chicago. Shade trees everywhere! This simple rendering doesn't cover everything so don't get too pissed off. The cynicism on here is unbearable sometimes. Can't we just be hopeful for once? Though I know many long time natives are tired of being let down, I think this might be different, Jax is changing.

It's a matter of money isn't it? I get it, but you know that private downtown investment fund set to be revealed in fall? Don't you think that this might be a great project for them to get involved with? As far as occupants go, you might be surprised as to who might be clamoring to get a spot at Jax's shinny new toy. Look at 220 Riverside. A fairly benign apartment complex in a long neglected neighborhood next to the vacant lots of LaVila but who whats to open up shop there? A well known chef from out of town and some other great local businesses. Think of what the Landing could do. Especially if we get our act together in regards to Hemming Park, The Elbow, Healthy Town, etc. in the mean time. I'm not saying its the second coming its just another project at the end of the day. All I'm saying is to give it a chance before writing it off so quickly.

You are welcome to use this against me in the future if it is indeed a total bust.  I just like to be positive.

[simms3]

^^^All of what you say is nice and I agree (and true, you were the only one at that "charette").  But I'm still opposed to a multifamily project on site.

Frankly, Toney is probably using the money thing to his advantage.  He has a playing card because he can tell the city that he won't invest another dime in the project and will merely keep the status quo if they don't allow him to build something he can profit from (i.e. multifamily).  But at the same time, I wish he'd throw money into the existing project and do everything you talk about in your reply, without some ticky tacky multifamily building taking up most of the space.

And look at that pool deck and those amenities those residents will get to enjoy there on PUBLIC land in a luxury (ugly) complex that will undoubtedly be made possible with the use of public funds.  All I'm saying is that the use (apartments) is highly inappropriate for that site.  Toney should be talking to Khan if he wants to put apartments on the waterfront.  And I can literally promise you that a mid-rise apartment structure in Jacksonville, FL with some of the lowest rents in the entire world will definitely not be iconic.  The best you'll get is 220 Riverside quality (or Strand Quality or those atrocities out there by SJTC called 5000 Town or something like that).  And I'm not sorry that my standards are high enough for my hometown whereby what's essentially average suburbany looking stuff (220 Riverside) doesn't cut it for my hometown postcard view.  Of course neither does the Parador garage and I literally shed tears over that, but we can't make more mistakes.  We cannot just settle when it comes to real estate as important as this.

I'm telling you all as someone who does work in the industry, too, I sympathize with all sides, but I firmly believe that Toney can keep his peak equity down, de-risk the asset by just working with what he has and using as much city funds as possible, and negotiating with the city to do so.  It's not the city's nor the taxpayer's issue to destroy public use with private apartments and help someone earn a higher profit and someone else earn a larger promote in the process.  They took on what they did, and they need to work within the confines of reason to climb out of their hole.

Think about one thing for a second - if Toney wants to build apartments, which are easy to finance and easy to do and easy to manage and easy to sell, why not build high rise?  Maybe not 50 stories, but 30-40?  That's not much higher than the SunTrust building, but would help the skyline out at least (rather than a clunky mid-rise).

I'll tell you why.

It's not even remotely feasible in Jax.  That requires the use of solid concrete, not cheap Tyvek.  That requires more expensive engineering and architectural services.  Construction takes longer.  Rents in Jax don't even come close to justifying high-rise construction (though they do in Charlotte and Nashville where high rises are going up right and left...so Jax is realllllyyyyyyy far behind).  So at best you are going to get a faux stucco monstrosity that Jax rents *can* support.  Fight the apartment use, and fight it hard.  This is taxpayer/city owned land, not Sleiman's land.  I'm sure it's not even currently zoned for residential.  Watch for conditional uses and zoning changes.  Monitor.  This is one of the rare cases in the world I think it's ok to be a NIMBY.

[UNFurbanist]

^Well then it won't become anything. And that will be the end of it. simple. We will nitpick the hell out of it and fight it and we won't get a damn thing. The Landing will be the same until the day that the sea swallows the city. (Which honestly isn't far off)

Look, Sleiman owns the building until like 2050 or something, like it or not he is on that site to stay and he wants to make some money. Fine, I can't fault the guy even though I might wish him to be an altruistic saint. But the fact is this still maintains a pretty large public segment with the riverfront park, retail, restaurants, "cultural center", kids play area, Laura st. extension and river walk. I don't see why mixed use residential is a bad thing here. Downtown desperately needs more residential in order to make it a 24/7 activity center. IMO the apartments are actually the best part of this because you might actually have people there past 8pm now. I don't know about you but I find that exciting. If this were a gated community on the water then i would agree with you 100% but the fact remains that it's not. It is a mixed use development on the river. I just don't know how that can possibly be seen as a bad thing.

[thelakelander]

Building aside, the addition of an interactive green space riverfront greenspace west of Main Street is one of the best things that could happen to the core of the Northbank. It's what cities like Chattanooga, Detroit, Tampa and Baltimore have gotten right and something that Jax has always lacked, despite being the "River City".

That is not a very large space though compared to those cities and what they offer. It is just a small strip I am assuming for the little concerts they have now.

Chattanooga and Detroit have great examples of spaces smaller that draw crowds due to the unique mix of activities in them and their proximity to other downtown destinations. Here's a few pics:

Detroit's Campus Martius Park









The Passage in Chattanooga

They should try to remove Hogan St. and just add more green space there. Interesting that they added some buildings right on the river too.

I agree that Hogan should become a part of an interactive green space south of Water Street. I'd take it one step further. Instead of focusing on how the Landing meets the river between Hogan and Main Street, they should be looking at how everything works together, at a minimum, between the Acosta and failing courthouse parking lot. 

[DrQue]

Multi-family housing is absolutely essential in making DT a 18 or 24-hour city. In order to attract restaurants, retailers etc you need people living in the area. The problem is no MF developers are willing to take the risk in downtown because there is no real draw (note that the Carling and 11 E are unable to sustain amortizing payments even though they are "stabilized").

This is a prime opportunity to make DT more livable by combining commercial and residential uses to feed off each other. Otherwise we are in the exact same situation with a nicer parcel of land.

[simms3]

^Well then it won't become anything. And that will be the end of it. simple. We will nitpick the hell out of it and fight it and we won't get a damn thing. The Landing will be the same until the day that the sea swallows the city. (Which honestly isn't far off)

Look, Sleiman owns the building until like 2050 or something, like it or not he is on that site to stay and he wants to make some money. Fine, I can't fault the guy even though I might wish him to be an altruistic saint. But the fact is this still maintains a pretty large public segment with the riverfront park, retail, restaurants, "cultural center", kids play area, Laura st. extension and river walk. I don't see why mixed use residential is a bad thing here. Downtown desperately needs more residential in order to make it a 24/7 activity center. IMO the apartments are actually the best part of this because you might actually have people there past 8pm now. I don't know about you but I find that exciting. If this were a gated community on the water then i would agree with you 100% but the fact remains that it's not. It is a mixed use development on the river. I just don't know how that can possibly be seen as a bad thing.

Agree to disagree.  I am very far far far from NIMBY, and I work in the industry as well.  I get it.  I've worked on deals that are on ground leases with city/state entities, and waterfront at that.  I've worked with redevelopment agencies.  I've worked on transformative properties that literally remind me exactly of what I envision the Landing could be.  I used to live within a quarter mile of perhaps the most applicable property in the entire country - the waterfront Ferry Building in San Francisco.

I want Sleiman to do well, and I truly believe he can.  But I think he can do so without apartments on *this* site.  I don't believe apartments are appropriate for *this* site.  I also know for a damn fact that 200-400 extra occupied apartments won't make a damned bit of difference for street vibrancy and won't alone support the level of retail that will make a difference.  You really need like 5-10,000 more apartments for this to happen, and there are still infinite sites, including on the water, with which to put them.  Not to mention apartments have no more than 50% the effect that condos do for fulfilling "resident needs" in terms of retail/entertainment.

I carry a very protective view of the waterfront between the Acosta and the Main St bridge.  I have less of a protective view of the waterfront outside of these bounds.  If it were up to me, that damn CSX building would be bulldozed yesterday.  MOSH would have a whole new building that wasn't so closed off and disgustingly ugly.

I view a bland (that's THE BEST you'll get) apartment building on the Landing site like I view the CSX building.  And not to mention, whether directly or indirectly, that apartment building will be made possible with the use of taxpayer funding via the city's various pockets.  In a more direct fashion, that could include building a "great" "community" complete with top of the line amenities for young professionals in the name of "creating momentum and a place downtown", but effectively subsidized rents to get the building built and proforma'd out where Jax yuppies can afford it.  In an indirect way, the apartment is built as part of a greater plan approved by the city with city funding going to certain aspects of the plan, maybe not the apartments itself, but those apartments aren't built in the first place without city subsidy to get the larger plan in motion.

It's ludicrous to even contemplate subsidized luxury/market rate apartments on city/taxpayer owned land.  The only thing worse I can think of is subsidized affordable housing on this prime waterfront land.  Actually, that's not worse in my mind.  I can't stomach subsidies for market rate apartments.  Especially apartments that are sure to be top of the market/luxury for the overall market.

And why are we even discussing apartments on this piece of property?!?  Land this prime should not have private residences at all, but at minimum it should be luxury CONDOS not apartments for yuppie 20s/30s year olds who are likely transplants and haven't figured out they can buy a home nearby for like $200K.  Yea, NO!  You *may* get better architecture (in Jax...in other markets condos are undoubtedly where you get your good architecture and apartments are almost always utilitarian) and certainly more "vested" owners with condos than apartments.  In a perfect world, developable areas on the waterfront (not where the Landing is) would be condos, and apartments would not be waterfront.

[brainstormer]

So I completely agree that increasing downtown residency should be an overall goal. I am struggling to understand why it is in taxpayer interest to have multi-family housing built on public land and then leased to a private entity. If Sleiman or a developer wants housing, then why don't we parcel up that space and sell parts of it with development restrictions. The city should maintain ownership of the land along the river, the extension of Laura street to the river, and identified public spaces, i.e. greenspace, gathering areas, the riverwalk. Sell the parcels along Independent Drive with development restrictions regarding interaction with the public spaces, required retail, etc. Am I correct that this would be more closely aligned to the public-private partnership with 220 Riverside and Unity Plaza? If Sleiman isn't interested in the parcels along Independent Drive, then allow other developers to submit proposals. This would at least make some of the land taxable again. Thoughts?

[simms3]

Multi-family housing is absolutely essential in making DT a 18 or 24-hour city. In order to attract restaurants, retailers etc you need people living in the area. The problem is no MF developers are willing to take the risk in downtown because there is no real draw (note that the Carling and 11 E are unable to sustain amortizing payments even though they are "stabilized").

This is a prime opportunity to make DT more livable by combining commercial and residential uses to feed off each other. Otherwise we are in the exact same situation with a nicer parcel of land.

This is how far away from "18-24" hour city you are.  In my mind, Manhattan itself is really only ~18-20 hours, people do sleep everywhere.  Sections of Chicago, SF, Boston and LA are also 18-20 hours.  It's actually very hard to support a noticeable amount of 24 hour businesses and an environment where you truly see people out and about for 24 hours a day.  The densest sections of these cities are all over 100,000 people per square mile.  And hint, the 18-20 hour sections of ALL of these areas, Manhattan included, are not the "downtown" areas, but rather the dense and bustling residential neighborhoods (HK, the West/East Village, etc for New York, the Mission in SF, Boystown/Lakeview area for Chicago, and Back Bay for Boston).

I digress, examples for Jax - Uptown Charlotte, Brickell in Miami, Midtown Atlanta, SoBro/Gulch in Nashville, downtown Austin - these areas now all have well over 10,000 condos/apartments in high rises in a confined area mixed in with commercial and entertainment and they are all doing well, but are still very very far from what I would call "bustling".  So if you think this ONE avg sized apartment complex will make ANY difference, you need to travel more and put some numbers together.  Jax should focus on developing up all of its surface lots and overgrown lots, literally strewn about everywhere in the urban core.  It should focus on cleaning up the Shipyards and having that developed.  It should NOT subsidize new parking garages anywhere, let alone within view of the waterfront (Parador), and it should NOT subsidize new apartments on waterfront city owned land that is arguably doing OK as it is but has clear paths to simply improve what's already there.

Looks like Toney is already thinking mixed use with his new maker space.  I think that's fantastic!  But using city money to put up a stucco luxury box with a pool, fancy gym, theater and event space for a bunch of rich-for-the-market transplant yuppies on city-owned public waterfront land is a sheer crime.  Let's not act desperate here.

[thelakelander]

Apartments would have been great on that Parador garage site across the street. They'd still be nice as a use covering up that ugly garage along Hogan Street, sort of like the Bookends garage in Greenville, SC.....but I digress.

[brainstormer]

Lake, can you think of examples from other cities in which housing such as apartments was built on public land and then leased to a developer? This is in reference to my earlier post. Actually is downtown development even approached this way anymore or are we trying to follow an old model by leasing public land for a private development? Should we be pushing for a private-public partnership similar to Unity Plaza/220 Riverside instead?

[CCMjax]

Ok, so at this charette, was there any discussion of modifying the existing structure to make it more inviting and creating more greenspace?

I think a huge huge huge huge concern, and rightfully so, is the lack of riverfront public greenspace downtown.  If they just modify the existing facility you would likely have to blast an opening through the north end to open it up to Laura St. and then tear down large sections of it on the river, leaving awkward portions of the existing building in place. 

I haven't seen any renderings of a modified facility, just tear down and build new renderings.  Are there any out there?

So much focus on the landing right now when the Trio is rotting away as we speak down the street.

I also agree with Simms that you don't need to be so focused on packing as many renters on this property as possible when you have surface lots and vacant property taking up huge areas of downtown and La Villa. 

[simms3]

Lake, can you think of examples from other cities in which housing such as apartments was built on public land and then leased to a developer? This is in reference to my earlier post. Actually is downtown development even approached this way anymore or are we trying to follow an old model by leasing public land for a private development? Should we be pushing for a private-public partnership similar to Unity Plaza/220 Riverside instead?

The Giants are going to build 1,500 units (mostly apartments I'm sure, since that alone would be an outrageous amount of condos in and of itself let alone in one develop, 40% of units will be affordable), with 1.5 million sf office and retail space, and 8 acres of parkland on land they lease from the City.  As such, we get to vote on whether we will allow their proposal or not (we vote on *everything* by ballot initiative).

http://www.missionrock.org/about.html

So this sort of thing is actually very common.  The Ferry Building in SF is on Port of SF land, and is a ground lease.  The differences here are:

1) Jax has *extremely* limited public waterfront land that could be transformed into something meaningful and whereas the Giants' development is miles south of the downtown area and SF already has literally miles of heavily used public waterfront, the Giants are *still* careful to limit heights, include architectural setbacks, and no structures within 100 ft of the waterfront.

So this is not a case where "but other cities are or aren't doing it", this is a case of let's do more stuff like that, just not on this site, which is *THE MOST* central site in Jacksonville

2) Other cities are much more careful about the architecture they choose for such sites, and are in positions to do so.  Jax is neither careful about architecture (it actually is the worst city for this of any city I have *any* knowledge of) nor is it remotely even in a position to dictate architecture and enforce it to be improved or significant/bold (just not financially feasible)

So where other cities might develop their precious land, they have the power to ensure it will be quality.  Jax doesn't.