http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/downtowntoday.php?dt_date=2013-09-23
Anybody else think this is a bit too much light?
Street level lighting much more important. Jax is always wanting "the big project" rather than actually investing in improving QOL that pays off over and over.
Quote from: stephendare on September 23, 2013, 12:19:09 PM
Quote from: Rynjny on September 23, 2013, 12:13:59 PM
http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/downtowntoday.php?dt_date=2013-09-23
Anybody else think this is a bit too much light?
Not enough, in my opinion. Certainly less than what Jville has always traditionally had downtown.
True, especially when compared to the 60s night shots from when all the older hotels, with their large rooftop signs, were still operating.
Who is paying for the installation, maintenance, repair and utilities?
I like it. Our Downtown looks dead at night, even from a far. Visitors driving over I-95 should be like wow! when they look over to the skyline, not why are the buildings so dark? even though they have no clue what is going on at street level. I say bring it on.
http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2013/09/23/downtown-jacksonville-advocates-pitch.html
Here's more picture from the Jax business journal..
This a a great idea, and although I don't know much about the other two guys, Mark Kingsnorth is a great lighting designer and will do Jax proud. Can't wait to hear more about the specifics of how to get this done.
I like the river blue but the rest of them look ridiculous like a christmas tree and having them light up to music? I am sorry I actually love gawdy christmas lights but not on the city building year round.
Thumbs up to lighting but please keep it simple and classy. I think the lit bridges kept to that philosophy.
I like it, but they should diversify the colors. Bring in some lava red, some green, pink, blacklight etc. Bring in as many colors as possible. And allow for some sinage, for example, that billboard at the southeast corner of Hemming Plaza would be a great and smart start. It could say, "Welcome to Hemming Plaza!"
I like the idea of lighting up the skyline but it is too much of the same color. A little variety would be better.
Good idea but to much of the same color, I like the teal if there is a Monday or Thursday night game. They could even host an event like the festival of lights. I think one of the German cities does that and also Sydney. I like the idea of lighting up downtown. That's an easy fix.
Looks like a teal version of Norfolk.
(http://hamptonroadssports.org/uploads/images/norfolk-skyline.jpg)
Is Dallas the first US city that featured this 'neon lit skyscraper outline' tech?
It's an excellent idea. I like the prospect of occasional changes to mark the season or a holiday...not unlike the changes in color on the Empire State Building in NYC. When I lived in Miami, the central image of downtown was I.M. Pei's Centrust Tower, now the Miami Tower, which is all but defined by its nighttime illumination. The trend spread to the whole city skyline. The colors of Miami Tower still change from time to time. Like Miami, J'ville has the advantage of a waterfront setting to reflect the skyline, further enhancing the effect of lighting up the city. As for the idea that street-level lighting would be more helpful, why does there have to be a choice between the two? Do both. As an earlier poster noted, Jacksonville does have a history in this area. I'm just old enough to remember the glorious neon of rooftop hotel signs stretching across the skyline...the George Washington, the Mayflower, the Seminole, the Floridan, etc.
Well said Mike :)
What about crowd-source funding for the installations? Then the building owner would just have the ongoing JEA bill.
They should start by turning on the lights on some of the buildings that are already there.
I'm all for it! I showed 2 of my colleagues @ work the project yesterday and they were all for it. :) :D ;D
Quote from: acme54321 on September 24, 2013, 07:08:07 AM
They should start by turning on the lights on some of the buildings that are already there.
yeah, I agree. That would be an easy start. What happen to all the green neon lighting Fidelity had on all its buildings, the purple neon lights JEA had on its building, even Riverplace Tower used to have lights around the top of it and of course the BofA tower dark as hell. Again ongoing maintenance is a major issue in this city, not only publicly but private as well it seems.
Quote from: fsujax on September 24, 2013, 09:46:15 AM
Quote from: acme54321 on September 24, 2013, 07:08:07 AM
They should start by turning on the lights on some of the buildings that are already there.
yeah, I agree. That would be an easy start. What happen to all the green neon lighting Fidelity had on all its buildings, the purple neon lights JEA had on its building, even Riverplace Tower used to have lights around the top of it and of course the BofA tower dark as hell. Again ongoing maintenance is a major issue in this city, not only publicly but private as well it seems.
Fidelity still has the lights. They only turn them on when we have Mon and Thurs night football games. I noticed that crap last year. They still have them, they just dont turn them on. Last I heard BOA has to get the lights repaired or something, and have not due to the cost.
QuoteShe described the project as "a new vision for Jacksonville" that could "put our city on the world stage."
umm.. I don't think so. Maybe if this were 1910 and we had led lights people would notice...
I love all of the ideas, except for the music. Our city isnt a damn Christmas Tree. I think the coolest thing to see would be our city and fountain lit up for Thursday or Monday Night Football. That would be freakin' awesome
So other cities are cutting back on urban lighting to be environmentally friendly and JAX wants a light show? I love downtown, but this is one idea I'm not getting behind right now. Solar or LED...maybe.
ETA:Ok, the article says LED would be used. Still neutral on the idea. It looks slick, but it's still light pollution that doesn't really doesn't address JAX downtown street level issues.
Quote from: acme54321 on September 24, 2013, 07:08:07 AM
They should start by turning on the lights on some of the buildings that are already there.
+1 !!!!!! I love the whole project, but for starters, lets turn on the lights that exist that the building operators currently don't use or don't work.
Talking to you:
Bank of America (pyramid at the top)
Fidelity (green neons)
CSX (they only use some of their lighting)
SunTrust (spent all the money to add lighting on the sides and never use it)
Riverplace (used to have lights at the top and the tower itself was twice as lit)
Crowne Plaza Hotel (red neon at the top)
JEA (blue neon at the top)
Quote from: fsujax on September 24, 2013, 09:46:15 AM
Ongoing maintenance is a major issue in this city, not only publicly but private as well it seems.
Which is what makes me wary of a project like this.
Remember those nice LED displays on the Main Street Bridge towers?
They were beautiful for the six months that they worked, and then moisture got into the fixtures and the city never bothered to get them fixed.
I'd think the money would be better spent finding a way to restore the existing uplighting that has, for one reason or another, been abandoned.
Personally, I like the existing lighting much more than the proposed project.
It's more Gotham, less Pleasure Island.
How long has Norfolk had their lights?
Quote from: Bill Hoff on September 24, 2013, 12:31:13 PM
How long has Norfolk had their lights?
For at least the 10 years that I've lived there.
I'll play Devil's advocate here...If you were head of the DIA and were told you had $50 million of discretionary money for downtown improvements, how high would this be on your list? The money can go to anything. Park improvements, skyway extensions, streetcar installations, corporate relocation incentives, historic rehabs, residential incentives, Landing improvements, Hemming Plaza events, Metro Park improvements, festivals, Jaguars stadium improvements, creation of a signature monument, cleanups of environmental issues on key development sites, OneSpark...anything you can think of.
Its a cool idea in theory and given an infinite amount of money to spend, would definitely be on my list. Realistically though, looking at the total net benefit to downtown, I think there are better key investments to make. I imagine (and hope) any funding of this would be done privately and not from city coffers, but I still think there are better things we can ask our corporate benefactors to invest in.
^I meant to put that in there. Lets assume its $5 million total for installation, with upkeep and energy costs paid by the buildings owners.
I purposely made the total amount of money much larger to see if it would even make the cut given a much larger budget and also to see where it would fall in people's total priorities.
You know if the building owners would just take a little more pride in their structures and do what every other cities downtowns seem to do, we wouldn't even have to be discussing a City initiative to light downtown. I could just imagine driving through Atlanta at night and seeing the BofA tower there all dark. (not).
The LED retrofit done last year on the Empire State Building cost them a few million dollars.
Here's the problem that must be overcome:
QuotePamela Smith did not see the presentation Friday, but said when she moved to Jacksonville from Miami to be the owner's representative at EverBank Center at 301 W. Bay St., lighting the building was a consideration. Smith said she is familiar with a similar project, "Light Up Miami."
According to lightupmiami.org, the south Florida nonprofit organization's purpose is "enhancing the image of Greater Miami through illumination, arts and festivals, because this increases our safety, economics, quality of life and community pride while attracting visitors, conventions and business to our area."
Smith said she investigated lighting the office tower and estimated the cost at $250,000, which she said she doubted at the time the owners of the building would approve.
Smith said she is open to looking at the concept again, but is not sure that lighting up the building would attract more tenants.
During downtown's old days, most of the buildings were owned by local entities that took pride in the community. After decades of mergers and consolidations, that civic pride is somewhat gone. Now, it's about dollars and cents. The success or failure of a concept like this will rest on convincing someone to pay the installation costs and cover the long term operational expenses.
Kind of sounds like mass transit......
"Smith said she investigated lighting the office tower and estimated the cost at $250,000, which she said she doubted at the time the owners of the building would approve." That is also likely based on standard installation, not all the bells and whistles that this proposal has.
"Installation costs vary widely, from $30,000 up to $500,000, depending on how complex the lighting is. At the high end of the spectrum, Marquis said, lighting could be set to music and "one building can interact with another, shimmer back and forth."
Based on the quote for the cost to light up the Everbank tower, I'm going to assume the $30k to-$500k range is per building. If so, we're probably looking at something in the $5 million range. That is really beside the point though...you can liberally say it will only be $2 million. The real question is, where would everyone rank this on their total list of ways to improve Downtown?
Any idea on what's the annual costs? Most of these buildings already have lighting installed. Evidently, building owners aren't too keen on paying the ongoing expenses with keeping them on. So what changes between what is happening now and what will happen if new lighting systems were installed?
Quote from: stephendare on September 24, 2013, 02:17:16 PM
its either worth doing or it isn't. Its not really a ranking system because each of the projects that you would include in any such list are also dependent on a different time frame. I think lake has it right, this is something that the private businesses would support or not. How much, for example does the Jazz festival cost in toto?
How do you determine what is worthy and unworthy without weighing the alternatives? As the article states, the owner of the Everbank center doesn't appear to be very interested and doesn't think it will help their ability to attract tentants. If so, that means the money for this will have to come from public sources, private donations, or grants. In which case, it is important to know if this should be a high priority fund raising goal for downtown, or if the money could go to better sources.
If the owners or tenants want to foot the cost, then let them do so, but if not...I think its important to discuss the merits of the proposal and whether its something to go all in on.
If the owners aren't willing to foot the ongoing costs, then it's not worth it, IMO.
Considering that the Empire State Building is worth more than all of Downtown Jacksonville, their ROI is a bit different.
Quote from: Lunican on September 24, 2013, 04:00:37 PM
Considering that the Empire State Building is worth more than all of Downtown Jacksonville
Sources??? According to wiki the ESB is worth 618 million (2013).
Quote from: stephendare on September 24, 2013, 01:23:22 PM
Quote from: CityLife on September 24, 2013, 12:47:29 PM
^I meant to put that in there. Lets assume its $5 million total for installation, with upkeep and energy costs paid by the buildings owners.
I purposely made the total amount of money much larger to see if it would even make the cut given a much larger budget and also to see where it would fall in people's total priorities.
LED lights arent that expensive, you know.
Where did you get the five million dollar figure?
the article says installation for some of the buildings could $500,000....so the $5 million figure may not be that far off
What the article doesn't address is why aren't the lights installed on most of the buildings now, not in operation? Solve that issue and everything else will take care of itself.
Quote from: thelakelander on September 24, 2013, 10:01:16 PM
What the article doesn't address is why aren't the lights installed on most of the buildings now, not in operation? Solve that issue and everything else will take care of itself.
Why would LLs light their buildings at night? Common area electric is charged to tenants. No tenants in DT buildings are off-hours users and likely none would reimburse LL for their PRS of off-hours common area electric. Off-hours recoveries are a big thing - how many DT workers in Jax are in their offices past 8PM? Common for a busy financial district in NYC, Boston, SF, and Chicago to have a relatively large degree of workers at any given hours of the night in most if not all major buildings.
Then you have to consider that LLs in Jax don't really get anything from their tenants (especially considering it's the ultimate tenant's market and even they aren't coming to the table). First and foremost, most of the buildings are at a vacancy level that is generally unsustainable from an investment standpoint, let alone from the standpoint of spending additional moneys. Now if prospects for rent growth and lease-up were strong (they are not), then LLs might spend money on things like enhanced lobby that bleeds out into streets, new elevator cabs, additional security for elevators/tenants, and exterior night lighting. Not in Jax.
My building has rents from $84-$106 full service and is generally 95+% occupied with late night workers, including myself. And ironically it has no exterior lighting. BofA Jax rents from $18-$22 full service, and probably has similar operating costs outside of taxes/insurance (CA has EQ insurance requirements and my building is 50 floors, and the basis for taxes on my building is also north of $1B whereas BofA would probably be lucky to go for north of $100M...but all else is likely similar). Tenants in BofA in Jax are still bargain hunting despite the building. That's tenants in Jax. There is no room or need for them to go crazy, and it's their market, but rather than pay higher rent and shoot for a new lobby, barricades in elevator banks, and a crazy TI, they'd rather go for lower rent and CAM caps. Just the nature of their business level and their needs.
Hopefully Illuminate Jax can get traction and funding, but I wouldn't look to LLs since most of them are squeezed so tight right now, and wondering when they can exit the market, ha. And I doubt as if most tenants are willing to pitch in in the name of a "more attractive skyline". That's not what's bringing them to DT Jax right now (who is coming to DT Jax?).
I'm definitely not sure it's the best use of limited public funds dedicated to address downtown at this point. Nevertheless, I agree that LLs have no real reason or desire to pay for enhanced night lighting at this point. If they did, the lights already installed on those buildings would already be on.
Quote from: Lunican on September 24, 2013, 04:00:37 PM
Considering that the Empire State Building is worth more than all of Downtown Jacksonville, their ROI is a bit different.
The ESB is about to be publicly traded, LoL. Unsolicited off-market bids have approached $1.5B to prevent the IPO, but the controlling interest (a wealthy family) is only interested in going public. So, yes the building is far more valuable than all of DT Jax! Pretty ridiculous, though I can pretty easily think of about 10 Manhattan "boring" office towers that are worth even more than the ESB...my company has bought and sold a few of them in the past 10 years. :)
Bottom line is that ownership of ESB has the means, capacity, and reason to light that building up. Not all buildings lend themselves to be lit up. I would only want to see the 4 top corners of the BofA building lit up in plain single-color fashion (perhaps different colors for holidays and events), but nothing more. LEDs going up the sides would turn me as a tenant off of that building, which is set up for high profile financial services firms (it was built for a goddamn bank) and law firms. It's certainly not a building that would look good with signage either (what building does, honestly?).
QuoteDuring downtown's old days, most of the buildings were owned by local entities that took pride in the community. After decades of mergers and consolidations, that civic pride is somewhat gone. Now, it's about dollars and cents.
This is so true. Businesses have a much smaller commitment to the communities that they draw their profits from in today's economy. I wish there was a way to change that everywhere.
For reasons Lake and Simms have described, this project will be challenged to take off, but I hope somehow it does, if the private sector can do it's (lion share) part.
Don't underestimate the affects of 50 or so thousand people driving through your city every night (on 95), and seeing an impressive skyline. It could be a much needed icon for a city that really needs to raise it's profile.
As it stands now, the skyline looks pretty impressive driving through. After all, there's virtually nothing (in terms of urbanism) worth seeing on I-95 between Richmond and South Florida (excluding Jax) or on I-10 between Mobile and Jacksonville. The way the highways rip through the heart of the urban core, you get looks of the skyline from a variety of views during a single trip. In fact, I'd go as far to argue that even the skyline in its current state is deceiving. It makes the city look more lively than it really is. It entices you to get off the highway only to be disappointed in seeing the scene so empty at street level.
The skyline looks fine during the day, impressive actually and yet decieving. At night you can barely see the BofA tower. Most of the lights are timed to turn off around midnight (Wells Fargo Center) and that's fine. No need for them to run all night. I do not think anyone is suggesting that.
Came across this article earlier. Paris' tallest building to get major makeover. Including lighting displays, etc.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324665604579079293620661018.html?mod=itp
The real issue I see still revolves around who pays. It's obvious the current owners of buildings don't view spending money on night lighting worth the negative ROI. Or else, the lights they have cut off would already be on. If this issue can't be resolved, then money will have to come from somewhere else. With that in mind, I believe council slightly slashed the DIA's operating budget last night.
QuoteThe EverBank Center at 301 W. Bay St. is currently 84 percent leased, but AT&T's departure will reduce that to 59 percent, Smith said.
Smith said that will leave the building with largest contiguous block of Class A downtown office space in the Southeast, outside of Atlanta. And she expects that it will need a new company moving into town.
"I don't think we can redo EverBank," she said. "That was a once in a lifetime thing."
EverBank announced in 2011 that it would move its 1,500 employees from the Southside to the former AT&T Tower, which was renamed EverBank Center.
Last year, owner El Ad Florida LLC, listed the building for sale.
Smith said a few offers came it but they weren't accepted and the building was withdrawn from the market.
The owners are about to start work on $4 million-$5 million worth of HVAC and elevator work, Smith said, that should take about a year and a half to complete.
The building was built in 1983. El Ad bought it in 2004 for $90.9 million.
Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/business/2013-08-13/story/downtowns-largest-building-big-hole-fill-att-leaving-everbank-center#ixzz2fuKmfVTR
So Everbank Center (which was so widely celebrated as a huge win for downtown) is half empty. The owners want to sell but can't because offers were too low. They moved in 1,500 workers in a 'once in a lifetime deal'. They are putting $5 million into the building but it is likely required to keep the elevators and AC running. Meanwhile the DIA is debating the market value of a retail spot that has never once had a tenant in it.
By the way Simms, according to Bloomberg the Empire State Building got an offer for $2.1 billion in June.
Kind of sounds like there's a gulf between what we think DT is worth and what the rest of the world believes.
I wonder if this could all be coordinated directly through JEA? Perhaps some sort of rebate program for offsetting some peak hours consumption (using lighting control systems, occupancy sensors, daylight harvesting, etc) that would allow enough savings to keep the lights on at night?
Quote from: thelakelander on September 25, 2013, 07:17:11 AM
As it stands now, the skyline looks pretty impressive driving through. After all, there's virtually nothing (in terms of urbanism) worth seeing on I-95 between Richmond and South Florida (excluding Jax) or on I-10 between Mobile and Jacksonville. The way the highways rip through the heart of the urban core, you get looks of the skyline from a variety of views during a single trip.
This is the very reason I fell in love with Jacksonville when I was little, as my family drove from the DC area to central FL regularly. The various views of the skyline and river, and the long buildup to seeing an urban place after 600 miles of post-Richmond rural driving, made it seem to me like the most intriguing place on the planet.
QuoteIt's obvious the current owners of buildings don't view spending money on night lighting worth the negative ROI. Or else, the lights they have cut off would already be on.
Because it's been dark since after the Super Bowl, many people may not remember that the top of the Bank of America Tower lights up. Liberty doesn't want to pay for the expense of turning those lights on now, so why would they want to pay for the expense to add even more lights?
There are two camps in regards to downtown... those that think it has a marketing problem, and those that think it has a neighborhood problem. I'm not of the opinion that there is a marketing problem. Telling me how awesome it is, doesn't hide the fact that it simply isn't as attractive as nearby vibrant neighborhoods like San Marco or Riverside. Downtown needs to have more special events and more unique businesses, not more window dressing.
Quote from: Wacca Pilatka on September 25, 2013, 09:23:24 AM
Quote from: thelakelander on September 25, 2013, 07:17:11 AM
As it stands now, the skyline looks pretty impressive driving through. After all, there's virtually nothing (in terms of urbanism) worth seeing on I-95 between Richmond and South Florida (excluding Jax) or on I-10 between Mobile and Jacksonville. The way the highways rip through the heart of the urban core, you get looks of the skyline from a variety of views during a single trip.
This is the very reason I fell in love with Jacksonville when I was little, as my family drove from the DC area to central FL regularly. The various views of the skyline and river, and the long buildup to seeing an urban place after 600 miles of post-Richmond rural driving, made it seem to me like the most intriguing place on the planet.
This is funny. I've taken a weird liking to Richmond and Mobile over the years for the same reason. When driving, I'm the guy who refuses to take the bypass when approaching Petersburg.
Quote from: fieldafm on September 25, 2013, 09:29:53 AM
There are two camps in regards to downtown... those that think it has a marketing problem, and those that think it has a neighborhood problem. I'm not of the opinion that there is a marketing problem. Telling me how awesome it is, doesn't hide the fact that it simply isn't as attractive as nearby vibrant neighborhoods like San Marco or Riverside. Downtown needs to have more special events and more unique businesses, not more window dressing.
Bingo. I believe this is a problem locally because we've built this imaginary wall around downtown and many believe it IS the urban core. The reality is people don't want to live in downtowns because the buildings are tall. They desire to live in walkable communities that offer a lifestyle where you can enjoy a diverse range of activities within a compact setting. An environment like Downtown just happens to a form of a walkable community.
However, so is Riverside, San Marco, Springfield and every adjacent neighborhood in this city developed before WWII. We do ourselves a disservice by overlooking this fact and the opportunities created (even for downtown specifically) by connecting these core neighborhoods with reliable multimodal transportation options. Cities grow organically. So all the overregulation and tunnel-visioned dreams earmarked for downtown only lead to the natural market taking advantage of opportunities in adjacent neighborhoods that also offer the walkable environment.