Madison Retail and the Main Street Project

[GarrettCarey]

Has anyone seen a master plan for the Main Street Redevelopment effort in downtown? What about.....

- renderings?
- tenants commitments / prospects?
- residential plans?
- duration?
- cost?
- tax incentives?
- when will we see some ground breaking activity?

Better yet, have they even gotten that far yet? It is not available viat Madison's website and I have not seen it anywhere else. Am I looking in the wrong place? Just curious to see their vision because we have all heard so much about it.

[MustangMonkey]

Besides a little picture I saw in a DMN article (which looked pretty neat) I haven't seen anything specific on the project. Many of the proposed tenants would be the same and simmilar to those of the Victory project, and would begin by being anchored by Niemun Marcus. The trolley would run from Main to McKinney Ave. I remember some of the projects having mixed parking and retail.

I'm sure we will here more stories from the DMN after the victory vote today. It sems like lately there has been less news on Main St.

[GarrettCarey]

Well, I know I have seen some of the small posters posted around downtown with one graphical representation (which is nice), but I was looking for something a little more solid and complete. I guess they just have not made any of it available yet.

I agree with you that we'll probably hear a lot more about it once the Dallas City Council approves Victory project. Unfortunately, Victory has taken the spotlight away from the Main Street effort and the Madison Retail Group. Hopefully Madison has made significant planning progress since they have not been under hte microscope lately. We shall see soon enough.

[jsoto3]

this is all i have seen:

http://www.jsoto3.com/images/main1.jpg

http://www.jsoto3.com/images/main2.jpg

http://www.jsoto3.com/images/main3.jpg

[GarrettCarey]

thanks jsoto

i have seen the first two.....all over downtown, but not the last picture

[MustangMonkey]

Glad I checked back or I would have missed these pics.

[MustangMonkey]

Dose anyone know why there is so much parking around the Adolphus. Is it just for guest or is it public parking.

I stayed there one night last year and my only complant is the constant honking cars in that garage. I've been all over other parts of DT and just here normal traffic, but when I drive by that parking garage at the Adolphus I hear that constant car honking that I heard while I was trying to sleep.

[GarrettCarey]

i believe it contains public parking as well. I live across the street (Manor House) with a similar parking garage scenario. Fortunately for me though, I am higher in the sky. It is , however, pretty annoying when you are exposed to frequently.

[GarrettCarey]

First, has anyone heard anything about the Main Street Project?

Second, I found this article on the International Economic Development Council website. Pretty interesting....even contains some thoughts from Madison. (IEDC (http://www.iedconline.org/EDNow/2_28_02/page3.html))

Here is the article. It is long.
---------------------
Focus on Downtown Revitalization


Big 'D" Gets Downtown Redo
Main Street is Focus of Revitalization Effort

There’s a song by a Texas musician that asks the question: “Did you ever see Dallas from a DC-9 at night?” The song goes on to tell listeners that Dallas is a “jewel” and a “beautiful sight.” And that’s true. The skyline of Dallas is quite impressive, and the city lights stretch as far as the eye can see, even on a DC9 high above the city streets.

Unfortunately, Dallas — certain sections of the downtown, anyway — is actually prettier from a DC-9 than it is up close and personal. A tour around the city’s central business district can quickly turn the city from dazzling to gray in the eyes of the beholder. Oh, sure, there are some highlights, some beautiful old and new architecture and a smattering of restaurants and theaters. But by and large, downtown Dallas has little color, few trees and fewer plants. It is a dizzying compilation of glitzy glass and steel interspersed with boarded-up brick and mortar and prairie-sized asphalt parking lots. And the streets that bustle with traffic during the daylight are desolate by 6 p.m. when the central city’s hundreds of thousands of workers head back to the suburbs.

Dallas’ lackluster downtown was one of the reasons the city lost a bid for Boeing headquarters to Chicago last year. For many, that was the last straw and the catalyst for putting all those plans to revitalize downtown into action. The people of Dallas want to ensure something like the Boeing debacle never happens again.

One such group of people, the Downtown Partnership, Inc., hopes to transform downtown Dallas into a trendy retail area, filled with one-of-a-kind shops, restaurants and other draws. Washington, D.C.-based Madison Retail Group has been selected to develop a “Main Street” shopping area that will draw and retain customers.

The Dallas difference
What makes this effort different from similar projects throughout the country is that it has an estimated buy-in by property owners and building managers of, oh, roughly 100 percent.

The flagging economy is certainly an incentive, as is the downtown’s current average vacancy rate — a combined 29 percent among Class A, B and C office space (Class A alone is at roughly 7-8 percent vacancy) — one of the nation’s highest according to recent newspaper reports. But according to Lake, the driving force behind the property owners’ consensus is the tenacity and vigilance of Dallas land-use attorney Susan Mead, who is also acting director of Downtown Partnership.

Mead, a lifelong resident of Dallas, remembers when downtown was a thriving retail center with movie theatres and other entertainment options. She said the downtown downturn happened gradually, but hit its peak period of decline during the 1970s and ‘80s when the city “made some planning errors.”

Among those errors was the decision to move a large portion of the retail in the city’s main business sector underground. It is, after all, really hot in Dallas during the summer. That, according to Mead, was the beginning of the end for downtown’s retail draw.

By 1996, the problem had become visible, with blight beginning to creep in. That’s the year the Central Dallas Association created a tax increment financing district for sprucing up the downtown core. Since then, the TIF, which was capped at $36 million, but reached that level in six years instead of the estimated 14-year period, has been successfully used to refurbish buildings in the downtown sector. But a cohesive, downtown revitalization project to return retail to the area has never been attempted until now, and there’s still money in those coffers.

“We got that part done,” Mead said of the rehabilitation of some of the older buildings. “But it was apparent to us that the retail wasn’t going to take off until we focused on it.”

Building a consensus
Mead knew that a consensus on whatever plan was formulated would be crucial to the project, so she began talking to property owners about a joint effort to attract retail.

Mead then coordinated a conference call among all of the owners and the 8 to 10 national developers under consideration for the project so that the property owners themselves could interview the developers and be involved in a key part of the process.

“That way, there was buy-in,” she said. Madison Retail Group immediately stood out. There was no question, she said, who would be chosen to bring retail back to downtown Dallas. “Basically, we made a recommendation, [the property owners] made a recommendation, and it was the same recommendation,” Mead said.

Madison’s first step would be to create a plan, then find a way to implement that plan.

Enter Madison
“Dallas is roughly 20 years behind cities like Washington,” said Richard Lake, managing principal of Madison Retail Group. “It has become an urban office campus instead of an urban vibrant city.” Over the last few years, residential units have begun to pop up as developers are turning former Class C office space into living quarters (part of the refurbishment mentioned earlier using some of the TIF funds). In turn, that has led to the attraction of a few restaurants, but for the most part, these new residents must get in their cars and travel to eat, shop for groceries and enjoy nightlife, Lake said.

“Dallas is growing and is expected to continue to create new jobs,” Lake said. “People from urban environments are moving in for those jobs and are looking for urban living.” But right now, they can’t really get it if they want to live in the heart of Dallas. “We need a grocery store and a drug store that doesn’t close at 5 o’clock,” Lake explained.

Madison, which also has offices in Plano, a North Dallas suburb, can begin redevelopment as soon as the city council gives the go-ahead. According to Lake and Mead, that should be soon. The project has the support of most of the board and the city’s new mayor.

Madison’s plan is to create 200,000 to 250,000 square feet of street-level retail space. That will be filled by attracting some new retailers, potentially some of the national restaurant and retail chains represented by Madison, including Restoration Hardware, Ann Taylor, Pier 1 Imports, Capitol Grille and Panera Bread. But Lake said the plan also calls for bringing to the surface many of the retailers from the underground network of tunnels that connect Dallas’ skyscrapers.

Just how Madison and the partnership plan to do that is not yet clear, but Lake said it is vital to the project. “We’ve got to get those people up on street level,” he said. “One of the reasons those retailers survive is there hasn’t been a place for them above ground. But now there will be.”

The project also includes additional entertainment, restaurant and grocery tenants along both sides of three main east-west corridors through the central downtown — Elm, Main and Commerce streets.

Three parking garages are also proposed for the area and will take the place of some of the surface lots currently being used. These garages will be serviced by valet, with drop-off and pick-up points at the eastern- and western-most borders of the revitalization section, plus one in the middle. Mead said the idea is that these valets can get your car for you regardless of which garage you might have parked it in.

“It will be convenient and people won’t have to walk all the way back to their cars,” she said. That could be a big plus for people who want to spend the day shopping, then enjoy dinner and a little entertainment a bit later.

The plan also calls for a total revamping of streetscapes, with a narrowing of streets, improved street parking, more attractive sidewalks, sidewalk cafes, trees and other plantings, a trolley system and loads of signage. The idea is to create an exciting and vibrant area that pedestrians feel comfortable in. In fact, some of the proposed plans make the area look a bit like Times Square in New York City. The addition of some green spaces is also planned because downtown Dallas currently has no attractive parks for people to relax in or stroll through.

Lake said there is no hard-and-fast plan for backfilling the retail space under Dallas’ streets if it is emptied as planned. But Lake thinks a possible reuse could be a subway. The Dallas Area Rapid Transit already provides light rail within close proximity of the downtown area and has plans to someday expand the service, but currently, that expansion is planned to be away from the city.

Lake and others believe that move could be the death knell for downtown. Instead, they are proposing using the existing tunnels under the city for a subway system. This reuse could cut down on costs of expanding the rail.

It is an aggressive plan certainly, but Lake anticipates completion within three years. And by 2006, he expects Dallas’ central business district to be about much more than just business.

The project is expected to help double the downtown residential population by 2006 (from 2,500 to 5,100); increase the office population by nearly 100 percent (from 125,000 to 200,000); create 300 additional hotel rooms; increase parking by 2,000 spaces; and improve occupancy rates to 94 percent.

While property owners will contribute to the cost of the project, it isn’t clear yet what the city’s contribution will be.

[JaeTex]

-Susan Mead's name pops up almost anytime I read about development in Downtown

-I couldn't find the article, but I remember in the last year or so reading her saying that some of the downtown property owners (the folks who own the undeground) had agreed with closing it down, but the proerties remained nameless in the article.

-I worked for short while earlier this summer in 1700 Pacific which has a tortuous parking garage. Rumor had it the reason for this was that when it was built the builder had to leave room for a future Dallas subway.

[KelleyUSA]

Has anyone else noticed that on the rendering (actually the layout diagram)- there is the ABC logo with the word studio in bold lettering. I wonder if ABC is planning on putting a street level studio as part of the Main Street renovation. I guess it could be similiar to that of The Today show in NYC (but on a smaller scale of course). This would actually be a great idea! Any thoughts?

[bloodandpopcorn]

That would be great, but I don't see that actually happening as very likely... At least not yet. But I'm really concerned that there is not more news or any real announcement or movement on the part of Madison to get this project going! Anyone have any idea when they will begin doing something?

[GarrettCarey]

From Thursday's Dallas Business Journal (7/18/2002)
---------------------------------------------
Downtown Partnership names executive director

The Downtown Partnership Inc. has hired Nancy Hormann as its first permanent executive director to lead the group's continuing efforts to revamp a 10-block area of downtown Dallas.

Hormann will begin her duties Aug. 1, replacing Dallas attorney Susan Mead, who has served as the organization's part-time interim executive director since its inception. Mead will continue working with the partnership, while focusing on her law practice with Jenkens & Gilchrist P.C.

Hormann was formerly executive director for the Sacramento Downtown District and worked at the City Center Partnership in San Francisco, where she managed a program to create the Union Square Business Improvement District.

She will be responsible for helping rebrand the 10-block area surrounding Main Street, once the principal retail area of Dallas.

The Downtown Partnership, formed to develop a coordinated approach to attract retailers and restaurateurs to the area, includes such downtown stalwarts as Neiman Marcus.

[bloodandpopcorn]

Do you think this means we'll be seeing some actual movement, or at least activily working towards beginning that movement, in improving this 10-block area?

[GarrettCarey]

I am not sure what it means. Obviously,we all hope to see some progress soon. I have written several emails to various city council members requesting something or anything regarding the progress of Main Street......with no reply. Perhaps they know nothing. Not sure. Hopefully we'll hear something soon via the news, a paper, a website, etc
---------------------------------------
From the GlobeSt.com website (07/18/2002)

Downtown Partnership Hires Hormann as Executive Director
By Jim McCartney
Last updated: Jul 18, 2002 05:10PM

DALLAS-Nancy Hormann is the new Downtown Partnership’s first permanent executive director.
Hormann, who will assume the job Aug. 1, has previously worked as executive director for six years at the Sacramento Downtown District.

She also has worked for the City Center Partnership in San Francisco, where she managed a program to create the Union Square Business Improvement District and helped to reinstate street life in this core of San Francisco retail, according to a prepared statement from the Partnership.

Hormann also has worked as a senior associate with the International Downtown Association, headquartered in Washington, DC, providing consulting and marketing strategies to about 80 clients. In the Partnership's statement, Hormann says Downtown Dallas “is on the cusp” of revival, with the addition of nightlife and a strong residential base recreating a vibrancy it has lost over the last quarter of a century. The Main Street core once served as the principal retail district in Dallas.

Susan Mead, who has served as the organization’s interim executive director since its beginning on a part time basis, will continue working with the Downtown Partnership while focusing on her law practice with Jenkens & Gilchrist, P.C.

As part of its overall redevelopment efforts, the Downtown Partnership of Dallas has hired Madison Retail Group, to help determine tenant mix. Roadside Development, based in Washington, DC, is working on the acquisition of sites for development of stores for major retail tenants such as Gap, Giant Food and Home Depot.

A redevelopment plan, prepared with the assistance of the architectural firm RTKL, serves as a guide and includes a coordinated leasing and marketing strategy, the Partnership says in its statement.

The entire Main Street core will be redeveloped. The plans include new storefronts, rework of historic buildings, signage, streetscape improvements, and public space improvements

[bloodandpopcorn]

Well, we're getting alot of press releases and articles now. That's at least a step in the right direction.

[SweetTalk]

Although I've visited dallasmetropolis.com many times before, today is the first that I've seen the Urban WebBoard. I thought I'd share a letter I recently wrote to the Robert Decherd, chairman of the mayor's Inside the Loop 2003 Committee.

August 18, 2002


Mr. Robert W. Decherd
Inside the Loop 2003 Committee, Chairman
c/o Belo Corporation
P. O. Box 655237
Dallas, Texas 75265-5237

Dear Mr. Decherd:

I read with great interest the front-page article “Out-of-town owners leave area with few champions” in the Sunday, August 4, 2002 edition of The Dallas Morning News. I write today to hopefully provide some data useful to you in your role as chairman of the mayor’s Inside the Loop 2003 Committee and to your mission to revitalize downtown Dallas.

At a recent town hall meeting to discuss the city manager’s proposed budget for FY 2002-03, First Assistant City Manager Mary Suhm reported that Dallas sales tax revenues are projected to drop to $183,749,503, a 15% decrease from their peak of $216,933,485 in FY 1999-00. Furthermore, Dallas sales tax reporting outlets decreased by 14% between 1996 and 2001 according to information obtained from the website of the Texas Comptroller for Public Accounts. For the sake of our city’s financial health, I strongly encourage you and your committee to consider what must be done downtown to help stem this decline in city sales tax revenues and to increase Dallas’ retail activity.

Every day, between 100,000 and 135,000 people live, work, or visit downtown Dallas, less than one square mile within the boundaries of Woodall Rogers, North Central Expressway, Julius Schepps Freeway, and Interstates 30 and 35E. This daytime population is roughly equivalent to the citizenry of Alexandria, VA, Bellevue, WA, Cambridge, MA, Pasadena, CA, Savannah, GA, or Stamford, CT. With such a population density up to 71 times greater than the residential population densities of any of these cities, why can downtown Dallas not support a greater retail presence than currently exists? I believe that it can if Dallas will target and recruit the types of retail establishments that are attractive to the types of people living, working, or visiting downtown Dallas.

Perhaps you or your staff at Belo are familiar with Claritas Inc., an Arlington, Virginia-based marketing information company, as it is a sister company to ACNielsen Corporation. Using complex statistical techniques that employ census data as well as consumer data, Claritas determined that every community in the United States could accurately be assigned to one of 62 PRIZM clusters. The PRIZM segmentation system is based on the familiar adage, "birds of a feather flock together." When choosing a place to live, people tend to seek out neighborhoods compatible with their lifestyles, where they find others in similar circumstances with similar consumer behavior patterns. Once established, the character of a neighborhood tends to persist over time, though individual residents come and go. Each PRIZM cluster represents a unique neighborhood type with its own lifestyle and consumer behavior patterns. Cluster nicknames, such as Blue Blood Estates and Winner's Circle, are intended to capture each cluster's essential characteristics.

Claritas produces a Workplace PRIZM report compiled from Census Bureau commuting data. This report provides information about the PRIZM cluster composition of the population working in an area. PRIZM cluster distributions are estimated by adjusting distributions in the tracts and ZIP codes where commuters work by weighted averages of the block group level distributions in the tracts and ZIP codes where commuters live. I ran such a report last week for the downtown Dallas area described above, and I write today to share them with you.
Who are they? According to this Workplace PRIZM report, 73,052 people work inside the loop. 23 of the 62 PRIZM clusters comprise over 75% of the downtown Dallas workforce and are represented at rates that exceed the proportion of each of these clusters among the U.S. population. I have highlighted a few of these below with descriptions from the enclosed book The Clustered World by Michael Weiss:

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Kids & Cul-de-sacs makes up 8.50% of the downtown Dallas workforce but only 3.81% of the U.S. population. These conservative parents of upscale suburban families shop at Costco, buy computer CD-ROMs, own two or more VCRs, and drive minivans and Mitsubishi Diamantes far more than the average American.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Gray Collars comprises 4.50% of the downtown Dallas workforce but only 1.94% of the U.S. population. These liberal, aging service workers, clerks, and low-level management types tend to be high school graduates living in single-family homes in the inner suburbs. They purchase lottery tickets, frequent Wal-Mart, attend auto races, and drive Ford Tempos, Mercury Topazes, and Buick Skylarks more often than the average American.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Young Influentials constitute 2.92% of the downtown Dallas workforce but only 1.13% of the U.S. population. These upwardly mobile suburban couples and singles tend to be political independents with few party loyalties, and they purchase jazz CDs and tapes, subscribe to online services, accumulate frequent-flier miles, and drive BMWs, Mazda Miatas, and Honda Preludes at more than twice the U.S. average.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Mobility Blues makes up 3.23% of the downtown Dallas workforce but only 1.24% of the U.S. population. These moderate-to-conservative, young, working-class married couples and single parents have high rates for attending professional sports games like basketball but don’t tend to vote due to their transient nature. They watch Cinemax at more than twice the U.S. average and listen to Spanish radio at almost four times the U.S. average. They tend to drive Kias, Suzukis, and Hyundais.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Young Literati are liberal, upscale urban couples and singles that comprise 2.43% of the downtown Dallas workforce but only 0.90% of the U.S. population. They go skiing, have passports, use American Express cards, watch foreign videos, and buy gourmet coffee beans at more than twice the U.S. average. They drive Audis, Volkswagens, and BMWs at more than three times the U.S. average.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp New Beginnings, filled with young educated singles and couples just starting out on their career paths or starting over after divorces, layoffs, or company transfers, constitutes 3.40% of the downtown Dallas working population but only 1.07% of Americans. They tend to be white-collar professionals who live in multi-unit rental dwellings. They scuba dive, play volleyball, buy microwaves, and drive Suzuki SUVs, Mitsubishi Eclipses, and Mercury Capris at twice the U.S. average.

·&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Bohemian Mix constitutes the largest percentage of downtown Dallas workers at 8.68% and is concentrated at a level almost ten times the U.S. average. In addition, 100% of residents inside the loop fall within this cluster. This progressive, multiracial mix of inner-city students, executives, writers, and public interest activists represents the most liberal lifestyle type in America. Nearly three-quarters of all Bohemian Mixers are single or divorced and an estimated third of this population is gay, continuing the cluster’s reputation as a haven for alternative lifestyles. They watch foreign videos, shop at Victoria’s Secret, drink imported beer, and drive Alfa Romeos, Volkswagens, Audis, and Saabs at a rate more than twice that of the average American.

Where do they shop? Claritas has linked its PRIZM clusters to product and lifestyle preferences that come from giant market research companies such as Mediamark Research Inc. and Simmons Market Research Bureau. The table below provides an example using two Dallas area-based department stores and my favorite apparel store, Banana Republic. An index of 100 represents the U.S. average. The seven clusters highlighted above comprise one-third of the downtown Dallas workforce with an average ratio three times greater than the U.S. population. As a group, they appear 6% more likely to shop at Neiman-Marcus, 2% less likely to shop at JC Penney, and 42% more likely to shop at Banana Republic than the average American. However, when we look more closely, only Young Literati is more likely to shop at Neiman-Marcus, and they do so at a rate four times that of the U.S. population. Four of the seven clusters are more likely to shop at Banana Republic than the average American.




When do they shop? Using the same lifestyle preferences from Mediamark Research Inc., the table below shows that these seven clusters are 7% less likely to shop in the afternoon and 11% more likely to shop in the evening than the U.S. population at large.



At the Claritas Precision Marketing Conference held last month in San Diego, I was surprised to learn that the real estate and retail sectors have adopted this available data and technology more slowly than other sectors such as automotive, communications, energy, financial services, and media. I encourage you or your staff to contact Claritas for a more thorough analysis in order to target and recruit the types of retail establishments that will attract to the types of people living, working, or visiting downtown Dallas. Such a complete analysis could include the downtown population’s propensity to shop at other stores such as Abercrombie & Fitch, Albertson’s, Ann Taylor, Blockbuster, CompUSA, Dillards, Eckerd, Eddie Bauer, Express, Foot Locker, Gap, Kroger, the Limited, Macy’s, Nordstrom, Office Depot, Radio Shack, Saks Fifth Avenue, Sam’s Club, 7-Eleven, and Target to name a few. The gentleman at Claritas with whom I’ve had the most contact is Mike Gersztyn. He may be reached at 800-234-5973 ext. 702, and I’m sure he would welcome your call.

I’ve also included another of my favorite books for your review – The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs. Although published over forty years ago, much of her book rings true today. Ms. Jacobs provides real-life examples and observations of how the built environment influences the ways people actually behave in cities instead of how urban planners, politicians, and bureaucrats think they should behave. Probably the most famous adherents to the principles she outlined in this book are urban planners and architects Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, who recently designed Legacy Town Centre in Plano.

In closing, I hope that this letter has provided some information that may be useful to you and your committee in your effort to revitalize downtown. I thank you for your consideration and wish you the best of luck in your endeavor. Please let me know if I may be of any assistance.

Sincerely,





Kyle C. Talkington



CC:&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Ms. Jan Hart Black, Greater Dallas Chamber
The Hon. Veletta Forsythe Lill, Dallas City Council
The Hon. Laura Miller, Mayor, City of Dallas
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Ms. Susan Mead, Downtown Partnership, Inc.
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Mr. Gerald A. Sampson, Neiman-Marcus

[gc]

Just an FYI....I have emailed more folks than I can remember in an attempt uncover where the Madison Retail work stands. Would anyone believe that I have gotten ZERO responses? No real surprise to me, but thought maybe we could hear something other than the Iron Cactus signing and more than what is available via the downtowndallas.org website. Does anyone have ideas as to a better way to get info....or should we all contiue to be patient?

[bloodandpopcorn]

I've actually gone to their "office" downtown, in/near the kirby building, and knocked on the door. Eventually a woman came out and waved me away, seeming to mouth "We don't sell anything here". So I responded "I'm looking for some information!" and she waved me off again, turned around, and disappeared.

Perhaps a letter to the editor of the Dallas Morning News would be a step forward, complaining about how "secretive" the Project people are being, and requesting (if not demanding) more information. I'm not by any means the best writer, so I'd rather not be responsible... I tend to be too vague and not really focus where I should. But I think a letter to the editor, at least one, maybe more, would bring as much, if not more, sucess than anything else we could attempt...

[tamtagon]

Much of my professional background is based in market research, and the PRIZM data shared with us are very valuable. Tracking the change of the downtown popluations, resident and transient, would be a wise investment for the city, and perhaps as juicy as a tax abaitment to lure potential occupants into the area.

I was discouraged to learn from another post that the downtown population is only just over 2,000.

[gc]

By the way, I am not sure how many of you are aware of this but you can sign up for a free weekly newsletter at www.downtowndallas.org.

Also, here are some interesting facts from that website that you may not know (not sure when they were updated).

[list=a]
An estimated 2,500 people live within the Downtown freeway loop.
Over 30,000 people live within a one-mile area of Downtown.
78% of these residents have at least an undergraduate degree; the median age is 34 years; and the median annual household income is $88,158.
Downtown is the largest employment center in North Texas with a workforce that exceeds 125,000 people.
Downtown is home to over 2,500 businesses including three Fortune 500 companies, 7 of the 10 largest metro area accounting firms and 7 of the 10 largest banks.
There are more than 75,000 off-street parking spaces in Downtown.
Two miles of underground and one mile of elevated pedestrian walkways provide weekday access to approximately 250 restaurants, store and retail services.
Approximately 41,000 Downtown employees use DART to commute to work.
Office space in Downtown totals 29.4 million square feet with an occupancy rate of 75%.
Downtown hosts over 200 special events each year which draw nearly 1.5 million spectators.
[/list=a]


Oh yeah, here is some more news I read in my apartment newsletter.....

"The Dallas City Council approved the design contracts for the upgrades of Elm and Commerce streets the full length of Downtown, from Industrial Blvd. to US 75. The work involves grinding the road surface and repairing the sub-base, repair and upgrades of the sidewalks and other pedestrian amenties."

To me, this is great news.....I live on Commerce Street and man..... this is GREAT stuff. I do not know how many of you actually drive downtown......but commerce and elm are T-E-R-R-I-B-L-E! This is certainly a step in the right direction.

[freewaytincan]

Offices are back up to 75%? Last I saw, I thought it stood at 71% or so. Anyway, what about residential? Where is it? ;)

[psukhu]

If the current downtown population is 2500, what is the anticipated growth for 2003?


The city is focusing on the infrastructure, which is good. (streets, sidewalks, etc)

The city should also focus on growing the residential population. The retail businesses will pop up to serve the residential population, just like they do in new suburban developments. The future grocery store on main is evidence of that.

[MustangMonkey]

Garrett:
That is good news for Elm and Commerce.
The bad street condition of those two roads can be masked when a whole lot of cars are on the road, but durring the quiet times it just makes the area look bad, and without all the city noise you can hear every bump and thump.

[gc]

In case anyone else was wondering, The Madison Retail Group is completely out of the Main Street Redevelopment effort. Nancy Hormann was hired to lead the entire effort. I knew she was brought in to lead but I was not aware of the departure by MRG. Anyways, this is just fyi. Below is a response I got from Nancy. I encourage others to email her as well.



The Madison Group has not been part of that plan for about 18 months, I am heading it up and we have had great success with the restaurants, we brought in Izmir, Iron Cactus, Pegaso, City Tavern and Metropolitan. We are just about to get a program started that is designed to attract retailers, it is an incentive program created to entice unique retail to Main Street. The most important thing we had to do first is get the buildings redeveloped so we had places to house the retailers. That is an ongoing process and many new projects are in the works. As for the website, The Partnership is only responsible for the Main Street portion of that site the rest is maintained by the CDA and I cannot speak for them as to how often they update. As for the Main Street portion we try and update once a month and should be current at the moment. Things
change quickly and we try and stay on top of it.
Hope that helps

[tamtagon]

God, I wish the Trolly could extend to Union Station, up Main St through Deep Ellum, and over to Citiplace along Haskell.


The most important thing we had to do first is get the buildings redeveloped so we had places to house the retailers. The most important thing we need to do second is make it easy to get around with out a car.

[tamtagon]

As I see it, for Dallas to include this coveted urban environment, vaulting DFW into the arena of world-class citite hinges on the gentrification of neighborhoods east of Central, west of Fair Park and south of Haskell.

I'm not really sure what to call this area, it covers such a lopsided demographic, but geographically, the area is excellent in Dallas. Ross Ave. has the potential to expand the Arts District to the other side of the highway - perhaps this would be the location of a theater row. This area needs to become the most densely populated of Dallas County. Turtle Creek and uptown will be treated to all upscale developments, but this area NE of the CBD needs the actualization of living quarters for another 100,000 "less affluent" people. Volume will balance the lack of disposable income, and foster creative living and the greatest variety of retail outlets. The next array of TIF-related programs the city should be planning right now is to support and manage the development of highest density, affordable developments NE of the CBD.