Buffalo Rising Online

Any interested retail /restaurants yet?

Im all in favor of the Liberty Building going condo

Infact, the truth is that the Lafayette should be converted to condo right alongside the Liberty and the Statler.

The stupidest thing had to be Snyder refusing to make the Hyatt a mixed use condo/hotel.

Now on with the cobblestone district, since you have an update on 95 Perry WHAT ABOUT THE REDEVELOPMENT OF THE FAIRMONT CREMERY?

AND YOU KNOW IF WOULDNT HURT TO PUT A FEW REDEVELOPMENT IDEAS OUT THERE FOR THE ADM/GREAT NORTHERN!

Although a bit nondescript on the outside, this is an incredible building. Because I've been interested in graduate school in historic preservation, and was doing a project for a client right across the street from this adaptive reuse project, Savarino generously offered me a tour of this building with their project site manager. The first floor is a forest of concrete columns easily two feet in diameter (probably more). These columns going up through the building provided enough load bearing at the uppermost levels for heavy motorized equipment to be driven around (and taken up and down in massive elevators). If memory serves, the building is so over-built compared to current requirements, that plans call for some of the columns to be removed to open up the floor plans.

Great people doing a great project with a great building - what could be better?

Luxury Condos in the Liberty Building would be awsome.

Rochacha is right on about these kinds of buildings. They were designed and built above and beyond what anyone would consider constructing today. That is why they are so well suited for rehab. If you tried to build a structure today with these same load requirements you would get laughed at and slapped with some ridiculously huge bill.

Again, this building is going to be occupied by mostly government tenants. Not exactly a benchmark of downtown redevelopment nor an example of a strongly rebounding market. The lack of residential in this project also does not bode well for an area that has a proven track record of successful housing.

None-the-less, this is still a good project. Chris Jacobs and Sam Savarino are true friends of downtown and have little else to prove. Let's hope that this is just a starting block of a larger redevelopment of that block that will involve plenty of mixed-uses.

Rochacha,

These industrial buildings tend to be the easiest residential conversions and utilize the historic tax credits as there is not much historic material that must be preserved. Unfortunately most of the Cobblestone district lost its warehouses, and most others are not in "desirable" parts of town for redevelopment. Hopefully the Trico building will soon be rehabbed.