Downtown development recap

[DowntownDan]

Are there any drawings of what the Bill White building will look like after renovation?

[Red Arrow]

Are there any drawings of what the Bill White building will look like after renovation?

A parking lot.

[TheArtist]

Are there any drawings of what the Bill White building will look like after renovation?

I have been curious about that too, did a little searching, but haven't found anything.

[DTowner]

Are there any drawings of what the Bill White building will look like after renovation?

Based on the fresh coat of blue paint the main structure recently received (and new windows on the upper floor), it looks like that part of the development it is going to look the same as now.

[AdamsHall]

Are there any drawings of what the Bill White building will look like after renovation?

I drive by pretty much every workday and it is difficult to picture how this development will turn out.  I applaud their effort, but that appears to be a tough space to make usable as apartments.  That said, including "5 restaurants" may answer some questions.

[AdamsHall]

Looks like dirt work has started on the Urban 8 lots.

[Townsend]

From their FB page:

If you drive down 3rd Street in downtown Tulsa, check out the construction. We are super excited!

[TheArtist]

This development up and going and the Bill White one finishing up is really going to make a difference for the East End.  Right now there is still just too much empty and run down to have that area be recognizable as "the next up and coming big thing for downtown". But these two and then people visioning the other developments that are planned to go in, will definitely turn the tide with that and help those developers "without much vision" see the potential.  

The east side of downtown really has the potential to become that pedestrian friendly "Urban neighborhood" type are that so many of us long for Tulsa to have. I would really like to see a lot of pedestrian friendly residential go in there to have that area feed into the core of downtown (aka by my shop lol) and other areas for work, dining and shopping. Course if we ever develop a retail corridor somewhere downtown that is where I would like my current shop and future ones to go.

Some day I would like to have either a multi-story department store type place, thats just as much an interesting and fun attraction as it is a place to shop, and or multiple fun shops of different types all up and down one street. Just depends on how downtown develops and how creative and hard working I can be to make it happen.  I will either succeed or die trying lol.  If this Christmas is good enough, I would really like to branch off part of my current shop and open another store next year or the year after at the latest.  I would love to do an imaginative and fun toy-store with different themed areas, a really unique bookstore, a retro inspired gift shop, a mens store, a women's store, a flashy art deco themed decor place also having fun gifts, all as different shops or as one multi-floor department store (like Harrods but even more over the top and entertaining).  Downtown should have the best and most creative of everything.  

[carltonplace]

There has been some activity in the east end in the last two years. Remember that Hodges Bend is less than two years old. Guru Stu is rehabbing a row of brick buildings on third street right accross from Urban 8 and there is some new retail and new lofts near Lansing. The old Living Arts building has something going on too.

[DowntownDan]

I guess this goes here too.  Take it for what its worth.

Work starting again on downtown First Street Lofts

Posted: Thursday, July 31, 2014 12:00 am | Updated: 9:25 am, Thu Jul 31, 2014.

By KYLE ARNOLD World Business Writer | 3 comments

Work on the long-anticipated First Street Lofts in the Blue Dome District is set to start again, said downtown developer Michael Sager.

Sager and his real estate group Blue Dome Properties LLC have started work after years of delay on the apartment portion of the former Jacobs Hotel site at 310 E. First St. with plans to offer the project for bids in the coming weeks.

"We have been working for three to four months to revise all of our construction plans for completion," Sager said.

With the new plans, Sager said construction could start in the next 60 days, with 180 days of scheduled construction. That timeline would put the completion of the project sometime in the early spring of 2015 with apartment leasing to start shortly after.

The 40,000-square-foot building has five floors, with apartments planned for the second through fifth stories.

Sager has been working on the First Street Lofts project since before 2007, when his company was granted $1.3 million from the original Vision 2025 tax.

"It's just been all about timing and the cash to make it happen," Sager said.

Originally, Sager and his company had hoped to finished the apartment section of the building first, and then come in later with ground-level retail.

But retailers were eager to move in with the boom in commercial property demand in the Blue Dome and Brady districts.

The S&J Oyster House restaurant reopened on the ground level of the First Street Lofts building in 2012, alongside liquor retailer Whiskey Business.

The property also has room for a third retail business on the east end of the building, but that space won't be open to a tenant until after the apartment sections are done, he said. That's because contractors will need that space to finish the upstairs space.

While Sager has been planning the lofts for more than a decade, he and his investment partners have actually owned the building since 1997.

Sager has revised the plans for the lofts substantially since his originally designs in 2007 and 2008.

He is now planning for 23 units on the property, ranging from 700 to 1,100 square feet. The old plans called for units up to 2,000 square feet.

"We just want some diversity. This is not a cookie-cutter project at all," he said.

Sager said the core systems in the building are finished, including electric, heating and air and plumbing. The remaining work, he said, will be to finish building the actual apartments.

So far there aren't any firm commitments for renters, but Sager said he isn't asking for commitments until the property is actually done.

"I can pick up the phone and call 12 or 15 people, but we haven't been prepared because we want people to see it before they sign anything," Sager said.

Kyle Arnold 918-581-8380

kyle.arnold@tulsaworld.com

http://www.tulsaworld.com/business/realestate/work-starting-again-on-downtown-first-street-lofts/article_28172494-5c1c-539c-ac17-50a030758b0d.html

[Townsend]

I guess this goes here too.  Take it for what its worth.

What do you think it's worth?

[DowntownDan]

What do you think it's worth?

I'll believe that the lofts will be complete when they are complete and not a second sooner.

[Townsend]

I'll believe that the lofts will be complete when they are complete and not a second sooner.

When the people move in and realize the plumbing's not actually connected to anything?

[DTowner]

It's good to see Sager has reactivated his PR firm (a/k/a The Tulsa World).  I believe this project will eventurally be completed, I just don't know the decade in which that will happen.

[AquaMan]

2007. What were you doing in 2007? It took a lot less time to build this hotel in what......1910?