New nuCLEus, sans apartments, eyed for summer start

Stark Enterprises wants to get started on building nuCLEus to

meet the timetable of its anchor tenant. So the Cleveland real

estate developer has slimmed the planned office building and

removed the apartment tower to trim more than $100 million

from the prior plan's $353 million construction cost (Cresco).

CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

If at first you don't succeed, try, try, try again.

Stark Enterprises has publicly released a third iteration of its proposed nuCLEus development. And sources say that Stark has the resources to move forward with a groundbreaking based on this plan as soon as the city's design review boards can meet again and act on it.

This version eliminates or delays residential in the project, now focusing on a single tower for offices only, rising above a large parking deck with ground-floor retail. Each new mixed-use concept by Stark for nuCLEus has eliminated a use from the prior variation.

The first, 2014 version was envisioned as a $500 million, 54-story structure with a hotel bridging between office and residential buildings, above a pedestal of parking and retail. The second version retained the retail/parking pedestal but perched atop it two separate 24-story towers of office and residential, costing $353 million.

The pedestal remains as does one tower -- an office building called One nuCLEus Place. But it would stand alone atop the far north end of the pedestal. Spaces were left open atop the east and south portions of the pedestal, perhaps for a future residential tower to rise someday.

The office tower, named One nuCLEus Place, would rise 25
stories and feature 340,000 square feet of Class A space, 73
percent of which is already spoken for, Stark says (Cresco).

E-mails sent to Stark Chief Operating Officer Ezra Stark seeking more information were not returned prior to publication. He acknowledged receiving them, however.

Stark is seeking to get shovels into the ground this summer for the office tower-only plan for a pressing reason. Its prospective anchor tenant, Benesch, Friedlander, Coplan & Aronoff, one of the region's largest and fastest-growing law firms, is quickly approaching the end of its lease at 200 Public Square. That lease will expire in July 2022.

It will take about two years for the pedestal and office tower to be built. But Stark executives apparently aren't worried about losing Benesch to another building in downtown Cleveland. They said they're worried about losing them to another city such as Chicago or San Francisco where Benesch also has offices.

Stark executives said recently they are concerned that Benesch will go the way of other major Cleveland law firms like Jones Day and relocate their growing number of employees to larger cities. A trophy office building could be a major recruiting tool for Benesch, Stark executives said in recent media interviews.

New site plan for nuCLEus shows the ground level uses, most
of which are for the 103,000 square feet of retail and restaurant
uses. The plan preserve the "laneway" linking Prospect Avenue
and Huron Road. But it also shows the Herold Building, at 310-
320 Prospect, expanded as an office building with a larger foot-
print and a vertical addition giving it eight stories (Cresco).

Benesch pledged to take 180,000 square feet of office space at nuCLEus. Another 68,000 square feet of office space was spoken for by other potential tenants, including Stark Enterprises for its headquarters. In total, those tenants would have filled 62 percent of the previously planned, 400,000-square-foot nuCLEus office tower.

But the new nuCLEus office tower is proposed to be 340,000 square feet. With the commitments in hand, Stark has 73 percent of that building already spoken for.

Another factor involved in Stark's desire to move forward immediately is the historically low interest rates. The low "cost of money" reduces the cost of borrowing for construction projects. For those projects like nuCLEus that have been just shy of their capital financing goals, low interest rates can help them stretch over the fiscal finish line.

There is no publicly available construction cost estimate for the new nuCLEus plan yet. Stark had all but about $15 million in hand or pledged to build the previous version -- a gap which it had hoped to fill with a Transformational Mixed Use Development tax credit, the legislation for which is pending in the Ohio General Assembly but stalled because of the COVID-19 crisis.

This image, showing the outdoor greenspaces on the rooftop
of the parking garage, is oriented with north at the bottom.
The top, or south side of the deck, may be reserved for a
future building such as apartments, hotel or additional
offices atop the parking structure (Cresco).

Eliminating or delaying the apartment building from the project certainly helps Stark deliver the rest of nuCLEus sooner. Although the cost of the discarded apartment tower isn't publicly known either, it represents a hefty savings.

For comparison, Stark spent $95 million building the 19-story, 187-unit, roughly 260,000-square-foot Beacon apartment tower atop the existing, 9-story 515 Euclid garage a block away. That tower was completed last year.

And, at Euclid Avenue and East 17th Street, the Playhouse Square Foundation is spending $138 million to build the 34-story, 318-unit, 602,000-square-foot Lumen Apartments and associated 550-space garage. This tower is scheduled to receive its first residents in June.

Based on the scale of those projects and their construction costs, less the cost of a garage, nuCLEus' discarded 250-unit apartment tower would have measured about 350,000 square feet and cost upwards of $100 million to build.

Outdoor greenspaces on the roof of the parking garage would
provide private terraces for the fourth-floor office tenant while
the eighth-level observation deck would open to all tenants of
One nuCLEus Place office tenants (Cresco).

According to a presentation made publicly available by Stark's real estate brokerage Cresco within One nuCLEus Place's listing, the new design for nuCLEus shows a still-large development totaling roughly 1 million square feet among all proposed uses including parking.

That breaks down to 340,000 square feet of highly sought after Class A office space downtown, 103,000 square feet of retail and 34,000 square feet of amenity space. Despite the office building's reduction and the elimination of the 250-unit apartment tower, the number of parking spaces in the six-level deck would remain roughly the same at 1,375 parking spaces, equaling about 450,000 square feet.

One nuCLEus Place would rise on 2.18 acres of land owned by a partnership of Stark and J-Dek Investments Ltd. Most of that land is used for parking, totaling 600 spaces in a surface lot and a 7-level garage on Huron Road that would be demolished. Also succumbing to the wrecking ball would be a two-story commercial building on Prospect Avenue featuring Mr. Albert's Mens World clothing store.

It's interesting to note that, when compared to the previous plan, Stark seeks to decrease the amount of office space from 400,000 square feet to 340,000 square feet while increasing the height of the remaining high-rise by one story to 25 floors. The number of office floors within that high rise would also increase from 16 to 18 while the new floorplates are about 500 square feet smaller. The building's height would remain at 350 feet, however.

One nuCLEus Place is a 25-story
tower (18 floors of offices atop a
seven-level pedestal of retail and
parking). Compared to the previ-
ous design for nuCLEus' office
tower, the new version is a little
skinnier but is the same height in
feet but one story taller (Cresco).

On the other hand, the amount of retail Stark proposes would increase from 77,820 square feet to 103,000. No retail tenants were announced or names otherwise depicted in the new nuCLEus presentation. Cordish Companies previously pledged to lease 48,000 square feet for a sports-entertainment venue called Cleveland Live! at nuCLEus.

While Stark retained a "laneway" -- an alley lined with shops, restaurants and courtyards -- in its new design, it abandoned the idea of opening up East 4th south of Prospect to pedestrians. The first nuCLEus plan would have closed East 4th to vehicular traffic between Prospect and High Street. The second plan narrowed East 4th as a southbound-only, one-lane street. The new plan has East 4th as a two-way street south of Prospect.

In one of the e-mails to Stark, NEOtrans also inquired about a rendering recently posted on the real estate listing service LoopNet, showing a renovation and expansion of the historic but vacant and condemned Herold Building, 310 Prospect Ave.

As shown, the four-story Herold Building would become an eight-story building, and expanded laterally on to the neighboring parking lot at 320 Prospect. The Stark/J-Dek partnership also owns the Herold Building and the parking lot at the southwest corner of Prospect and East 4th. Expanded, the Herold Building would be about 60,000 gross square feet -- possibly accounting for the 60,000 square feet reduction of One nuCLEus Place.

Stark and J-Dek Investments propose to expand the Herold
Building vertically (by four more stories -- note the eighth
story is set back) and horizontally onto a parking lot at East
4th Street and Prospect Avenue (NBBJ Architects).

Last summer, Stark sought to demolish the Herold Building but was turned down by the Landmarks Commission. The Historic Gateway Neighborhood Corp. offered to work with Stark on securing tax credits and other financing to help rehabilitate the building.

Tom Yablonsky, executive director of Historic Gateway, did not return a phone call and an e-mail seeking more information prior to publication.

An expanded Herold Building is proposed to be renovated and expanded as an office building with a ground-floor retail or restaurant space, according to the new site plan for nuCLEus. It specifically identifies an office lobby entrance off East 4th and a 5,895-square-foot ground-floor retail space. The Herold site is across 4th Street from the nuCLEus site.

Just west of the Herold Building are several more decaying, low-level buildings. One of them, 300 Prospect, is listed for sale. The owners, a joint venture between the Weston Group and Bobby George, reportedly would take the building off the market and redevelop it if nuCLEus goes forward, said a source who spoke off the record because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly about it. The vacant building, once home to Record Rendezvous, served as one of the cradles of Rock n' Roll.

END

Demolition, groundbreaking this week for big Ohio City project

Site preparation is already under way, and demolition of the
Market Plaza retail strip will be followed by excavation of the
Ohio City site for the first phase of Harbor Bay's huge Market
Square project. It's across the street from the West Side Market,
seen in the background of this northward-looking view (KJP).
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

Demolition work is scheduled to start today for the $140 million Intro phase of the Market Square development in Cleveland's Ohio City neighborhood. But if you wanted to attend a groundbreaking ceremony for this mixed-use project, the coronavirus crisis has made that risky and unnecessary.

There's still going to be a groundbreaking in the coming days, just not a ceremony, said Dan Whalen, vice president of design and development at Chicago-based Harbor Bay Realty Advisors LLC.

"No formal groundbreaking is scheduled at this point due to COVID-19," he said. "We're pushing onward quietly."

But not invisibly. Crews were busy in the past week with site preparation -- putting up construction barriers and fencing around the roughly 2-acre site at Lorain Avenue and West 25th Street.

Also, workers have been installing larger sewers below West 25th, Lorain and Gehring avenues since March 23 to accommodate the 558,000-square-foot development. Most of that work was set by the city to occur during the overnight hours, scheduled before the pandemic and its sharp reduction of vehicular traffic made that workaround moot.

The project includes a 350,000-square-foot first phase, comprised of a nine-story residential building over ground-level retail and 550 below-ground parking spaces. When an anchor office tenant is signed, Harbor Bay will pursue a roughly 208,000-square-foot second phase in an 11- to 12-story building just south of the mostly residential first phase.

The suburban-scale Market Plaza has occupied the southeast
corner of Lorain Avenue and West 25th Street for more than
30 years. Larger-scale developments that would be more befit-
ting of this urban, high-profile site were proposed over the
years until the Ohio City residential market evolved to the
point where a large, mixed-use development like Market
Square finally became feasible (KJP).

Demolition of the 1989-built Market Plaza retail strip will take only a few days. Once the debris is cleared, construction crews will start excavating the site for the underground parking garage, Whalen said.

Ward 3 Councilman Kerry McCormack said he remembered the first rendering that came out for the site from a different developer in 2013.

"Seven years later, it's beyond exciting to see that work is starting," McCormack  said. "West 25th and Lorain is one of the best locations in the City of Cleveland and it will finally be the intersection it deserves to be. This corner is now reaching its potential."

At the intersection is the iconic West Side Market, the United Bank Building, Market Ave/Market Sq. Park and now a bustling mixed-use, transit-oriented development, he said.

The first phase consists of a 290-unit apartment building over 36,000 square feet of ground-level commercial spaces. Some of the commercial spaces are two stories tall, namely those facing Lorain and the south side of the West Side Market. Most of the commercial spaces will be retail and restaurants. But Whalen wasn't ready to reveal who they might be.

"Can't say just yet," he said. "The names are coming soon. But we're definitely going to gear towards local-service, neighborhood, daily-use-type stuff. A few (will be) food and beverage businesses, but a handful of other stuff."

Compare to the same view above, the corner of Lorain and
West 25th will look vastly different by the middle of 2021.
Indeed, the corner is already looking different as the Mar-
ket Plaza retail strip comes down (HBREA).

Exterior renderings of the development are being refined to reflect tenants' space usage needs and signage. However, getting city approvals may be difficult for some time as the city design review boards aren't meeting -- virtually or otherwise.

Existing zoning allows a building on this site up to 12 stories tall. But the height of the second phase -- the office building -- could be less depending on the tenant mix. There also is no minimum square footage of office leases Harbor Bay needs to have signed before it can move forward on the office building, Whalen added.

"There's no set number," he said. "It depends on any number of things. It's completely subjective on our part."

Cost of building the entire development is estimated at $175 million. On March 20, Harbor Bay closed on the bulk of its project financing -- up to $130 million in taxable lease bonds from the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority. Some of that could be used for the second phase when the need arises.

The project also has a $10.8 million loan from the Ohio Development Services Agency and a $2 million loan from the city of Cleveland. Harbor Bay is contributing up to $30 million, Whalen said.

Construction is due to take about 18 months. When completed, Market Square will be the largest mass timber-framed building in the United States. The wood is being imported from Austria through the Port of Cleveland.

END

Coronavirus crisis casualties in Cleveland real estate

The 12th+AVE condos on East 12th Street downtown will
instead be apartments as Geis Companies anticipates that
renting the homes will be easier than selling them in the
economic aftermath of the coronavirus crisis (GLSD).
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

UPDATED APRIL 10, 2020

While the temporary scaling back of spending for the Sherwin-Williams' (SHW) new headquarters+research (HQ+R&D) project is probably the most notable impact from the coronavirus crisis, it isn't the only one in Greater Cleveland.

It's important to note that no real estate development project, so far, has completely succumbed to the crisis. But several have been delayed or modified to deal with our suddenly changed economic reality.

With the SHW HQ+R&D project, CEO John Morikis said in a video and a letter to employees this week that its sales remain solid during the crisis. However, SHW is reducing spending on HQ+R&D consultants to support the company's social distancing and remote staffing activities.

The need for the HQ+R&D remains -- to consolidate employees from multiple locations into fewer facilities -- and SHW staff continue to work on it. So SHW's plan to move into its new HQ+R&D facilities in 2023 also remains intact.

A preliminary massing of the Sherwin-Williams headquarters
in downtown shows a potential first phase in blue/green with
later phases in red and yellow. The project continues albeit
with less use of outside consultants to save money for the
company's coronavirus recovery efforts (WKYC).

The London Stock Exchange Group's (LSEG) ELITE initiative headquarters project has reportedly been pushed to the back burner during the crisis. The international business support program had hoped to establish its Cleveland's presence in the first quarter of 2020.

A downtown office with about 40 employees at the outset was envisioned -- and reportedly still is. But with domestic travel severely reduced, international travel virtually halted and the need to help businesses and employees recover from the crisis, the LSEG's attention is not focused on expansion at this time. There is every reason to believe that its Cleveland headquarters project will restart when the "all-clear" is given.

A Transformational Mixed Use Development (TMUD) tax credit pending in the Ohio House of Representatives isn't likely to pass anytime soon, due to the crisis.

Backers had hoped that the legislation could be moved out of the House's Economic and Workforce Development Committee and passed by the full House last month, with a possible signature by the governor in early April. That could allow three years of tax credits, starting before the end of the state's current fiscal year that ends June 30.

Renovation of 925 Euclid into The Centennial would get a big
boost from the passage of the Transformational Mixed Use
Development tax credit pending before the Ohio General
Assembly. Unfortunately, the legislation isn't going any-
where anytime soon as all non-essential work by the
legislature has been halted. But an Ohio economic
recovery program may offer a boost (LoopNet).

But the Economic and Workforce Development Committee hasn't met since Feb. 12 and won't be meeting again anytime soon. Not only has the crisis suspended all non-essential activity by the state legislature, but committee Chairman Paul Zeltwanger was named on Monday as chairman of the Ohio 2020 Economic Recovery Task Force.

"I cannot answer any questions about when the Economic and Workforce Development Committee will meet again or what will be on the agenda. I genuinely do not know and would not want to speculate," said Josh Ferdelman, Rep. Zeltwanger's legislative aide.

However, Ferdelman said the new task force and Rep. Zeltwanger's leadership of it could move forward some new economic development initiatives to spur growth in the wake of the crisis.

"I imagine there’s significant overlap of interest between the two committees," he said.

Two Cleveland projects that were considered candidates for the TMUD tax credit were Stark Enterprises' nuCLEus and Millennia Group's The Centennial. However, both reportedly had secured other equity to possibly move forward as early as this summer. It is not known if either project is still a go as there was no response to e-mails seeking comment from principals of both companies.

Proposed since 2014, Stark Enterprises' nuCLEus development
in downtown Cleveland may have hit a new snag as the corona-
virus crisis has slammed the retail sector. That comprises a sig-
nificant portion of Stark's business revenues (KJP).

More recently, Chief Operating Officer Ezra Stark didn't respond to an e-mail requesting more information about Stark Enterprises' financial and employment situation. Rumors have swirled recently about layoffs of property managers and other staff as the company owns many retail properties whose tenants had to close under governmental orders and may not be able to pay their rent.

Of Stark's 36 properties, 19 are retail centers and three are student housing complexes. That doesn't include Stark Restaurant Group's ownership and operation of 11 Menchie's Frozen Yogurt franchises in Ohio and Pennsylvania which are still open for take-out, pick-up or delivery.

Another sign of the times is that Geis Companies' 12th+AVE condominiums, now under construction on East 12th Street and Hamilton Avenue in downtown Cleveland, won't be marketed as condos. Instead, Geis will rent them out as apartments due the economic fallout from the coronavirus crisis as fewer buyers are likely to have the money to afford the condos when they hit the market. Previously, 31 condos were planned.

"We’ve decided to move forward with the building as an apartment project rather than a condominium project," said Mollie Neale, executive vice president of Geis Residential Management, LLC. "The property will be comprised of 35 one- and two-bedroom units with high-end features and finishes. We have not finalized pricing yet. However, the units will be around $1.90 per square foot and we anticipate opening winter 2020-21."

Construction on the 12th+AVE building at left has been under-
way since December. But the building will be marketed as
apartments rather than condos. That's a similar fate to
the building at right that was constructed in 2008
as condos but is now apartments (KJP).

Condos were removed from the Multiple Listings Service and the 12th+AVE Web site has been taken offline to redesign it around the apartment offerings. Condos were to range in size from 1,147 to 2,495 square feet with list prices from $300,000 to $685,000.

Construction continues as it has since December. It is doubtful that a full recovery from the coronavirus crisis will occur by the time the time the building opens. That is what makes it different from a more expensive condo development in Rocky River which could see construction start by summer. It isn't due to be completed until mid- to late-2021, hopefully after an economic recovery is underway.

Ironically, 12th+AVE is next to a 62-unit, 10-story residential building in the Avenue District that hit the market as condos at the start of the Great Recession in 2008. Difficulties in selling the condos and other financial problems forced then-developer The Zaremba Group to market the remaining units as apartments.

It was another blow to efforts intent on developing a stronger for-sale residential market in downtown Cleveland. Geis bought the 10-story building, which cost Zaremba $25 million to build in 2006, for $15 million last year. There, monthly apartment rents range from $1,450 for the smallest one-bedroom unit to $3,675 for a penthouse, according the Avenue District Web site.

END

Chester75 sounds University Circle's boom in Hough

Proposed at the northwest corner of Chester Avenue and
East 75th Street in Cleveland's Hough neighborhood,
Chester75 is the latest development to capitalize on
growing rents and shortages of quality housing in
and near booming University Circle (Famicos).
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE

UPDATED APRIL 13, 2020

A significant, multi-phase residential development is proposed on the border of the Hough and Fairfax neighborhoods, in the vicinity of Chester Avenue and East 75th Street. It and other developments represent a continued spillover effect from booming employers and residential investments in neighboring University Circle.

The Famicos Foundation, a nonprofit community development corporation, submitted building permit applications to the city this week for the first phase of Chester75, to rise on the northwest corner of Chester and East 75th. The site at 1914 E. 75th St. previously was home to the Cedar Congregation of Jehovah Witnesses.

In its place, Famicos is proposing a four-story, 56,700-square-foot market-rate apartment building. According to its permit application, the building will offer a mix of studio, one-bedroom, two-bedroom and two-story townhome-style units.

Included in the proposed apartment building's designs are ground-floor common areas, a fourth-floor community room, roof deck and 50 off-street parking spaces, the permit application shows. City Architecture is the architect.

Famicos acquired the 0.84-acre site on May 10, 2019 from JW Congregation Support Inc. of Ulster County, New York for $300,000, according to a deed transfer filed a week later with the Cuyahoga County Recorder.

Chester75 is the result of a partnership among multiple entities. However, the project's developer is not yet known. It has one, otherwise permit applications wouldn't have been submitted to the city. But Knez Homes founder and president Bo Knez refuted a recent report in Ward 7 Councilman Basheer Jones' newsletter that his firm will be the developer. He said he bid on the project but hasn't heard any response since.

Site plan for the first phase of Chester75 (CPC).

The principal financier of the project is AES Management Corp. and its President Vanessa Whiting, according to a source, confirmed by Cuyahoga County records. On April 16, 2019, AES Management loaned $350,000 to Famicos which used 1914 E. 75th as collateral.

AES Management Corp. is the owner and operator of 15 Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen franchises in the Cleveland-Akron area according to Whiting's LinkedIn page. The firm also supports local affordable housing developments. This market-rate development is reportedly a different direction for AES Management.

However, Whiting's son, Tony Smith II, is a development associate with First Interstate Properties which recently developed the luxury 20-story One University Circle apartment tower on Euclid Avenue at Stokes Boulevard. The firm is currently pursuing a $20 million, 88-unit, mid-market apartment building up the hill from University Circle called 121 Larchmere. Smith reportedly is working on Chester75 independently of First Interstate.

As noted earlier, the northwest corner of Chester and East 75th is considered to be the first phase of Chester75. At least two more corners and possibly the fourth corner are also in play for residential development and possibly some ground-floor commercial uses. It is too early to know yet if and where multi-family buildings or townhomes would be placed on which quadrants of the intersection.

At a public meeting held last fall about the development, Famicos' Executive Director John Anoliefo said the nonprofit development organization was in the process of acquiring additional properties for the Chester75 development, according to the Ward 7 newsletter.

Conceptual usage of the area around Chester Avenue and
East 75th Street, looking generally east (Ward 7 Observer).

On the northeast corner of Chester and East 75th in the Hough neighborhood is 2.7 acres of vacant land that is mostly in the city's Land Re-utilization Program.

On the southeast corner in the Fairfax neighborhood are mostly underutilized properties except for the designated historic landmark Charles Frederick Schweinfurth house built in 1894. Schweinfurth was a famous architect. The home on East 75th was his personal residence.

On the southwest corner is a mix of developed and vacant properties. But the next block west starts a collection of properties owned by local and national developers and investors including Berusch Development Partners LLC (dba Euclid 71 LLC), Vazza Real Estate Group (dba BD Euclid Ave LLC and BD Cleveland LLC) and David Chesler.

The Chester75 development is a direct result of fast-growing employment at the nearby Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals and its spin-off businesses, as well as from University Circle seeing some of the fastest-rising rents in the country. Rents there grew 44 percent last year.

NEOtrans first reported the Chester75 development last November in a news brief about University Circle-area growth spilling over into neighboring Hough where new rental listings rose nearly 8 percent last year to $1,415 for a one-bedroom apartment, according to Rent.com.

END

Lakefront luxury development secures construction financing

Looking east towards downtown Cleveland along Lake Erie,
700 Lake in Rocky River offers 25 condominiums and eight
townhouses on Lake Road. Already, one-third of the for-sale
residences have pre-sold (Brickhaus). CLICK TO ENLARGE

A real estate partnership announced this week in a written statement that it has finalized its construction financing and hired its general contractor for a luxury condominium and townhouse development on the west-suburban lakefront.

The partnership Carney Brickhaus along with its contractor Infinity Construction are due to start construction by summer on 700 Lake in the City of Rocky River. Comprising the partnership are developers James Carney and Andrew Brickman. The latter is principal of Brickhaus Partners.

Construction of the $35 million first phase of the development is expected to take about 15 months. Construction financing was provided by Erie Bank after Carney Brickhaus hit its pre-sales requirement, selling one-third of the development's residences.

This is occurring despite the pandemic crisis which is, at best, slowing down real estate development activities nearly everywhere.

First phase of 700 Lake is outlined in red, between Bradstreet's
Landing Park and the Bay Village city line. A possible second
phase featuring townhomes is proposed where a half-dozen
homes on Breezevale Cove now stand (Google/KJP).

"When life is unusual and all the rules for conducting business and living life are changing every
day, the Carney Brickhaus team and their strategic partners are moving along with the construction
of the long-awaited 700 Lake condo on Lake Erie in Rocky River," said the Carney Brickhaus partnership in a written statement.

Located on 2.5 acres at 22700 Lake Road, the 700 Lake development took its name from one of two lakefront estates that previously occupied this site. Both were demolished two years ago, followed by two smaller homes on Breezvale Cove in late-2019. All were acquired by an affiliate of Carney Brickhaus called Rocky River Preservation Partners II LLC.

On that land, Carney Brickhaus will build eight townhomes fronting Lake Road, just west of Breezevale. Behind them will rise the 25-unit condominium building built of concrete which will be three stories in front, facing Lake Road and five stories in back, facing Lake Erie.

Site plan for the first phase of 700 Lake. Note that north is
to the right in this image (Brickhaus).

A later phase comprised of townhouses is planned on 2.1 acres just east of the first phase. It will first require the acquisition of six private homes on Breezevale. Carney has acquired one of those homes while Brickhaus has acquired three, according to Cuyahoga County property records. The other two are not yet under the developers' control.

Just east of Breezevale is the 1975-built, eight-story Beach House Condominiums, the 1997- to 2000-built Harbor Village townhomes and Bradstreet's Landing Park. The park is about to undergo $3.4 million worth of improvements including a reconstruction of the closed fishing pier.

At 700 Lake, the townhomes will all offer three bedrooms and measure from 2,000 to 2,200 square feet. They will have terraces ranging from 650 to 750 square feet and individual, indoor garages entered from the back. Pricing for the townhomes start at $750,000, according to the Kim Crane Group at Howard Hanna's Rocky River office.

The condos will range in size from 2,200 to 3,600 square feet. Each offers three bedrooms, private outdoor spaces and lake views from every residence. There will be indoor and outdoor parking for condo residents and visitors. Condo pricing starts at $1.2 million.

Rendering for 700 Lake with Lake Road at the bottom-left of
the image and Breezvale Cove to the right (Brickhaus).

Interior finishes for the townhomes and condos will be high end, imported from Italy. They include
kitchens by Aran Cucine, wood flooring by Garbelotto Pavimenti and tile by Fiandre. Appliances and climate controls will all be state-of-the-art offerings from Wolf, Sub-Zero, Thermador and Bosch.

A sales office has been established at 19204 Detroit Road in downtown Rocky River.

"Infinity is pulling permits, and in the coming weeks will be completing a variety of different preconstruction activities," according to the written statement from Carney Brickhaus.

"The construction fence to secure the property will be installed along with additional construction
trailers," the statement said. "After that, clearing will begin, followed shortly thereafter by the grading and installation of all utilities and infrastructure."

END

Lack of city hall tech risks making construction sector sick

Using technology to make public meetings more public, or to
be held at all during the pandemic, has suddenly become more
important. On March 24, the Greater Cleveland Regional Tran-
sit Authority held its first-ever live-streamed board meeting at
the urging of board member Justin Bibb (center). Without the
meeting, several potential job-creating agenda items couldn't
be acted upon and might be postponed a month or so (CPT).
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

On March 24, the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority's (GCRTA) Board of Trustees did two things it had never done before.

One, GCRTA's board voted to help form and partially own a unique public-private corporation to acquire and oversee development of its Ohio City Red Line station-area property in partnership with Carnegie Management and Development Corp. That was among several potential job-creating items on that meeting's agenda that included the sale of Midtown land to the Cleveland Foundation.

And two, GCRTA's board made those decisions in its first-ever virtual meeting, broadcast live through Facebook with public comments and questions accepted by e-mail. The live-streamed board meeting was forced out of necessity by the COVID crisis but GCRTA had been discussing the idea for months, said Justin Bibb, a GCRTA board member.

A total of 1,213 people viewed some or all of the live GCRTA board meeting, according to Facebook's statistics. That's far more people than could have ever fit in the transit authority's board room at 1240 W. 6th St. in downtown Cleveland. That's also far more people than could fit in their schedules to attend the meeting, even under normal circumstances.

"This is huge and makes me excited about how we can continue to use simple, low-cost technologies to engage with riders," Bibb said afterwards on Twitter. "This was a big priority for our Ad-Hoc Tech Committee and (I'm) happy we were able to advance it forward quickly. COVID-19 has showed the importance of having resilient operating models to continuously engage and serve residents."

In Miami, Florida, a city commission meeting proceeds as
scheduled on March 25 despite some commissioners self-
isolating. That was because the City of Miami had already
used technology to simplify permitting and enhance public
access by live-streaming city meetings (Mike Sarasti).

But the same cannot be said for nearly all local municipal governments. Their meetings of city councils, planning commissions, boards of zoning appeals (BZA) and other scheduled public gatherings remain canceled for the foreseeable future. That has stalled proposed real estate developments big and small and their resultant job creation, several developers said.

While city officials in many communities say the meeting cancellations are necessary to comply with Sunshine Laws, technology is making that contention questionable.

A few Cleveland-area suburbs like Westlake are continuing to hold live-streamed city council meetings on their Web sites yet most continue to cancel all planning and BZA hearings at least until the end of April.

But the City of Mentor is live-streaming all city council, planning commission and BZA meetings. And the City of North Ridgeville is holding its city council, planning and BZA meetings as scheduled -- all via YouTube.

They are the exceptions, not the rule. And while Cleveland accounts for more than one-fourth to one-third of all new residential units built each year in Cuyahoga County, the City of Cleveland reportedly has no plans to institute virtual planning commission, landmarks or BZA meetings.

Real estate is considered an essential activity that should continue during the pandemic crisis, according to Gov. Mike DeWine's March 23 order.

City of Cleveland guidance on how
to submit applications for building
permits, rental registrations, certifi-
cates of disclosure or occupancies
for residential properties (AIA). 

Cleveland Planning Director Freddie Collier didn't respond to questions e-mailed to him prior to publication of this article.

However, some building permits that do not require new or additional design/zoning/building code reviews or appeals can be obtained through Cleveland's online portal. Also, rental registrations and certificates of disclosure/occupancies for residential properties can be obtained by contacting the city, by mailing them to the city, or by dropping off applications (not checks/money) at the drop boxes at the front/rear entrances to City Hall, 601 Lakeside Ave.

Cleveland isn't alone among regional peer cities in its cancellation or indefinite postponement of planning/BZA-type meetings:

• Pittsburgh (postponed until further notice);
• Columbus (canceled until at least April 14);
• Cincinnati (canceled until at least May);
• Buffalo (canceled until further notice);
• Detroit (canceled until further notice).

The City of Indianapolis reports on its Web site that the planning department continues to conduct business albeit remotely due to COVID-19 precautions -- as does Cleveland's. And Indianapolis' site is unclear as to whether planning/BZA meetings will continue to be held at all.

City of Miami's multi-media desk for managing the live-
stream of public meetings as well as communications so the
public can interact with those meetings (Mike Sarasti). 

Building project reviews are needed to meet continuing housing demand, despite the economic slowdown.

"We're actually surprised at the number of clients who are still out there and want to buy a home," said Bo Knez, founder and president of Knez Homes, one of Greater Cleveland's largest housing developers. "There was a housing shortage before we went into this in February and March and it's still there."

He said that capital liquidity is also still available to fund new projects and build new housing inventory. But the biggest hindrance to starting new construction projects and creating more jobs is a lack of access to city halls, he said.

"Many of them are not electronically capable" of handling new plans, project applications and issuing building permits, Knez added, without pointing fingers. "So we're working with the ones that can move forward. Those are the cities that are electronically capable."

Even among construction projects already approved and permitted, getting building inspectors to show up at construction sites to approve work and issue occupancy permits is taking more time, said one construction manager who spoke off the record because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

The growth of construction jobs in Greater Cleveland increased
by at least 8 percent or nearly 3,000 jobs in each of the first two
months of 2020. It was the fastest growing job sector in the re-
gion which lost more than 2,000 jobs overall in the same period,
according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is the booming
Hingetown section of Cleveland's Ohio City (Patrick Shepherd).

The National Association of Home Builders this week issued a report showing that each new single-family home built creates an average of nearly three jobs while each new rental apartment creates 1.25 jobs.

For big projects like the City Club Apartments or the Circle Square development, that's several hundred jobs for each project. Those new jobs create a ripple effect throughout the economy, generating tens of thousands of dollars in tax revenues to local, state and federal governments per new construction job, the association says.

Those jobs and their benefits will go to the cities who are best prepared technologically, said Bibb, who is rumored to be considering a run for mayor of Cleveland in 2021.

"We’ve got to find a way to modernize and streamline the permitting process," he said. "Making it easier for residents and businesses to interact with government helps to create more trust and confidence in our local leadership."

END

Calming traffic at RTA station key to developing area

Urban architect Yong Woo Lee of planning firm AECOM pre-
sents transit-oriented development options at a public meeting
held June 20, 2017 at the Cudell Recreation Center. For the
Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency, AECOM
identified promising rapid transit station-area development
sites. One of those was the West Blvd-Cudell Red Line rail
station that's the subject of a new planning effort (KJP).
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

The revitalization of Cleveland's Detroit-Shoreway neighborhood continues to spread west. To the north, Edgewater Park and its healthy namesake neighborhood have improved in recent years. And to the west, Lakewood has seen Greater Cleveland's fastest-growing real estate prices along with new housing development.

In between all of this is a left-behind area surrounding the West Boulevard-Cudell rapid transit station and Cudell Recreation Center. But that could start changing thanks to a planning effort underway by the Westown Community Development Corp. called the West Boulevard-Detroit Avenue Neighborhood Plan.

The station and recreation center are principal anchors of the Cudell neighborhood. They depend on pedestrian accessibility and could help attract pedestrian-friendly development. To do so will first require making that area more hospitable to pedestrians. That simple goal is the foundation of Westown's development masterplan.

The roadways around the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (GCRTA) station are designed to move a high volume of cars as quickly as possible. But they were designed that way long before Interstate 90 was built, when a combination of streets including Triskett Road, Berea Road, Detroit Road, West Boulevard, Baltic Road and the West Shoreway was the fastest way for motorists to reach downtown Cleveland from the West Side.

The area outlined in orange is the target area for Westown
Community Development Corp.'s West Boulevard-Detroit
Avenue Neighborhood Plan (City Architecture).

And they were designed that way with little regard to safe pedestrian access to the rapid transit line, even though most transit customers typically begin/end their trips as pedestrians. Instead, the West Side Red Line was built in the 1950s and 60s primarily as a park-n-ride service for downtown commuters.

Depending on park-n-ride traffic tends to limit GCRTA's Red Line to two types of riders -- those heading downtown in the morning and those returning to their cars in the evening. That's a big reason why Cleveland's rail system is so lightly used, according to a 2017 Transit- Oriented Development study by the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency (NOACA) and its consultant AECOM.

With most stations surrounded by big parking lots and big roads, there was little opportunity to develop a "low-mileage lifestyle" popular with young people and urbanists. That lifestyle is made possible by Transit Oriented Development (TOD) -- dense, neighborhood-scale mixed-use districts of housing, commercial and recreational uses within a comfortable walk of each station.

TODs tend to produce more pedestrian activity and transit ridership, with riders traveling on the rail line throughout the day and night for a variety of reasons -- work, school, shopping, medical appointments, nightlife, sporting events and so on, according to the NOACA study.

Detroit Avenue no longer needs to be up to seven lanes wide
past the West Blvd. rapid transit station, at right, and Cudell
Recreation Center, at left. And traffic still moves fast through
here. That has given rise to ideas about calming traffic with
fewer lanes, better pedestrian signage and redesigned inter-
sections to improve pedestrian safety (City Architecture).

The car traffic that once poured past the West Boulevard station has been gone for decades. But the seven-lane wide Detroit Avenue by the station remains, as do intersections with angled streets or gently curving lanes so cars can turn corners faster.

"They're death-defying traffic patterns," said Westown Executive Director Rose Zitiello. "It's a hazardous situation for pedestrians."

It's also proven to be a deterrent to TOD investment surrounding the West Boulevard station. Numerous transit-supportive developments have been built, are under construction or planned in Greater Cleveland in recent years. But not so much at the West Boulevard station.

"At the time, the NOACA study was trying to attract development," she said. "It (the study) showed there was a market for it. But after the (study's) recommendations were issued, there wasn't much interest from developers. Many of their findings were very well thought out. So we really wanted to build on that TOD study."

This is a design concept for calming traffic on Detroit
Avenue past the rapid transit station and Cudell Recre-
ation center (City Architecture).

For the study, Westown organized an informal stakeholders group comprised of NOACA, Detroit Shoreway Community Development Organization (DSCDO), City of Cleveland, Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD), West Boulevard resident Tom Yablonski who also serves as executive vice president of the Doantown Cleveland Alliance, The Palazzo restaurant and Environmental Design Group. Westown hired City Architecture as its project consultant.

Foremost among the early, preliminary recommendations is to improve the transportation experience at West Boulevard and Detroit that lays a foundation for TOD. Small-scale traffic-calming measures such as narrowing Detroit and squaring off its intersections with Berea and West Boulevard are possible recommendations, Zitiello said.

The plan will also identify potential development types for nearby underutilized properties and build off recent/ongoing investment and planning in the study area. The goal is to make a strong case for funding of the recommendations that come out of the planning work, study documents show.

Among the public investments occurring in the area is the nearly $45 million in infrastructure improvements GCRTA has been making to the Red Line tracks, retaining walls and electrical systems between Tower City and Hopkins Airport, GCRTA's current five-year capital program shows. The transit authority is also early in the process of replacing its aging rail cars with new trains. That program is estimated at between $250 million and $300 million.

Based on AECOM's market analysis, this was a recommended
development concept for the West Boulevard-Cudell Station
site -- several buildings of market-rate and affordable apart-
ments over retail and parking along a narrowed Detroit
Avenue to improve pedestrian safety (AECOM).

At the last study stakeholders meeting March 9, Hollie Dellisanti, CMSD's executive director of architectural services for capital projects, said the CMSD board has approved spending $34 million to address facilities at he Marion C. Seltzer K-8 School, 1468 W. 98th St. It hasn't been decided if the district will rebuild or replace the school. Seltzer School is located next to the Cudell Recreation Center.

Amid mostly small-scale private investments in the Westown-Cudell area, a big investment last year could soon produce hundreds of new jobs. Weston Group built a 168,750-square-foot warehouse as the first phase of Madison Industrial Park, 10801 Madison Ave. Several sources said this week that eCommerce giant Amazon will be the tenant for that warehouse as well as for a second, proposed warehouse to be built by Weston.

"I hope it's true," said Ward 11 Councilman Brian Mooney. "It will benefit many businesses in the area. I do know that Amazon is the rumor and that Weston was still trying to negotiate with one or more people."

And last November, a California-based group bought the Chicle Apartments and 10 neighboring townhouses at 10307-10335 Detroit Ave., just west of the West Boulevard station. But the investor group's intentions remain unknown.

The Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority's West
Boulevard-Cudell Red Line rapid transit station (Wikimedia).

In 2013, Marous Brothers renovated Boulevard Terrace and Neal Terrace, 10107 and 8811 Detroit Ave., respectively, for $10 million total. Boulevard Terrace is a 116-unit complex of row houses built between 1895 and 1917 while Neal Terrace is a 48-unit row house complex built in 1907. Both are within an easy walk of the West Boulevard station.

Next steps including fine-tuning the case for more public and private investment in the neighborhood. City Architecture will test its recommendations with the study's stakeholder group. The proposed findings will then be delivered to the City Planning Commission for its possible adoption. If the commission adopts the plan, it can then seek a mix of local, state and possibly federal grants to implement it.

Zitiello said the goal is to wrap up the planning work by June.

"Then we'll go for some TLCI (Transportation for Livable Communities') funding" from NOACA, she said. "There's no money for this year so we're hoping to get it for 2021 to develop some project-level plans for traffic calming, better signage and roadway changes."

END