Avenue Communities is looking to break ground September 2008 on its mixed use redevelopment project called Hayden Flour Mill. Phase one calls for 60,000-sf of retail and office space and will take about 14 months to construct. It is unclear when the second phase of the project might break ground.
For more information on Tempe's Hayden Flour Mill.
A brand new Starwood Hotels product called Aloft is under construction in Tempe just behind (north) of North Shore Condominiums and near the site of the proposed Onyx High Rise Condo Tower. The new five story, one hundred thirty six room hotel should be completed by early February 2009 and will offer hip, cool, upscale limited service hotel rooms appealing mostly to buiness travelers.
The Bad News
Many retail stores along Tempe Mill Avenue have failed and closed and some people say that the area is the most "depressed" that it has been in the last thirty five years.
How did this happen? Well clearly part of the reason is that retail sales across the country are down. But this does not explain the depth of the problem.
A big part of the problem is that the transition from a largely college student population to a demographic including high rise condo dwellers has not been easy. Retail rental rates along Mill Avenue skyrocketed in anticipation of a coming population "boom" of these more affluent condo owners.
The problem was that the boom was postponed as high rise condo sales plummeted and construction of thousands of units came to a halt or were cancelled altogether. Of the condos that were completed many many of them were purchased by investors. These investors found themselves competing with one another for a limited number of investors and rents went down.
So, we saw the rents at local shops go up, fewer than expected people moving to the area, and many of the people who did move to the area being of a lower economic demographic than what had been expected.
The Good News
Tempe is hot. The street scene is vibrant and romantic like that found in other dense cities around the world (albeit at a much smaller scale) like Manhattan, London or Amsterdam. It has a young energetic population that lives nearby and spends time and money on the street. It is bordered by a finite geographic feature (ie The Lake) which encourages denser vertical growth vs. sprawl. It's a relatively small and compact area that further adds to the energy. AND the coming new light rail cuts through the center of it.
Tempe will turn around.
The problems with Centerpoint High Rise Condominiums will work themselves out. With this, five hundred or more people will take up residence just off Mill Avenue. Retail rents won't come down but landlords will offer smaller store fronts which will be more affordable for store owners. Smaller shops will mean more shops. More shops will mean a wider variety of products. A wider variety of products will appeal to more people and business WILL boom. As the area gains in popularity (and the real estate market recovers) condo rental rates will go up and more affluent renters will join the area, thereby feeding the economic machine.
With this renewed success of Mill Avenue more condos will be built and true synergy will occur.
There is so much good news, bad news and rumors floating around about the various high rise and loft buildings in Phoenix, Scottsdale and Tempe that we decided to give you a voice on WKU. We are adding widgets on most of our community pages that allow you to rate a particular high rise or loft community or just leave a comment (or a bit of gossip). Currently the tool is only active on the Summit at Copper Square, Optima Biltmore, Optima Camelview, Scottsdale Waterfront, Galleries at Turney, Residence at the Grove, and Orpheum Pages. But keep checking back as we are agressively modifying our pages to include this feature.
Feel free to shoot us an e-mail and request the tool on any community you have something to say about and we'll get it done right away. Let's hear what's on your mind :-)
This is a long way off but a new study has been ordered to research the feasibility and need for a passenger rail line running along Grand Avenue from the soon to be completed light rail system to Wickenberg.
The study will take about a year and should answer such questions as costs, infrastructure options, projected passenger traffic etc.
http://www.azcentral.com/community/glendale/articles/2008/07/24/20080724gl-peorail0724-ON.html
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WeKnowUrban specializes in the high rise & loft condo market in Phoenix, Tempe, Scottsdale & more. It's agents have been the number one resale agents of high rise & loft condos in Phoenix since 2003.
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