Create a downtown civic plaza
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BY MATT OLBERDING / Lincoln Journal Star
One of the goals of Vision 2015 is to provide better jobs, housing and entertainment to help Lincoln keep its best and brightest young people.
If things go as planned, a downtown project could provide all three.
Nearly a year after Mayor Coleen Seng first pitched the possibility of a skyscraper, pieces have been falling into place for what is now called the Catalyst One Project, a redevelopment of the block bounded by 13th, 14th, Q and P streets.
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Overhaul of downtown block bounded by 13th, 14th, P and Q. The city plans a public square and 600-stall parking garage. Private developers are expected to build a project with several possible uses, including office, retail, hotel and housing.
What it costs: City’s estimated price tag? $8.3 million to $12 million on parking garage and $2.5 million on civic square. But private development costs could reach $50 million. City also plans private fundraising effort to help pay for the civic square.
Who benefits: Until a developer is chosen for the project, it’s hard to say for certain who will profit. But others — university students and staff, downtown shoppers, downtown workers — will also benefit.
Potential barriers: Failure to get a satisfactory bid from developer, lack of public funding.
Looks like: Pioneer Courthouse Square in Portland, Ore.
Probability factor: Almost certain. The city has already acquired property, done some demolition and budgeted for parking garage. Several developers have expressed interest, and more than 50 packets of bid requirements were mailed this month.
In October, the city demolished the Douglas 3 theater, the first step in creating a civic square.
At the end of December, the StarShip 9 theater closed, and the city took possession of the building that will eventually be demolished for a city parking garage.
And earlier this month, a private developer bought Taste of China restaurant, the last holdout on the block, after months of negotiations with the city went nowhere.
Once that final block fell, the city wasted no time going forward with the project.
On Jan. 14, it mailed more than 50 packets containing specs for bidding on the project to developers and others who expressed interest.
In addition to the civic square and the 600-stall parking garage, developers are being asked to put retail space on the ground floor of the garage, build a mixed-use tower on top of the garage, and build a couple of buildings on the east and north sides of the civic square.
Dallas McGee, Lincoln’s assistant director of urban development, said he’s confident the city will get good proposals for the site.
“In terms of magnitude, we anticipate this will be the most significant private investment in downtown in many years,” he said.
As much as $50 million in private investment. And the city is kicking in $2.5 million on the civic square and from $8 million to $12 million on the parking garage.
McGee said the city hopes to have a developer selected by April, after which negotiations will begin on the terms and scope of the redevelopment. It will likely be next year before work starts, he said.
McGee said the project got the “catalyst” moniker because it is expected to jumpstart other development, such as the retail and entertainment corridor along Q and P.
Others see that happening, too.
“I have a very positive feeling about the plaza essentially anchoring further development of the P and Q corridor,” said Tom Smith, a downtown businessman and member of Vision 2015.
Smith said the project fits well with the 2015 group’s aims.
For one, it is a significant public-private development already under way, he said.
It’s also strategically located, close to the university, proposed arena and arts and humanities center in the Haymarket, and Antelope Valley area.
Smith said he’s heard lots of ideas for the kinds of development that might end up on the block, including office, retail, hotel and condos.
“People see the plaza block as a lot of different things,” Smith said, “but everyone’s excited about it.”
Well, maybe not everyone.
When it was announced the StarShip 9 would close, several people lamented the city would no longer have an cheap movie option.
And Taste of China owner Chan Hua fought for months to stay on the block, even though the city said acquiring his restaurant was vital to the project.
At one point, Hua likened the city’s efforts to make him move to his family’s loss of businesses to communist governments in China and Cambodia.
Eventually, U.S. Property owner Monte Froehlich paid Hua $730,000 for his property — $300,000 more than the city was offering — to get the project moving.
But even that windfall won’t remove Hua’s bad feelings.
“If it was up to him, he wouldn’t have to move, he wouldn’t have to talk, they wouldn’t have to change,” Steve Guittar, Hua’s real estate broker, told the Journal Star in December.
“He’ll probably never feel that this was a good idea.”
Downtown Lincoln Association President Polly McMullen said she’s heard from as many as a dozen different people or firms interested in possibly bidding on the tower and another three or four groups that asked about donating to the civic square project.
The trend of revitalizing downtowns that started on the coasts a decade ago is now reaching Lincoln and picking up steam, she said.
“We’re just starting to move down that road,” she said.
And that’s important, said McGee, to keep young people in Lincoln.
“Communities that are attractive to young people are communities that have invested in their downtowns.”
But McMullen and Smith said people shouldn’t look at the catalyst development, or any of the Vision 2015 projects, as only benefiting downtown.
Said McMullen: “That money ripples through the economy and benefits everyone.”
Reach Matt Olberding at 473-2647 or molberding@journalstar.com.
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