In the Chinese culture cranes are considered very auspicious--a sign of longevity and prosperity. And as someone who has an affinity for anything Asian, it is promising to have so many cranes hovering over downtown Phoenix. Surely, there must be something good happening down there …especially when they are building cranes.
The maturing of Phoenix into a “21st Century City” is the confluence of many factors—mass transit, dense urban housing, educational facilities, new high rise mixed use projects—all happening at the same time. This multi-headed hydra will ultimately result, once the dust settles, into a downtown that will offer a true 24/7 environment of live, work, play and learn.
In downtown Phoenix, light rail construction is moving along with expected completion around December 2008. It has been a messy, disruptive process leaving several downtown businesses hanging on by a thread. But in the long run it ought to bring new vitality and possibility to the downtown core. Already there is evidence of new transit-oriented development underfoot—new restaurants, shops, pedestrian friendly sidewalks etc. Tom Simplot, City Councilman credits light rail as the stimulus for much of the revitalization taking place downtown. In it’s wake it has created a domino affect.
The education piece is critical to the evolution of downtown Phoenix and attracting the knowledge worker that will create a solid foundation for economic vitality. The Phoenix Biomedical campus that started with TGEN over 5 years ago was the catalyst that sparked new interest to the downtown core. Following that was the commitment of our major universities, in particular Arizona State University, to a downtown campus that promises to bring around 15,000 students by 2015.
There are other mega size mixed use developments planned such as CityScape that will take up 3 city blocks and One Central Park East, the first high rise office building in downtown in 8 years. Some of the big projects like the $200 million Sarver deal have dried up, but many of the others will happen completely transforming the city as we know it. AJ’s has agreed to come downtown now that there is critical housing mass—something long overdue.
We will see completion of several major projects sometime in 2008 that will include the new Sheraton Hotel. The Sheraton will feature over 80,000 sf of meeting space and rooms. These were necessary expansions for us to just stay competitive in the hospitality market. The convention center has seen three times more bookings than five years ago. But supply of hotel rooms is not keeping up with the demand and the city is looking for the private sector to come up with another 1,000 rooms in the next year.
About 1.5 M people currently live in Phoenix. Also next year we will see the completion of numerous residential towers such as 44 Monroe, The Summit and W Developments. Some of the projects on the boards are just talk, some of them are happening. Estimates say that there will be over 10,000 more people living in the redevelopment area over the next decade. Currently there is a boom around luxury downtown living, but there is a real need housing for every demographic. There is a call for affordable housing in the downtown core.
And yes, the dust will eventually settle. But we did not do all this to settle, we are on a trajectory of going to the next level. According to traditional lore, the crane mediates between heaven and earth—navigating between what is real and what is possible. In order to achieve greatness we must balance between our aspirations and reality. I am excited to see how 2008 unfolds.
Claudia Bullmore
Chief Strategist
SkymarketingAZ.com
Claudia Bullmore is a guest author on UrbanLifeBlog.com and a bright light for Phoenix. She is the inspiration behind Ignite Phoenix a group dedicated to making Phoenix a powerful, exciting, nurturing city.