Development: More SODO Renderings

The website for the ambitious $480M Legends District-SODO project on the southside of downtown Indy was recently updated. It features a promotional video containing several fly-through clips with various parties talking about the proposal. There's also an information packet in pdf format with some diagrams and a siteplan. For convenience, I've pulled the visuals out of the information packet so you can take a look (the full document can be viewed here). As always, click on any of the pictures for a larger version.




Couple quick observations, mostly based on the siteplan:

• The project will be built in multiple phases, presumably based on demand.
• They're proposing 200 condos. Seems a bit ambitious, particularly when you look closely at the numbers and see that they're planning 1600 sq.ft. and 2800 sq.ft floor plans. Those are big condos. A majority of the condos are in the second phase, with 70 in the first phase.
• Where's the little guy in this plan? Why not take half the condo units, split each of them in half and market them as apartments? With so many different buildings with condo elements -- I count six buildings with condos -- it would be quite easy to maintain them as separate entities.
• Parking is very well hidden, with all of it either underground or backed up to the train tracks. And there certainly is a lot of it, with 1500 planned for phase 1 and 700 in the second phase.
  
• Copious ground floor-retail. Even the theater building has a retail element. Three of the retail units are labeled "x2", presumably double-floor units for the proposed big-box stores.
• On the southern end of the siteplan, it shows Merrill St. with an arrow "TO LILLY" pointing East. I haven't been by there in a while, but isn't Merrill St. fenced-off under the railroad tracks? Interesting, if they're proposing to reopen that.
  

Development: Legends District - SODO

The rendering of Legends District that's been released (see "This 'n That" below) leaves something to be desired in terms of detail, not to mention that it only shows about one-third of the proposal. On Friday, WTHR and WISHTV posted videos of their news pieces that include some fly-through video and more renderings. They don't help much with detail, but they do provide a much better idea of the lay-out of the project. I captured some of the images from the video so we can take a look at it (sorry about the quality and size -- a slightly larger version is available if you click on these images):

Site Overview:

Looking North:

Looking Northeast:

Looking West (Henry St. runs down the middle):

Looking Southwest:

Parking Garage between the CSX Line and Pennsylvania:

Looking Southeast:

Looking Southeast at the corner of South and Madison:

Ground level in the public plaza:

Quick observations:

• The developers respected the street grid, not only maintaining Henry St. between Madison and Pennsylvania, but extending it to the CSX line. The Scioto St. alley between Arby's and Subway would be vacated, though I don't think that's much of a loss.
• It's clearly designed with street-level atomsphere and walkability very much in mind.
• Decent density on the northern section of the project. It appears to be generally around 5-10 stories, with the one large structure at South & Pennsylvania perhaps as tall as 15 stories.

Hopefully we'll get some more detailed renderings in the future.

(note: the Legends District logo is a trademark of the Legends Entertainment Group, LLC.)

Development: This 'n That

Three Mass Ave: the pit continues to grow. At this point, I think they're still just removing dirt and shoring up the pit walls. Very soon, we may see some concrete for the underground parking garage.

Cultural Trail: the Alabama St. paving is largely done, just some work left at the intersections. Signs indicating bike and pedestrian sides of the trail (and other information/directions) have been attached to the lights. If the weather clears up this week I may try to grab some pictures.

O'Malia's: the renovation work appears to be in the final stretch. The "wine room" where the cooking school used to be is really shaping up nicely. The temporary shelves have finally been removed, opening up the huge windows in that room (though I like the additional light, is this good for the wine?). An interesting paint job, very different than the rest of the store, has been added to the walls -- you'll just have to check it out. One thing that really pleases me about this renovation is that it hasn't been completely converted into a generic Marsh. There are elements of the "stock Marsh" but you can still tell it's O'Malia's.

Paramount Tower: if you missed the update below, the big news from Cory Schouten is that the Paramount Tower proposal is being moved from its original location on Illinois to the NE corner of Michigan and Capitol, directly across from the Gibson Building. The height has also increased from 11 to 16 stories and an on-site parking lot has been added to the proposal. This figure is included with the IBJ article:


The gap along Michigan St. is an old 3-4 story building that I believe is currently occupied. A 1-to-2 story building on the North St. side appears destined for demolition.

Legends District - SODO: a huge $480M project has been announced for 11 acres of downtown bounded by South St., Madison Ave., the CSX Railroad Line and Merrill St. This is very preliminary and many, many things need to fall in line for this to become a reality. Still, it represents one of the most exciting announcements for downtown in quite a while. The addition of urban-style big-box stores like Target, Best Buy and Dicks would be huge for downtown residential development. The absence of these kind of retail optons is one of the major gaps in downtown living that keep some people away. Here is a rendering, with Madison Ave. in the foreground and South St. at the far left: