Salvation Army building renovation

Here's the site plan that MetroPlains was kind enough to give me for their renovation of the Salvation Army building in downtown Davenport. I have heard this refered to as the Riverwalk Lofts, but I don't see a final name on this plan. It also shows what could be a future Phase 2 on the east side of the block. Nothing is determined about this yet, however. I'd suspect it depends on the success of Phase 1. They hope to start construction within the year, and estimate it will take around 10 months to complete the renovation.

I know how some of you feel about limited-income apartments, but that's what the government gives out the grants for at the moment. Without alternative financing you'd have to charge $2000 a month to renovate some of these warehouse buildings. What's interesting is that market rate (expensive) apartments are actually renting faster than the tax-credit (still not cheap) apartments in the Crescent Lofts complex. Hopefully this means that a market rate apartment or condo building will be in the near future for downtown Davenport.

What people need to keep in mind is that every additional resident that moves downtown gets us that much closer to the critical mass where retail and dining starts to come in to cater to downtown residents. Once that happens, even more people will want to live near these things and downtown really starts thriving.

This could turn out to be a great site, considering how close to the downtown core it is. Once the Freight House is rejuvenated there will be nightlife across the street, more nightlife up on Third Street, and the Figge just a couple blocks away. Lets hope it does well and compliments the other projects going on downtown.

Friday Assortment

First, an image of the Centennial Bridge. Just because.

New big box store coming to former Joevan site -QCOnline
Anyone have any guesses as to what "big box store" will be replacing the blighted Joevan/Shopko/Target eyesore at Kimberly and Locust? Anything's better than what's there, especially considering how much of a gateway to Davenport that is. My guess is Circuit City.

Also, don't forget that the 2nd version of Monday's LeClaire Park planning meeting is today in the Design Center, at noon. So take your lunch break and head downtown to help shape Davenport's riverfront for years to come. Bring lunch.

Things coming up in the next few days:
A post in about the RiverWalk Lofts (Salvation Army renovation)
Possibly something about the casino's rumored plans
Maybe even a Where in the QC is this?
Hopefully some images captured on the upcoming warm days.

Good news for Moline Open Thread

Moline's Bass Street Landing eyed for high-rise -QCTimes

Jealous, why would I be jealous? Although I must say, if the Moline site falls through, I could think of a few places in downtown Davenport where this would look good.

In all seriousness though, this would be a great project for the Quad Cities as a whole.

Downtown Developments (maybe)

First of all, a lot of people have been wondering what's going on with the Forrest Block building at 4th and Brady. Many, including myself, were worried about this project falling through, especially because so little progress seems to have been made. The dumpster disappeared recently, and as I was walking home from the LeClaire Park meeting Monday night the front door was wide open and unsecured, which didn't seem like a good sign at all.

However, from Alderman Frink's blog, I paste this info:

7) What is happening to the Forest Block building?

A) The City has conditionally awarded Highland Investments $200,000 to assist in the redevelopment of the façade of the building through the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Downtown Redevelopment Program. This program is for the removal of slum and blighted conditions in targeted downtown commercial buildings. Because the program is federally funded, we had to conduct an environmental assessment on the building. That environmental assessment has been completed and final clearance was received by the federal government approximately ten days ago. A commitment letter from the City to the company will go out later this week. The CDBG award will be contingent upon the company securing all financing for the project, which I understand the company is in the process of finalizing.

That's good news for sure. I must say that I can't think of a single building in Davenport the would make a better poster child for "slum and blighted conditions."


In other news, does anyone know what's happening in the block between 3rd and 4th and Scott and Western? There's been a lot of earth-moving, digging, demolition, and other assorted activity at the site next to the pawn shop there for several months. For a while it looked like they were tunneling under 3rd street. Nobody that I've talked to knows anything about new construction there, so is it just a new parking lot? Anybody?

Also, yesterday's QCTimes article about the Mississippi Lofts might be the article that finally convinces me to give up reading the QCTimes.comments. I don't know if the comments are coming from 8 year olds, or 80 year olds, but whoever they are they have no idea about current rental prices. (or much of anything else) It seems like no matter what the article, most of the commenters there are negative about it. The reason you probably won't ever see this blog listed on the QCTimes blogroll is because I don't want all that additional negativity over here.

Preliminary LeClaire Park Sketch

Here's what's being called a "Programmatic Sketch" of the highest ranking ideas from the public for LeClaire Park. You're going to want to click on the image to be able to read the labels. I'll try to answer any questions about what various pieces are, based on how they were explained at the meeting.

Here's a link to the city page that has both this sketch and the comment form. A link to that page can also currently be found on the front page of the city website.

Its a safe plan, in that I don't think any part of it will horrify the general public, enrage the QCTimes commenters, or otherwise galvanize people against the plan. I also feel that its a good plan that includes many different things that would help our riverfront and downtown. Its just a preliminary plan, so the guys at the Design Center are hoping to get a lot of feedback on what's good and what's bad about it. A few areas I know they want to know about would be a riverfront restaurant and where it could fit, what it would look like, etc, and also more details about what each area of the park would contain. Other things are whether the pier should line up with Main Street as the RiverVision plan shows, or line up with the Skybridge to extend that visually.

Hundreds of people are giving their input towards the plan, and this sketch shows that its being heard. If you don't participate in the process then you have no business complaining earlier, so...

Here are a few ways to let your input be known:

• Go to the 2nd version of tonight's meeting, which is Friday at noon in the Design Center
• Comment here, and the folks involved will hear the ideas one way or another
• Stop in to the Design Center and give your opinions
• Call or email Darrin Nordahl, Matt Flynn, or Steve Ahrens
• Use the automated form on the city website.

Monday morning open thread

I disappeared to Chicagoland for the weekend, so just an Open Thread for now.

Don't forget to attend the LeClaire Park meeting tonight at 6:30 in the 2nd floor meeting room of the RME.

News links & an old book

Landmarks group throws cold water on Armory plan -QCOnline
"Landmarks group needs to suggest (and pay for) a better plan" -QCI

Airport buying Flick's in $2.3M deal -QCOnline
Airport to buy Flick's -QCTimes
This seems fairly logical, assuming Flick's can find another location. The "QCI" Airport is certainly getting a lot of good news and good numbers lately.

Van Fossen pleads guilty to OWI -QCTimes
For some reason I thought this was already taken care of. Aren't DUI cases normally processed in less than 18 months? No one around the blogs seems to really think VF should remain in office, so there's hardly anything to discuss here. Resign already!

Davenport Past & Present 1858 -EBAY
I wasn't going to post this one, because I was hoping to win the auction. However, its got all day left and its already over $50, so it'll probably go higher than I can really shell out for a 149 year old book right now.

Open Thread

Mostly this thread is for people who can't follow the rules in the thread below.

Here's something I got from Darrin Nordahl of the Design Center regarding Friday's Earth Week event:

On Friday, the Design Center and Steve Ahrens (Development Director for the Levee Improvement Commission) will host an Earth Day Event at the South End of the Skybridge, between 1 and 2 p.m. This is a chance for the public to learn more about the LeClaire Park Expansion and begin to see some the ideas that were shared through the various input sessions.

Also, on Monday at 6:30 p.m. at the RME (2nd Floor), we will have another public event that reveals all the input we’ve received from the inputs sessions, as well as show a programmatic plan for discussion and further input.

An experiment

In the past, I've ranted and raved about how people think only in absolutes. A few threads down on the Battle of Bill Lynn thread, I've been accused of this myself.

Here's the problem as I see it. A blogger says something positive or negative about something, and is then categorized based on that. For example, I have defended Craig Malin on some issues. Because of that, I'm instantly labeled as a Craig Malin-lover. People speak as though I don't see any mistakes or faults of the man. Its not true, but since I defend him, I'm lumped into that "black or white" category. Sometimes there's no need for me to point out mistakes he's made, such as the recent Judge sneaking-around, because there are already 2000 people pointing that out. Other times, like with his whole "I'll give the raise to charity" thing, I've come right out and said it was foolish.

Another recent example is the Guardian Angels. I've been fairly critical of the idea because of the physical interventions. So of course I must hate Guardian Angels. However, I do not hate the GAs. In fact, I see some positives to it, and I've even mentioned them. They have energized people about protecting their neighborhoods in a way that the existing neighborhood groups have been unable to do, which is definitely a good thing. I'm not going to claim that I'm a GA supporter, but that doesn't mean I'm cheering for them to fail either.

There IS a middle ground on nearly every subject, but it seems to be missing from most online discussion.

Here's the experiment for this thread. Long time readers will recognize that I've tried this before. If you comment on this thread, no matter what you say, you need to include something from the other viewpoint. If you point out that the Skybridge is stupid, you have throw in something good about it, such as its popularity among visitors. If you want to post how much you like French Silk Pie, mention a negative (zillions of calories) as well.

I will delete posts, on this thread only, that do not follow this formula, so if you insist on being all negative (or positive, rare as that is) I'm posting an Open Thread above this one.

I'll start things off:

I have been generally displeased with Bill Lynn's words and actions since the last election, but on the other hand, he was one of the first Alderman to have a website. He was online long before Frink and Hamerlinck were even Aldermen, much less had blogs. Even better, he has an archives of his past newsletters available there. Online access is a step towards transparency.

A few reminders

I should have posted the Earth Week schedule at the beginning of the week, but I assume most of you would have seen it on Alderman Frink's blog or in the newspaper.

Today the council is touring the new PD, which will be the first LEED certified municipal building in Iowa. That's a good thing. I'm hoping the public will have a chance to tour it, or at least part of it at some point. This Saturday, those attending River Action's Fish and Fire 2007 will get a sneak peek of at least the green roof, if not the whole building. Here's the website for that event, the rest of which will be held at John O'Donnell.

Tomorrow the Design Center will be hosting an open house from 11am to 2pm. The Design Center is collocated with the City's Parking Office, at 2nd and Brady in the first floor of the MidAmerican Building. According to the Official Week's Schedule, at this event, "this department and other allied community organizations will display examples of their activities that are making our community more healthy, active and green."

Friday there will be some sort of event at the South end of the Skybridge showing off park planning and development projects. I'll try and get more info on that today.

Saturday Ian Frink is having another All-Wards meeting, this time at the Genesis Heart Institute on East Rusholme. Here's his page about the meeting.

Tuesday Morning Brooke Quote

Here's a somewhat blurry (not a lot of room for my tripod in the stairwell) early morning image of a towboat locking through.

I'm not usually a big fan of Alderman Brooke, even though he votes the way I prefer. The same could be said for Dumas, but at least Brooke does anything... Anyway, like him or not, he's not subtle. Today's QCTimes article about last night's meeting had a quote from him that caused me to burst out laughing when I read it.

“It needs a professional, a CEO, to run it, not 10 politicians elected every two years,” he [Brooke] said. “Nine of the 10 aldermen of Davenport have no experience running a business. Eight of the 10 have no real job at all. One is in jail. No other city in Iowa runs without an administrator.”

Of course, his math is a little wrong, unless he doesn't count teaching as a job. Lynn and Hamerlinck teach, Dumas has his Victory thing, and Frink has a full time job as well. There may be others. I'm also curious which one he feels has experience running a business, but all that is beside the point. The gist of what he said is correct, even if the specifics aren't. We elect random people to represent us, but they will almost never be people with the years of experience and education to run something as complex as Davenport on a daily basis.

I have always respected Alderman Hamerlinck for his accessibility, web-friendliness, and representing his ward well even though I disagree with him on most issues. However, by suggesting we get rid of the CA position, he has lost a lot of that respect from me. Saying it has nothing to do with the current occupant that we all know he so dislikes sounds eerily close to a lie. Maybe Alderman Lynn's style is rubbing off on him.

Niabi Zoo images

Some of us from the "Quad Cities" group on Flickr met up at Niabi Zoo this morning for some picture-taking. I was surprised how crowded the zoo was getting as I left around 11:30, and I'm always pleased with how much progress is made every year at Niabi lately. Here are a few quick images, and I'll add a link to the ones I post on Flickr when I get around to that. Update: It turns out that my free Flickr account limits me to 3 subsets, so here's a link to all of my Flickr shots, with the newest (zoo) ones first.The cash cow railroad was doing good business as always.
You just can't go wrong with 9" tall baby goats.A black bear finding another breakfast of fruit salad and dogfood.Construction is still underway on the Colobus Monkey habitat and the Serengeti Observation Deck, which according to the website will be the future site for giraffe feeding at Niabi Zoo. Two years ago I visited the zoo after about a 10 year gap, and was very pleasantly surprised with how much had been added. Now just 2 years later even more stuff has been, and is being added. Its yet another often-overlooked amenity we have in the Quad Cities.

Saturday Open Thread

Update to post below: Chicago will be the US bid for 2016! -SI

Frequent commenter Hoganj300 dropped me a line, hoping for some discussion on the 2016 Olympics. Its a little outside of normal QC-based discussion, but it would have an impact. That is the year that Chicago and LA are competing to be the US city to again compete against cities from around the world. Hogan was saying how much Chicago hosting the Olympic Games would help the entire Midwest, and I heartily agree. It would probably be the best and sometimes only chance for many of us to actually see the games in person, and could really show the world that we're not "flyover country."

He also wondered if this kind of an event and all the infrastructure work that goes into it could be a good chance to expand public transportation, such as Amtrak routes. I'm hoping that we have Amtrak service in the QC area long before 2016! If we do have some sort of train service to Chicago, hopefully the Quad Cities could work together and market themselves as a day trip for the visitors from around the world. Lake Michigan is great and all, but there's something about the Mississippi. Of course, that all assumes that Chicago beats LA, and then beats cities from around the world. Chicago is clearly a world-class city, and its so vibrant and bustling even without a major event going on that I imagine it would be quite a scene with hundreds of thousands of visitors from almost every corner of the world. So here's hoping for Chicago.


For those of you that don't feel like talking about an event 9 years and (potentially) thousands of miles away, this is an open thread.

New Oneida Landing news

I got an email today from JJ Condon, the developer of this condo project. The website, OneidaLanding.com, has been updated with some new renderings, site plan, and floor plans. He said that pricing should be up early next week. He also mentioned that he's looking at redeveloping the vacant One River Place at Oneida and River Drive.

Despite my misgivings about the location, something like this is a good thing for Davenport, and I think its a pretty great looking building. Check out the site for more views and such.

This stuff...

I would rather post about something else, but I know people are going to keep talking about this for a while longer. I just have a few things to say.

There are clearly people who feel wronged by Malin professionally, and post about how he is the worst thing since... well, the first ward Alderman. There are always going to be people who don't get along with their boss, etc, so I'd suspect there's some of that involved.

If Craig Malin is the extraordinarily skilled puppetmaster of corruption that he's portrayed as by some folks, why is he constantly getting "caught?" If he had these skills of deception and manipulation, don't you think he'd somehow avoid the constantly negative press and scandals? From what I've seen, he just doesn't care how things appear. This CAN be a good thing to an extent, as you don't want a public official to be constantly worrying about appearances and spin. He once said something to me along the lines that you can't spend your life worrying about that kind of thing. However... at some point he needs to see that "not worrying about how things look" becomes a problem, and starts to hurt the city.

There are 2 sides to every story, but we generally only get one when it comes to city hall scandals. It took a Freedom of Information Request to find out that the QCTimes call which supposedly caused Malin to confront Ms. Webb actually happened after she had left the building. Malin and company can't fight back the same way that people fighting against them can, because it would consist of making private information public.

This stuff does nothing but hurt Davenport. Even if Craig had been fired, there would have been no benefit. The city would have been out a half million bucks, and qualified candidates would think twice (more than they already will) about applying for Davenport positions. Then any CA we do hire will probably get hit with the same attacks that Malin's getting. So we are just continuing down the path of scandal, and Davenport's city hall being the laughingstock if the Midwest. If 5 Alderman and the Mayor want Malin to stay, then that's democracy at work, and the other 4 need to get over it.

In a whole other circus, hopefully the council gets their nerve up to kick out VanFossen if he's found guilty in his trial tomorrow.

Here are some things our council and the blogs SHOULD be talking about:

• The historic project to reshape our riverfront, WITH public input
• The ongoing study and suggestions to revitalize our older corridors
• Healthy debate over things like Prairie Heights, PEDCOR, and AT&T
• The ongoing wayfinding project that's being worked on by city staff
• A world-class art exhibit coming to Davenport in September
• Where Isle of Capri is going to go
• The circus to end all circuses that will be November '07

SoLo is back

Best news in blogging for a long time.

www.solodavenport.blogspot.com

Just Images and captions

For those of you wanting to discuss the pitiful circus we call City Hall, stick with the thread below. I'm beyond sick of all of this drama myself. Both "sides" of the council are spending too much time fooling around and not enough time helping Davenport.

I took a drive and a couple walks yesterday to check out a few things.
First I drove out to see if any construction has started on 65th east of Brady in regards to connecting it to Eastern. Nope.
My second stop, which could hardly have been farther away, was to check out the new Sunderbruch Park (formerly Southwest Park) on Telegraph Road. It definitely paints me as an East Sider, but I don't think I've been that far down Telegraph in my 24 years of living in Davenport. Aside from being distant, this is shaping up to be a great park. There's a paved bike/pedestrian trail that winds a ways into the park, and there are also dozens of dirt hiking or biking trails throughout the area. I'm definitely going to have to return with my bike and investigate Sunderbruch Park further once we get past this crazy Winter weather. Everyone who enjoys nature or lives in SW Davenport should check it out as well.I posted what is basically this same picture, although with more construction going on, last year around this same time. For some reason I just love this view of downtown Davenport.The reason I was in the RiverCenter to take that image both this year and last year was the ISPA State 8 and 9-ball Championships. Its quite an impressive operation to move in probably over 100 pool tables into both sides of the River Center, and then hang lights over each one. The schedule is as follows:
Wednesday, Singles 9-Ball
Thursday & Friday, 8-Ball Singles Event
Saturday & Sunday, All Team Events
I'm pretty sure its free to watch, and its a pretty cool event for downtown.

Bring on the conspiracy theories

Davenport may reorganize legal department -QCOnline

Davenport council to consider demoting attorney -QCTimes

Its got everything! It could tie in with the Malin pay scandal, the VanFossen everything scandals, the last time the council tried to take control of legal, potential nepotism, Alderman Meyer being left out, hundreds of thousands of dollars... I'm sure this will be a great topic for wild speculation and uninformed discussion. I always did find it funny that people took a break from hating on Mary Thee as soon as she went against Malin, since he's more hated by certain folks than she is. As I said on Cruiser's post about this, with some of the recent developments in the first ward, we're probably going to need more attorneys either way. Looking at the results over the last few years, new leadership in the legal department does seem like a decent idea though.

Let's see if some of you folks can work Lee Harvey Oswald into your theories.

Opening Day '07

Today was Opening Day for the Swing of the Quad Cities at John O'Donnell Stadium. One of the new owners was making the rounds, talking to people and meeting the fans. Obviously the weather wasn't good, but there were some school groups or something. The General Admission section had large blocks of kids, which probably helped push the attendance to 1500 for the day. Some of the new specials will be good for the team, such as the Tuesday $44 special. It consists of four box seat tickets, four slices of pizza, four sodas, and a Swing program. That seems like a reasonable price for a family of 4 to have a night out. If attendance starts coming up, the atmosphere will be more exciting and more people will be excited to go to games. The temperature ranged from 42 to 46 degrees, with occasional snow flurries. It was definitely the first time I'd seen those at John O'Donnell.
The hated-by-some sky blue uniforms are gone, replaced by darker blue and pinstripes. I don't foresee this increasing attendance, but I guess every little bit helps.


Here's a quick video of one of the Swing guys lining out. Next time I might try taking more videos and posting them online.

Easter Open Thread

Probably no new posts from me until Monday. Talk about whatever Easter or non-Easter topics your heart desires. This picture is from last year's Dwyer and Michaels Easter Egg hunt, because I forgot to make the trip to Iowa City for it yesterday.

Where in the QC is this? #14

Update at 11:50PM: We have a winner! hoganj300 successfully guessed the location of this image as a mural in Moline under the Arsenal bridge viaduct along the bike path. Here's the full mural, in all its wackiness.Update: Ok, here's another image to hopefully make things easier.
This one might be too easy, but we'll see. I'll post another image as a clue if no one gets it by the time I get up this afternoon.Where in the Quad Cities is this?

ebay, trailers, etc

• I know I'm late on the bandwagon, after the QCTimes and QCOnline articles about it, but here's the ebay auction for the Pierce School Mall. Eleven hours to go as of 7am, and no bids yet. Seems like just the existing tenants and investment potential would make it worth the third of a mil. Just don't try and open a Mexican dance club there.


• Keith Meyer presents another reason why I'll never be able to see eye-to-eye with my Alderman. In this QCTimes article about the council barely approving the contract to design the already-funded concession/restroom pavilion, it says that Alderman Meyer would like to have a concrete pad for a "concessions trailer." If there's one thing that says world-class riverfront to me, its definitely NOT "trailer." Maybe instead of spending $20 million on the new police station, we could have enlisted some of our homeless to help cobble it together out of pieces of plywood, twine, and corrugated metal. I think Davenport should behave like a city of 100,000, and some of the council thinks we should spend weeks arguing over a couple hundred thousand dollars for a logical project. I guess we'll just always have to agree to disagree.


• While going through my 4+ gigabytes of digital photos, I found a couple that I might be able to use for "Where in the QC is this?" threads, so I'd predict one of those in the next week or so. I was looking through the images looking for stuff to upload to my growing Flickr album.


• The Office finally makes it return tonight, if you're into that sort of thing.


• Speaking of making returns, the Swing of the Quad Cities will be playing their home opener next Monday, at noon. Its magnetic schedule day, so who can miss that? I urge many of you to turn out and show your support for the soon-to-be new owners. Hopefully they can make a night at the ballpark fun and affordable for families once again. I'm definitely planning on attending.


• No images for now; I'll give you dial-up folks a break.
  

Where'd the 150 people go?

Last night's LeClaire Park expansion meeting had maybe 20 citizens in attendance, which was a far cry from the 150 that went to the public kickoff meeting. It sounds like Saturday's meeting wasn't any better. From what I'm hearing, quite a few people are filling out the Online Survey located here, so at least the guys from the Design Center tasked with putting together a plan have something to work with. They have also been meeting with small focus groups, such as downtown businesses, the kids' session written about in the paper, etc.

None of the meetings I've been at have shown a clear public consensus. Some people want all grass, some people want a ferris wheel, others want to leave it as parking. Some people like the idea of a restaurant to replace The Dock, others don't want any permanent structures south of River Drive. One interesting thing is I've been able to look at some of the plans from the 80's and 90's, some of which are quite dramatic. Some of the plans from back then really had the casino dominating the riverfront, similar to Bettendorf's current strategy. Of course none of these saw that light of day back when they were being proposed. Go transparency.

Hopefully when a preliminary plan is presented, people will be able to pick things that they are ok with, and others that most people don't like. I find it worrisome that so few people are involving themselves in this, even if you count the hundreds of surveys that have been filled out. If even 300 people help design the expanded LeClaire Park, are 97,000 others going to complain about what's decided?

Lazy Tuesday

Yesterday the most recent addition to QCI's Museum of Crescent Cracker and Macaroni factory memorabilia arrived in the mail. Here's the link to my previous post about my collection of this junk, I mean... valuable history. This one's a postcard postmarked 1917, and shows what the back of the card calls the "most modern, sanitary, and sun-light Cracker and Macaroni Factory in the world."I hope to possibly have another post this afternoon, although I don't know what it would be at this point. Tonight is the 2nd of the 2 meetings for people to have input about the LeClaire Park Expansion. The meeting is from 6:30-8:00PM, in the 2nd floor of the RME, or Redstone Building. Everyone who wasn't at Saturday's meeting should show up tonight.

Back from the weekend Open Thread

I was visiting a friend in Bloomington, and to my surprise the house he purchased last month is in a New Urban/Neo-traditional neighborhood. Despite being an "older" New Urbanism development (2001) the neighborhood is still too new for the mature trees that will really make it seem like a traditional neighborhood. It does have alleys, rear-loaded garages, sidewalks, front porches, narrow streets (parking only on one side) and a central park square within walking distance. Similarly to the pending Prairie Heights development, the retail element isn't mixed into the residential like it would be in what I understand as true New Urbanism. Still, you can definitely see the difference between the image above and a typical new subdivision with wide streets, big yards, and houses dominated by 2 and 3 car, front-loaded garages.

What'd I miss out on around the QCA this weekend? I see both newspapers have printed articles basically saying no one knows what's happening with the Rhythm City casino move. Also, on the way back from Bloomington I swung through downtown Peoria, so expect some images of a few of their downtown developments in the next week. How did the LeClaire Park expansion meeting go Saturday? Anyone who missed it, don't forget the other meeting tomorrow night.