Developers know that mixing uses in a project complicates the design, limits financing options, and requires intricately choreographed timing. All this makes mixed-use projects much more challenging. Yet mixed-use redevelopment adds a vitality to cities that is hard to match with single-use buildings.
In Charlotte, North Carolina, the Crescent Stonewall Station project redesigned the entrance ramps to Interstate 277, which encircles downtown Charlotte. It thus created tracts of vacant land in Center City, resulting in a building boom along downtown’s Stonewall Street.
Elsewhere in Charlotte, the former Charlotte Observer‘s 10-acre brownfield site is being redeveloped into a gateway to Center City, the Arts District, and the convention center.
In Raleigh, North Carolina, a project called The Dillon transformed a low-lying brick warehouse into a 17-story office tower, while preserving a sense of history and architectural detail. The redevelopment is helping to revitalize Raleigh’s downtown warehouse district.
In Greenville, South Carolina, the beautifully-renovated Falls Park has been the focal point of downtown revitalization efforts for well over a decade. Now the 6-storey Falls Park Place project has added retail, a huge restaurant, a bar, offices, six “super upscale” apartments, and a wraparound balcony with a view of the waterfalls.
In Charleston, South Carolina, the Courier Square project is a 5-year, 12-acre project to redevelop another former newspaper site, that of the Post and Courier. The $100 million downtown redevelopment will feature 266 residential units, 90,000 square feet (8,400 sq m) of commercial space, and a 600-space parking deck.
Photo credits: City of Greenville.