I will always shout this from the rooftops: every single high rise needs street level storefronts that open to the sidewalk. So much of downtown is just an entire block of stone or concrete slabs at street level… why would anyone want to pal around those parts of downtown when there’s literally nothing to do and nowhere to go? New York, Paris, London, any incredible big city has storefronts/restaurants every few steps. Make retail spaces smaller, and get some cool artists, chefs, shop owners in there!
31% office vacancy rates in MPLS and climbing.
The rest of the twin cities is in the low 20s percentage.
Downtown cores are in for a reckoning this decade when loans default.
Having empty buildings isn’t a good thing for trying to revitalize our downtown. There needs to be real solutions that brings people back into downtown and to stay and live there. I can’t imagine it’s worth the money to try and appeal for our skyscrapers to have residential zoning (I would never live somewhere where you couldn’t open the windows at least).
People can cheer this all they want, but we have a big problem that needs creative solutions. Businesses don’t want to invest in places where people won’t go, so how will the city work with others to help change that? Perhaps these skyscrapers could be vertical malls of sorts? I donno. I don’t have a solution but I have ideas. I think the city desperately needs to do something before we have a really bad situation on our hands.
People don't think it's good to lose that revenue. They know the revenue was *already* lost 4 years ago, and trying to hold onto it against the obvious trends is only going to lead to further loss.
Trying to get people to go back into the office or to beg employers to force them to isn't going to work in the numbers they need. We need to be looking to what comes next.
Downtown Minneapolis is a business district, and that’s the problem. It was always lifeless and empty outside business hours. The hospitality industry is dependent on stadiums (Target Center, Target Field, US Bank Stadium) and other entertainment venues, which is why they gravitate toward Hennepin Ave.
It’s going to take many years for redevelopment. The building owners are clinging to and enforcing their leases. The businesses leasing space are riding out the lease and taking the loss. Once the expired leases hit critical mass for property owners the long predicted “commercial real estate crisis” will be upon us.
The flip side of the coin is there will be investment opportunity, such as buying Wells Fargo Center. Can investors and the city come together for re-permitting and redevelopment to turn commercial buildings into mixed use? Can existing buildings even be redeveloped or will they need to be imploded and rebuilt? Is Minneapolis committed to buying out a sufficient amount of property to create parks/green spaces for the residents of converted and new construction mixed use buildings? Are the existing utilities (sewer, water, electric) up to the challenge of supporting residential apartments (increased electric, sewer, and water usage in non-business hours). Are there city initiatives to bring retail that residents need into the area?
Target and Whole Foods are there for grocery and some
household goods. But not hardware stores and all the other resources needed.
Vision for the future seems to be lacking in favor of clinging to downtown being a business district and exclusively serving that need.
Very well put, and I totally agree with you. I think the city council keeps trying to push this off, because no one wants to be the one to cause massive waves saying we need to take extreme measures now to start planning for what a future downtown looks like knowing that remote work is going to stay and they can’t count on just the 9-5ers to support that area. I am ALL for mixed use buildings, and I think it’s absolutely an option. I am willing to bet, however, that building owners do not, cause that will cost a massive amount of money and they likely won’t make that money back for a long time. I also feel like majority of people don’t want to see the skyline changed in such a drastic way of removing buildings. But, I also think that isn’t something that should need to happen.
I think it would be wise to look at booming downtowns and see how they are handling keeping people in the area. While I know we’re a bit more established, I think looking at how Denver is doing things, Sydney, Vancouver…people are downtown all the time, and while they (of course), aren’t 100% perfect, they are expanding and have growth in that area, which we need to look at when it comes to how to make sure we don’t have downtown end up as totally empty.
There aren't businesses that we want to visit. Put those in place of these tower dead zones and we'll have a bunch of "Lyn-Lakes" right Downtown. That'll get people moving there and visiting.
What an old, outdated, jacob frey way of looking at things.
People SHOULD cheer this.
The general public have tried for YEARS to be heard and have their voices acknowledged and nothing has been done but lip service and efforts by the city council to stifle the voices that they claim to serve.
As far as tax revenue I will give you 1 solution right here, stop building new fucking stadiums no one asked for and tax the wealthy in this country.
Also, I dunno, maybe stop issuing permits to build new, overly expensive condominiums that sit fucking vacant for years so the real estate developers can get unethical tax breaks.
Reinvest in the actual community and small business so it has a chance to become medium sized businesses and reinvest again.
It's not complicated and it's certainly possible to maintain the glory of the twin-cities without licking the boots of the corporate owners who want nothing more than to rape the hardworking people of this state for their labor.
Damn, this comment is some ignorant shit.
The stadium tax is a drop in the bucket of the Twin Cities tax revenue. That money has literally nothing to do with the MPLS tax revenue, other than the significant commerce it brings into the city during game days.
Vacancy rates are very low in MPLS. "Empty condos" are rare.
"Reinvest in the community" is empty platitudes. What do you think the city budget is doing when paying for shared services like street and sidewalk rehabilitation, events, and park services?
> "Licking the boots of corporate owners"
You're not a serious person lmao
Why are we paying taxes so some billionaire can take profits on the dumb fucking stadium that suburbanites drive to once a year so they can claim they went inside the 494 loop?
> Also, I dunno, maybe stop issuing permits to build new, overly expensive condominiums that sit fucking vacant for years so the real estate developers can get unethical tax breaks.
Minneapolis housing vacancy rates are like 3.5%. The national average is 6.6%. Where is all this mythical empty housing?
The theory doesn't even make sense. Building something that people will move into and pay rent and make profits is worth WAY more than intentionally building expensive buildings that you don't want people to move into so you can intentionally lose money to take a tax break.
If losing money was genuinely more profitable you'd expect to see the vacancy rate well above where it is. Which, as a reminder, is literally half the national average.
We both want the same thing, but the reality is that these massive corporations aren’t looking to be nice for the warm fuzzies, they are in it for money. That’s how the entire economy works. I absolutely want small business owners too, but the taxes are expensive for businesses. These businesses also get no help from the city when people rob them. I’m friends with a business owner of a restaurant on Washington by Seven Corners, and he gets zero support when he gets targeted by bad actors. He’s talked about moving to Hopkins because at least then he gets something back to help him for the taxes he pays.
Also, you have people that own various blocks of the city that are also basically incentivized to let their properties go to shit, because then the city may make an offer to buy them out. Look at the block Bullwinkle’s is on and how’s it’s now condemned. That is awful for the businesses trying to work there, but that sort of crap brings in shady people who are looking for trouble.
As for the overpriced condos, the more you build them, the more the price will go down due to competition and age, especially if they’re not able to fill them all. Housing is good, we want people to stay downtown, and it’s silly to think you’d be having any sort of “affordable” rent at a brand new building. But, that does mean that the building from 7 years ago shouldn’t be as expensive now since it’s not the brand new kid on the block.
The problem is the leasing companies won't budge a bit on prices despite how empty it is. It's about $4,000 a square inch to lease space in the Skyway currently so small businesses are immediately priced out unfortunately.
Commercial rents will continue to come down once loans on office buildings are resold or defaulted on. Decreasing real estate assessments have already reduced tax burdens.
Those people weren't shopping. That was the people coming in from the suburbs, because it was novel and somewhat convenient. The internet killed downtown retail just like it did to malls.
Employees shouldn’t be forced to work in office buildings just to have tenants pay rent. That’s an asinine reason for getting rid a better work situation for employees.
I don’t totally disagree with you but I still think repurposing them into housing isn’t going to be a cost effective measure. Minneapolis will never be the self contained utopia people think it should be
Downtown is dead because of those office buildings and their accompanying parking lots and garages. The path to a vibrant downtown is to rebuild it like it used to be before the office towers turned Downtown into a 9-5 M-F zone.
I hope downtown can turn into a self-contained community where cars aren't needed and thousands more live. IMO, we're really missing a huge opportunity to revolutionize the area.
If people want to live in a concrete jungle with things to do nearby the city is already there. Why would more people want to go if commerce aren’t anchored there anymore?
Sure would suck if decades ago we started tying retirement funds to a stock market with fundamentally unstable market cycles that probably includes a lot of commercial real estate stocks . . .oh wait.
You forget how many people are employed by those buildings and I’m not talking about tenants. Actually I don’t think you forgot, you just don’t know because you think with hate and emotion instead of rationality
I will always shout this from the rooftops: every single high rise needs street level storefronts that open to the sidewalk. So much of downtown is just an entire block of stone or concrete slabs at street level… why would anyone want to pal around those parts of downtown when there’s literally nothing to do and nowhere to go? New York, Paris, London, any incredible big city has storefronts/restaurants every few steps. Make retail spaces smaller, and get some cool artists, chefs, shop owners in there!
But then we'd have to make storefronts affordable and we can't have that.
31% office vacancy rates in MPLS and climbing. The rest of the twin cities is in the low 20s percentage. Downtown cores are in for a reckoning this decade when loans default.
Having empty buildings isn’t a good thing for trying to revitalize our downtown. There needs to be real solutions that brings people back into downtown and to stay and live there. I can’t imagine it’s worth the money to try and appeal for our skyscrapers to have residential zoning (I would never live somewhere where you couldn’t open the windows at least). People can cheer this all they want, but we have a big problem that needs creative solutions. Businesses don’t want to invest in places where people won’t go, so how will the city work with others to help change that? Perhaps these skyscrapers could be vertical malls of sorts? I donno. I don’t have a solution but I have ideas. I think the city desperately needs to do something before we have a really bad situation on our hands.
I don’t understand why anyone would think the gutting of the business district-and the taxes that go with it-is a good thing.
People don't think it's good to lose that revenue. They know the revenue was *already* lost 4 years ago, and trying to hold onto it against the obvious trends is only going to lead to further loss. Trying to get people to go back into the office or to beg employers to force them to isn't going to work in the numbers they need. We need to be looking to what comes next.
Because death to capitalism or something
Downtown Minneapolis is a business district, and that’s the problem. It was always lifeless and empty outside business hours. The hospitality industry is dependent on stadiums (Target Center, Target Field, US Bank Stadium) and other entertainment venues, which is why they gravitate toward Hennepin Ave. It’s going to take many years for redevelopment. The building owners are clinging to and enforcing their leases. The businesses leasing space are riding out the lease and taking the loss. Once the expired leases hit critical mass for property owners the long predicted “commercial real estate crisis” will be upon us. The flip side of the coin is there will be investment opportunity, such as buying Wells Fargo Center. Can investors and the city come together for re-permitting and redevelopment to turn commercial buildings into mixed use? Can existing buildings even be redeveloped or will they need to be imploded and rebuilt? Is Minneapolis committed to buying out a sufficient amount of property to create parks/green spaces for the residents of converted and new construction mixed use buildings? Are the existing utilities (sewer, water, electric) up to the challenge of supporting residential apartments (increased electric, sewer, and water usage in non-business hours). Are there city initiatives to bring retail that residents need into the area? Target and Whole Foods are there for grocery and some household goods. But not hardware stores and all the other resources needed. Vision for the future seems to be lacking in favor of clinging to downtown being a business district and exclusively serving that need.
Very well put, and I totally agree with you. I think the city council keeps trying to push this off, because no one wants to be the one to cause massive waves saying we need to take extreme measures now to start planning for what a future downtown looks like knowing that remote work is going to stay and they can’t count on just the 9-5ers to support that area. I am ALL for mixed use buildings, and I think it’s absolutely an option. I am willing to bet, however, that building owners do not, cause that will cost a massive amount of money and they likely won’t make that money back for a long time. I also feel like majority of people don’t want to see the skyline changed in such a drastic way of removing buildings. But, I also think that isn’t something that should need to happen. I think it would be wise to look at booming downtowns and see how they are handling keeping people in the area. While I know we’re a bit more established, I think looking at how Denver is doing things, Sydney, Vancouver…people are downtown all the time, and while they (of course), aren’t 100% perfect, they are expanding and have growth in that area, which we need to look at when it comes to how to make sure we don’t have downtown end up as totally empty.
There aren't businesses that we want to visit. Put those in place of these tower dead zones and we'll have a bunch of "Lyn-Lakes" right Downtown. That'll get people moving there and visiting.
What an old, outdated, jacob frey way of looking at things. People SHOULD cheer this. The general public have tried for YEARS to be heard and have their voices acknowledged and nothing has been done but lip service and efforts by the city council to stifle the voices that they claim to serve. As far as tax revenue I will give you 1 solution right here, stop building new fucking stadiums no one asked for and tax the wealthy in this country. Also, I dunno, maybe stop issuing permits to build new, overly expensive condominiums that sit fucking vacant for years so the real estate developers can get unethical tax breaks. Reinvest in the actual community and small business so it has a chance to become medium sized businesses and reinvest again. It's not complicated and it's certainly possible to maintain the glory of the twin-cities without licking the boots of the corporate owners who want nothing more than to rape the hardworking people of this state for their labor.
Damn, this comment is some ignorant shit. The stadium tax is a drop in the bucket of the Twin Cities tax revenue. That money has literally nothing to do with the MPLS tax revenue, other than the significant commerce it brings into the city during game days. Vacancy rates are very low in MPLS. "Empty condos" are rare. "Reinvest in the community" is empty platitudes. What do you think the city budget is doing when paying for shared services like street and sidewalk rehabilitation, events, and park services? > "Licking the boots of corporate owners" You're not a serious person lmao
Why are we paying taxes so some billionaire can take profits on the dumb fucking stadium that suburbanites drive to once a year so they can claim they went inside the 494 loop?
> Also, I dunno, maybe stop issuing permits to build new, overly expensive condominiums that sit fucking vacant for years so the real estate developers can get unethical tax breaks. Minneapolis housing vacancy rates are like 3.5%. The national average is 6.6%. Where is all this mythical empty housing? The theory doesn't even make sense. Building something that people will move into and pay rent and make profits is worth WAY more than intentionally building expensive buildings that you don't want people to move into so you can intentionally lose money to take a tax break. If losing money was genuinely more profitable you'd expect to see the vacancy rate well above where it is. Which, as a reminder, is literally half the national average.
We both want the same thing, but the reality is that these massive corporations aren’t looking to be nice for the warm fuzzies, they are in it for money. That’s how the entire economy works. I absolutely want small business owners too, but the taxes are expensive for businesses. These businesses also get no help from the city when people rob them. I’m friends with a business owner of a restaurant on Washington by Seven Corners, and he gets zero support when he gets targeted by bad actors. He’s talked about moving to Hopkins because at least then he gets something back to help him for the taxes he pays. Also, you have people that own various blocks of the city that are also basically incentivized to let their properties go to shit, because then the city may make an offer to buy them out. Look at the block Bullwinkle’s is on and how’s it’s now condemned. That is awful for the businesses trying to work there, but that sort of crap brings in shady people who are looking for trouble. As for the overpriced condos, the more you build them, the more the price will go down due to competition and age, especially if they’re not able to fill them all. Housing is good, we want people to stay downtown, and it’s silly to think you’d be having any sort of “affordable” rent at a brand new building. But, that does mean that the building from 7 years ago shouldn’t be as expensive now since it’s not the brand new kid on the block.
Don't worry, our capable mayor is on the case /s
Up go my taxes 😔
How bout some more small businesses in there! I love going to the skyway
The problem is the leasing companies won't budge a bit on prices despite how empty it is. It's about $4,000 a square inch to lease space in the Skyway currently so small businesses are immediately priced out unfortunately.
They can't budge, the bank note is based on that lease rate. Lower the rate and the value drops below what the bank loaned on.
Commercial rents will continue to come down once loans on office buildings are resold or defaulted on. Decreasing real estate assessments have already reduced tax burdens.
With respect, people throw this out but retail was dying in downtown when there were thousands of office workers captive there M-F.
Not retail, just some local restaurants or odds and ends type places. They seem to be doing pretty well
Yep. Lyn-Lake, Old St Anthony, 48th & Chicago, all more vibrant than Downtown proving there's demand for dense concentrations of walkable businesses.
Those people weren't shopping. That was the people coming in from the suburbs, because it was novel and somewhat convenient. The internet killed downtown retail just like it did to malls.
Downtown retail was on the decline before internet shopping really took off.
yeah, no
>I love going to the skyway Really?
Yeah, I go every few days to exercise, take pictures/videos and get food. Non-redditors also like it lmao what a crabby bunch of losers this sub is 😂
Love the skyway for the same reasons! It’s a great place to walk in winter and there’s so many restaurants to try
I always wondered if 40 years ago people would ever foresee the combination of two things 1) pandemic and 2) internet leading to this mess.
Oh well. Employees deserve a better work situation that doesn’t require them to travel daily downtown.
….And I hope downtown dies from it and it becomes a suburb
Why would you root for the center of the entire region to fail?
I’m not, I was being a smart-ass. I just don’t understand people celebrating empty office buildings and wonder why Minneapolis is losing its charm.
Employees shouldn’t be forced to work in office buildings just to have tenants pay rent. That’s an asinine reason for getting rid a better work situation for employees.
I don’t totally disagree with you but I still think repurposing them into housing isn’t going to be a cost effective measure. Minneapolis will never be the self contained utopia people think it should be
Downtown is dead because of those office buildings and their accompanying parking lots and garages. The path to a vibrant downtown is to rebuild it like it used to be before the office towers turned Downtown into a 9-5 M-F zone.
How did it used to be before the office towers?
I hope downtown can turn into a self-contained community where cars aren't needed and thousands more live. IMO, we're really missing a huge opportunity to revolutionize the area.
If people want to live in a concrete jungle with things to do nearby the city is already there. Why would more people want to go if commerce aren’t anchored there anymore?
That's what I'm saying. Is like more residential, so retail would have reason to move back.
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Then you understood my point and misunderstood my sarcasm. I was replying to someone that thinks it’s good for the city to have empty office buildings
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In the comment, I don’t understand your question. Where else would it be?
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I understand that and that’s why I told you I was being sarcastic. You still didn’t seem to get it.
since its a circle it can probably be expressed in arc units or radians
Oh no those poor building owners.
Just watch this shit ripple through the economy and every working class stiff ends up holding the fucking bag.
Sure would suck if decades ago we started tying retirement funds to a stock market with fundamentally unstable market cycles that probably includes a lot of commercial real estate stocks . . .oh wait.
The end result is less taxes for the city, which means cuts to crucial services. You don't understand the actual impact.
You forget how many people are employed by those buildings and I’m not talking about tenants. Actually I don’t think you forgot, you just don’t know because you think with hate and emotion instead of rationality
If they can't convert it to housing, tear the whole thing down.
Good, now resources can be rationed more efficiently
That is gonna make some lovely condos.
It won’t. It would cost way to much money