The periphery

When you're talking Europe, the periphery (Greece, etc.) is ailing, while the core, especially Germany and Scandinavia, is doing well. In Phoenix, the situation is reversed. To be sure, the depression has clobbered huge swaths of Phoenix suburbia, left Pinal County circling the drain and driven a stake into the dreams of Superstition Vistas and Buckeye with 400,000 poor boobs from the Midwest. Glendale is underwater on its super mortgage to hucksters and Westgate is in foreclosure. And the compromised, local-yokel professional seers have once again pushed out their prediction of "recovery," this time to 2015. Still, what little economic activity that's happening is occurring in places such as Scottsdale and Chandler.

The news for the city of Phoenix is gloomy. What few companies are coming to the metro area are setting up shop on the periphery. Banner Health, which killed a hospital on the Phoenix Biosciences Campus that would have led to a quantum leap in its synergies, has teamed up with the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center to establish a "world class" treatment facility in Gilbert. (The irony here is that Anderson is part of the Texas Medical Center in central Houston that should be the model for the Phoenix campus). ASU and the Mayo Clinic are setting up a medical school in north Scottsdale. Even as central Phoenix is clearcut with huge swaths of empty land, a big data center chose Chandler for a new operation, among the other new projects and expansions that the suburbs can boast. Even within the city, venerable law firm Fennemore Craig stabbed downtown (well, Midtown) in the back, relocating to 24th and Camelback.

As far as I can tell, this isn't even being discussed in the Phoenix mayoral race. Yet it's one of the biggest problems facing the city and metro area.

It's not new. With its ethos of more-land-than-brains, Phoenix's real-estate herd has been building "greenfield" office "parks" far out for decades. After the S&L collapse hurt so many of them in the Central Corridor, they vowed never again, and moved to Camelback, north Scottsdale, and out, out, out. Since at least the last 1990s, downtown and the Central Corridor have seen a steady, and now alarming, loss of private-sector employment and private investment. (CityScape is a drop in this dry bucket). The leasing boyz relentlessly steered offices out to the suburbs, especially cherry picking the city's assets. The more affluent residents have moved there, too. This is steadily leaving the city as the slum donut hole in a metro area that underperforms all its peers, but hey, you don't have to shovel sunshine, and the periphery will gather the good stuff.

The best of America's cities are moving in exactly the opposite direction. Seattle is one good example but hardly the only one. Younger people and empty-nest baby boomers like the energy and convenience of the city, especially a vibrant downtown (I can see four cranes from my condo window, soon to be five). The creative force that quality density encourages is now being appreciated. This trend will accelerate in a high energy future. So once again, metro Phoenix is left at another competitive disadvantage, because all these cities also have plenty of suburbs, and they don't all look alike, either.

Metro Phoenix's radical decentralization is extremely costly, particularly if the externalities are priced in (e.g. loss of cooling agricultural land, emissions, etc.). These greenfield developments are only inexpensive via the most shallow calculations, but those are what counts in a state run by the Real Estate Industrial Complex. All these office tilt-ups with their vast surface parking lots require driving long distances, almost always in single-occupancy car trips. I know people there who drive 100 miles a day and think nothing of it. Good luck when gasoline is $10 a gallon. Even in car-crazy Houston, the Texas Medical Center is on light rail, so people have options. Big stretches of Phoenix's light-rail line (we built it, you bastards) traverse blighted, empty land. The bias to suburbia also encourages disengagement and isolation — no wonder Arizona is kook central. It discourages recruitment of the best creative-class workers. And, in general, it does nothing to expand the pie and turn around the region's ghastly economic (much less social) performance. There is no quality, competitive major metro without a strong central core and downtown. Thus, every coup on the periphery will continue to be triply offset by the costs of a city of Phoenix in decline.

The solutions are well known. Phoenix should put all its energies into building out the downtown Biosciences Campus, bulking up the UA med school and academic research, adding the pharmacy school, a hospital, private-sector research and development, and biomedical manufacturing. Don't take T-Gen for granted. ASU deciding to team up with Mayo in north Scottsdale ought to be a wake-up call about the city's slow and halting commitment to the downtown campus. The city should create a real center-city economic-development authority (and kill off the worthless zombie organizations) that will recruit businesses especially from Southern California. City Hall should make the center city the cheapest, fastest place to do business. Banked land should be taxed. Infill should get incentives (and Bell Road is not infill). Best-practices nationwide should be emulated.

Yet none of this is happening. Instead, we have the walking dead mayor (with New Times devastating appraisal). We have a mayoral debate that seems to boil down to: "Ug, public employees very bad!" vs. "Public employees are kinda bad in some cases, but not as much as you say." Meanwhile, the wealthy stewards and major non-profits that hold a real city together are lacking. Everybody else is just waiting for housing to come back (good luck with that). And the toxic sense that Phoenix's loss is the "Valley's" gain continues.

 

Comments

[CDT]

Calling Fennemore, Craig's move to 24th & Camelback a "stab in the back" of downtown is a tad harsh. The firm's current office is at 3033 N. Central, just north of Thomas, so it wasn't really and truly downtown to begin with.

[koreyel]

Jon writes:

"Even as central Phoenix is clearcut with huge swaths of empty land..."

Want to get something done about that? Then back fill it with citrus orchards. As there is nothing like trees to entice dozer blades. Neroli is like cocaine for the developer boyz. They'll be salivating like dogs and pissing on each other to do the infilling....

[phxSUNSfan]

There would be no room for Fennemore Craig in downtown. There is no class A office space available for any company interested in moving to the core, espcially one of that size. By my crude estimations we would need at least two more high-rises the size of CityScape’s office tower to stay ahead of demand and potential demand.

Mayo Clinic's Medical School is only a collaborative effort with ASU that will offer very few degrees and an extension of its Rochester, MN campus. It is not the true ASU Medical School envisioned for the Bio-Med Campus; one that would compete directly with an adjacent UofA school currently under construction along with a Cancer Research Center that will begin construction at the end of this year. What downtown needs besides more office towers is more residential units: What would make for an interesting investigation is looking into why construction in this micro-market is lacking though pent-up demand is there.

Large data centers, facilities that will employ very few during operation, are not welcomed nor should be in downtown; perhaps in Phoenix’ Gateway Center (NE of Sky Harbor) or in the Sky Harbor Center (office development area) but not in a downtown area even with swaths of vacant land because they offer no employment density for that CBD.

[phxSUNSfan]

Phoenix' Gateway Center is actually N and NW of Sky Harbor...

[cal lash]

Phoenix is burning whilst we fiddle faddle. As in "The Good News by Ed Abbey. The desert always wins.

[Phx Planner]

phxSunsfan,

I'm also bullish on market demand downtown and near light rail stations - but long term.

Short term (next 5 years)low-mid rise "4 over 1" rental housing (wood frame on top of masonry podium - like Artisan lofts and the subsidized project under construction at Central/Campbell) will most likely be all that is built within this timeframe.

Downtown needs to be juiced a lot more in order to bring demand for office or steel frame mid-high rise residential.

Fast-tracking LRT connections to south and west, commuter rail (and condemning/re-establishing Union Station) and adding multiple feeder streetcar spurs would help. An infrastructure-focused trillion+ federal stimulus is the only real hope for this.

Knocking down city-owned parking garages at 3rd St. and 3rd Ave and Jefferson and replacing with world-class open space would be another big catalyst, as would restoring key historic buildings (the Professional Building probably being the top priority)

I agree with Jon that government intervention will be needed (just like every other city) in the form of expedited permitting, tax abatements, and an aggressive business attraction/expansion program in strategic agglomerative industries.

[phxSUNSfan]

Phx Planner, I only disagree in that demand for high- rise living, especially downtown, midtown, and Tempe, is high as witnessed by buildings that are nearly full and all 1 bedrooms or studios in those high-rises occupied. I personally know people (at least 20) who would love to rent an apartment downtown but cannot find a place to rent and It likely that this problem is being repeated by hundreds of people. There is a market for renting but not for selling condos which confuses some. But the issue is that no one is willing to buy in this market and with such uncertainty but there are plenty willing to lease. The only anomaly is One Lexington...

[phxSUNSfan]

I forgot to mention that the new Eastridge/Concord residential buildings on Roosevelt will be a nice addition of 2 mid-rise, high density buildings but that it is going to be marketed as private student housing is frustrating.

[soleri]

Fennemore Craig's requirements were not Class A office space but a large amount of contiguous office space. It's a large firm currently occupying over a third of the Phoenix Corporate Center. Back in 1965 when it was new, the 27-story building was the tallest in Phoenix. It was noted for its exterior elevator that allowed for some great viewing. Although renovated inside, it's clearly seen better days, so the law firm's new digs at the Biltmore Financial Center represent an upgrade at no additional cost. Thank you, real-estate depression.

Otherwise, it's possible to see the broader trends (economic cannibalization, retail-sector devastation, and metastatic urban cancer) as permanent features of metro Phoenix's sideways lurch into a dismal future. Once you abandon the hope that it's ever going to get significantly better, you sleep better at night.

I've noticed how residential North Central Avenue, upscale and bosky, hasn't looked so shabby in decades. The former McCain house just north of Glendale Ave. is now on the market as a short sale. The grounds haven't been watered in months and the ash trees in front are dying. Elsewhere, it seems as if every other house has a for-sale sign. This points out how an economic system designed to reward the richest among us is now hurting even the upper-middle class.

The little gourmet take-out store by my house closed last month. It managed to stay open for three years, which is a tribute to its owners and vision. It was exactly the kind of business that gives a neighborhood cachet and value. These are the little deaths - hardly unexpected - that haunt me. The old Target store at 7th Avenue & Camelback is vast and indomitable signage of blight. The middle-class is poorer, as are the poor themselves. The national outlook signals a depression but Phoenix looks like it's already there.

[Emil Pulsifer]

Hi,

I don't mean to hijack this thread, but I wanted to draw attention to something I didn't have time to post yesterday that deals substantively with the peak oil issues discussed in the previous thread. Please direct all replies to the PREVIOUS thread, where you will also find a copy.

"A Winter" wrote:

"The tar sands are low flow resources that will never exceed 3.5mb/d. Important but no savior of the world economy if that's lost in a single year."

Nope. The figure of 3.5 mb/d is for 2025 and is not a maximum. See here:

http://www.capp.ca/aboutUs/mediaCentre/NewsReleases/Pages/2010-Oil-Forecast.aspx#fV6oiGOhp8Tx

But the production curve really ramps up from there. By 2078 the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA, not to be confused with the IEA) estimates that Canadian tar sands oil ALONE will be 41 billion barrels per year: that's 112 mb/d from that source alone. That doesn't even begin to take into account Venezuela. See p. 16 and the graph titled "Canadia Bitumen: A Potential Path from Resource Base to Production", p. 16 of the following slide show:

http://www.eia.gov/neic/speeches/Caruso061305.pdf

(Incidentally, that's from 2005 so estimates may have changed.)

"azrebel" wrote: "pipeline 500,000 barrels per day"

Actually, the XL pipeline is eventually expected to carry up to 900,000 barrels per day.

http://www.earthworksaction.org/KeystoneXLpipeline.cfm

If this still seems inadequate relative to the 20 mb/d the United States consumes (21 percent of U.S. oil comes from Canada, and 99 percent of Canadian oil exports go to the U.S.), bear in mind that this is a SINGLE pipeline. At the moment tar sands output is only 1.5 mb/d so immediate construction of numerous pipelines (whether to the U.S. or to the Canadian coast where it can be loaded aboard ships bound for China) shouldn't be expected.

[koreyel]

"An infrastructure-focused trillion+ federal stimulus is the only real hope for this."

I'm sure President Perry or President Christie will be amenable to this. They think big...

C'mon lets get real.
That ain't gonna happen sailor...
Austerity is in the saddle riding mankind...

Look, I know my post up above seems like I'm blowing off Jon's post. I am not. I am actually saying something profound about human beings, and providing you geniuses with the least expensive way to save the heart of Phoenix.

Mental experiment:

Imagine all the vacant land downtown, and round about, is neat in orchards and hung with fruit. Orderly trees of 15 years. Does anybody really doubt that land would be coveted for development? As distinguished from weed-strewn glass-littered lots?

The way to get Phoenix redone is to reclaim the land, rip out the cement, and plant trees. That's bulldozer food. I guarantee it. It really doesn't cost that much. In fact it is damn cheap. You have to give developers something sexy, something worth blading...

Trust me. I've kept my eyes open my whole life. I know how the human animal with capital thinks. He is a dumb creature. He is as easy to trick and trap as a Dodo bird was once to club. And my plan is the cheapest, the quickest, and probably the only way to get this done...

[Emil Pulsifer]

P.S. That should have read 21 percent of U.S. oil imports come from Canada.

[soleri]

PSF, you can't simply will into being high-rise residential buildings. They are expensive to build under the best of circumstances, and it's fairly obvious there's no market for top-dollar rentals in downtown. The rentals that are there (44 Monroe, e.g.) happened only because of bankruptcy. Ditto for One Lexington, which is selling its condos at half the original price. Chateau on Central, the faux-Victorian, project at Palm Lane & Central, has 21 units and one sale (Phil Gordon). That despite a 50% price reduction after the project's foreclosure. Centerpoint in Tempe is another Mortgages Ltd bankruptcy, hence its bottom-feeding success.

The few projects out there (including the mid-rise at Minnezona & Central) are taking advantage of the tax code to offer limited-income housing. I'm not a tax expert so I have no idea where these vehicles might by themselves work to offer significant residential in CenPho.

As Talton and PhxPlanner suggest, it's going to be government that swings the big bat here. 2012 looks like a bloodbath, so I'm guessing it's going to be at least five years before we get to a place where we might hope again.

[Mick]

Whoa folks.

I greatly respect Mr. Talton, but opening a pharmacy school is a horrible idea. Students are graduating $100K in debt from pharmacy schools and can't get jobs. I know pharmacists who are sitting at home with nothing to do. There is already a huge surplus of pharmacists in the US.

[Mick]

Whoa again.

As Emil said, not to hijack this thread, but this column is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. Within a few years, if not sooner, large numbers of Americans will be obviously starving. If a Republican wins in 2012, unemployment will at least triple. Hospitals are going to fail all over the country as Medicare is wiped out.

The US will degenerate into a plantation. A majority of Americans will have the standard of living of a slave, with hopelessly inadequate food and shelter. How are businesses going to survive? Starving people make poor customers.

Within a few years, there are going to be emaciated corpses lying around on every street corner.

[Mick]

If a Republican wins in 2012, there will never be hope in North America ever again. The US will be no better than a gulag or a forced-labor camp.

Republicans don't want to pay Americans to work. They want us to compete with Chinese prison labor.

We must stop this. Nothing else matters. I wish we could find a legal, Constitutional way to completely replace our government. If we don't we are going to starve. There is no other possible outcome.

[koreyel]

@Emil

The pipeline will get built. It is a done deal. This has been obvious at least since the moment when Obama turned aside the new EPA air quality rules.

For three reasons in order of importance:

1) The oligarchs need the money.
2) Mr. Obama needs the votes.
3) We the wee people need the jobs.

That it will only supply 5% of the country's needs for oil and may cause spill problems doesn't matter. That it is carbon intense doesn't matter either. That it means the death to lots of Canadian boreal trees is unimportant too. Your arguments for it don't matter. Nor does anybody's arguments against it. The oligarchs want it, and they own all three branches of government. They do as they please when they please. They can even sell crap to Iran if they want to.

So it is a done deal.
Stick a tarry fork in it.

[Emil Pulsifer]

Mr. Talton wrote: "And the compromised, local-yokel professional seers have once again pushed out their prediction of 'recovery,' this time to 2015."

The Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce recently invited speakers addressing three economic sectors -- global, national, and Arizona. (Angel Cabrera, Beckie Holmes, and Elliott Pollack respectively). The Arizona Republic reported a "recap" (summary) of comments by all three.

Even though Pollack said that Arizona job and population levels will return to 2007 levels "in 2015 or 2016" and asserted that housing prices will recover "but not to 2007 peaks", he later noted that "No economic recovery is possible in Arizona without strong recovery in housing and construction sectors".

Now contrast that with the national speaker, Holmes, who stated that "the national economy should approach full recovery in 2015 but construction and manufacturing sectors may take until 2020 to get back to 2007 levels".

If the national construction sector will take until 2020 to recover fully, and Arizona can't recover without a strong recovery in construction, doesn't that suggest that 2020 may be close than 2015 or 2016 to full recovery for the state? Especially since Arizona starts from a deep hole where that sector is concerned, having lost a large amount of construction jobs as a percentage of its economy?

(assuming intervening economic problems don't cause further difficulties -- big assumption)?

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/2011/09/30/20110930economists-see-Arizona-recovery-2015.html

[soleri]

Mick, I'm not quite as apocalyptic as you but I tend to think you see things at ground level that are perceptive and prescient. That said, Republicans will not gut Medicare and the reason is the health-care industrial complex. It controls 18% of GDP. These people already own a good chunk of Congress. No way will they permit their industry to be gutted by their own political class.

But you're right that they don't care if the average citizen lives or dies. And they'll make sure taxes are cut on the rich and effectively raised on everyone else. They have done this by creating a multiple-tier society: Haves, Have Lessers, Have Littles, and Have Nots. Essentially, unless you're in the top 5%, you'll be paying significantly more just to stay alive.

There will not be a revolution from the left and if there's an outbreak of violence, it will come from the right. As a nation, we are deeply hypnotized by race and status. The right figured that out a long time ago and it's why we're politically paralyzed. We see what is happening yet we've convinced ourselves that the least powerful are somehow the most responsible. It was an amazing mindfuck the right got away with it. But they couldn't have done it without our cooperation. The truth is devastating: we are getting what we deserve.

[eclecticdog]

The California and Bust link to Vanity Fair is a worthwhile read. Big troubles ahead for CA, and that means AZ too.

I visited my right-wing friend out in Fountain Hills last week and he assures me things are all right. There are no more real estate deals to be had in FH (although I didn't really see them to be "deals" or "steals"). The CA refugees have snatched them up. I told him the second round is coming. If CA can't service their pensions, what will this mean for AZ?

I wanted to ask, but didn't, if he was thankful the economy has turned the corner under Obama! Maybe next time.

[Emil Pulsifer]

phxSUNSfan wrote:

"What downtown needs besides more office towers is more residential units: What would make for an interesting investigation is looking into why construction in this micro-market is lacking though pent-up demand is there."

Agreed, and I would extend the analysis beyond downtown to the more general city center: there are lots of dead zones ringing downtown, some north but many south.

Small businesses that sell retail want a local customer base before they locate in a given area. That means a vital local residential sector, unless the business markets to office workers who commute in for the day (but that restriction severely limits the number and nature of local businesses).

All real-estate developers in Arizona know that first you build housing then you attract businesses eager to take advantage of the disposable income of newly attracted residents. (More accurately, housing is built at the same time that the foundations for local business infrastructures are laid, with plenty of room for growth for additional businesses to locate there over time.)

In order to attract residents, you need amenities. Obviously those downtown won't include single family homes, lawns, low crime rates, new (and perhaps better funded) schools, spanking new buildings, and other traditional suburban attractions.

That leaves financial considerations. Downtown (and central city) living must be made more affordable to be broadly attractive. More affordable than suburban living means not only the ability to sell a car and walk or ride the trolley, having local businesses offer most of the goods and services you will want, as well as a nearby job for you, but also means affordability in rents.

That suggests that the city AND county and state needs to get busy with both tax subsidies for developers who build there and businesses that locate there, but with an agreement in writing that a significant portion of this cost savings will be passed on in rents that remain a given percentage below city averages.

(Gotta run. More another time maybe.)

[azrebel]

Special times when I realized I was living in The Valley of the Sun(stroke)

They moved the Phoenix Open to Scottsdale.

Mary Rose Wilcox was shot in the butt and she thought that was a vote of confidence.

Babbitt lost the glasses and began acting Presidential.

Wolves were re-introduced into cattle country. (Grizzlies to follow)

Janet, the first Shemale governor.

Crudnals move to AZ.

McCain showed that carpetbaggers were easily elected in AZ. (Renzi noticed)

Every place with an elevation higher than 1500 ft. is called Northern Arizona.

Frank Kush fired for smacking a kid who deserved to have his butt kicked all around the field along with his parents.

Verado, really? A high dollar suburb where teeth used to be optional?

Doing away with Camp Tontozona and replacing it with a big white tent?

I could go on, but dinner calls.

[morecleanair]

Jon: lots of pent-up intellectual ferment during your novel-writing haitus! Reading and trying to digest all of the above, I'm left with the specter of Morrison and the sprawl-meisters trying to conjure up the grand plan called "SUN CORRIDOR" which would be a megalopolis housing maybe 9 million souls . . . forget whether there's enough water . . forget the effect on our already abysmal air quality. Delusional, for sure, but also seductive to the "boyz", as Jon calls them.

So my viewpoint is influenced by the specter of yet another series of Fairy Tales about how the Valley grows. Grady Gammage grooves on this!

[AWinter]

$100,000 for pharmacy school?! That's even more ridiculous than the law school scam. It just goes to show a thing about education (among other elements of civilization): first it's a privilege, then it becomes a public good, it's turned into a business, and then degenerates into a racket, until it becomes a privilege again.

[Buffy The Vampire Slayer]

The Valley should press, "reset".

[azrebel]

The world of authors:

William Faulkner
Ernest Hemingway
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Kurt Vonnegut
Jon Talton

Sarah Palin
Bristol Palin
Jan Brewer

Wait?? What??

[azrebel]

I'm really liking the "planting trees" idea for all the empty lots in Phoenix and I like the "reset button" idea also.

We have some smart people on this blog.

[Rate Crimes]

What is the lowest (hypothetical) floor one would have to rent in a downtown Phoenix tower in order to raise oneself above the toxic, brown cloud?

[eclecticdog]

When will the City of Phoenix use imminent domain to seize the wasted space on the NE corner of Central and Indian School? It's just banked land, why not add it to the park? And the city will have the added bonus of putting on the other land bankers on notice.

[azrebel]

Rate, I know the answer to that one!

18th floor.

Used to watch the brown ooze in from the freeway and at that level I was just above it.

[Emil Pulsifer]

The Arizona Republic had a story a few days ago headlined "Moving downtown has saved couple lots of money, time". Excerpts:

* * *

A year ago, the Helgesons were celebrating a makeover of their Queen Creek home by TV star designer Nate Berkus.

This year, Jessica and Cody Helgeson have turned that southeast Valley home into a rental and are celebrating their recent move to a high-rise in downtown Phoenix, 44 Monroe. Moving downtown has saved them hundreds of dollars a month in gas, reduced their headaches, eliminated their long commutes and improved their social lives, they said.

The switch from suburban to urban life has its price. They lost nearly 800 square feet of space and a lush green yard.

Do they miss it?

"We haven't really," said Cody Helgeson, 26. "We had a yard that was all landscaped, but at the same time, we were paying a gardener to come out every week."

"Here we have Civic Space Park," he said. "It's not even a block away."

. . . The building (44 Monroe) also sits near the Metro light rail, which enables some of its tenants to commute to work on mass transit.

Cody Helgeson said that convenience has allowed him and his wife to sell one of their cars.

"When we lived in Queen Creek, we were budgeting about $500 a month in gas," he said. "Now, we've got it down to one vehicle. We're probably able to go one whole month on one tank of gas. We walk everywhere."

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/2011/09/28/20110928phoenix-downtown-couple-move-44-monroe.html

Admittedly, the article (which appeared in the Business section) does read something like an advertisement for 44 Monroe; and with rents ranging from $1,600 to $3,000 a month it's scarcely a model for urban vitalization (unless you believe that can be accomplished by a handful of wealthy, young, childless yuppie eccentrics). Still, I thought it was appropriate to the thread and of potential interest.

[phxSUNSfan]

Emil, u also have to realize that many of us younger folk and even yuppies do not mind roommates. Plenty of us are more than willing to share space. I have a two bedroom apt and a roommate. We pay under $1000 each toward rent...

[phxSUNSfan]

I was also going to add that in order to create more density downtown, developers will need to build housing that is more affordable. Perhaps teaming up with government agencies to provide housing for "low income" individuals. In many cities like Seattle, up to $35,000/year (maybe even a little higher) qualifies an individual into the low to moderate income bracket, thus allowing those people to rent units in places like Yesler Terrace after redevelopment.

The problem with many of the condo buildings built in Phoenix and Tempe to date, are that they were built much too luxuriously with amenities that were rather ridiculous. If you look up some of the amenities that were to be offered at what is now called West 6th in Tempe, you would be amazed most. First, we need more people to move downtown then as the city center becomes more active, inviting, etc those with deep pockets would eventually follow. Building from nothing to "Upper East Side" is just too big a leap for most cities: That was the issue with the original offerings of 44 Monroe and One Lexington's first incarnation.

[azrebel]

From the look of the couple in Emil's article, I would say that the "density" of Downtown has already arrived.

What a couple of dweebs.

They are the perfect couple representing the Queen Qweek culture.

These people will be supporting my Social Security???????????

Not that I'm one to judge. ( : - )

What the hell are they doing to each other under the table???????????

[cal Lash]

I follow this blog, as I have great respect for Jon Talton. I enjoy his take on the world and most of the comments that follow. And I respect Jon as he knows and understands the Valley of the Sun amidst the Sonoran desert (what’s left of it). A number of you post stuff I enjoy and of course I read Soleri as each time it’s like being swept up in a new gentle Siddhartha river. However for the most part as Jon knows I am a Sahuaro and Sand dude. I see no reason to build something more than one story high nor much larger than 1000 square feet. A nice cave with a SW entrance will do, thank you. Actually my cave is about 300 Square feet. I get nauseas thinking about living in something tall surrounded by a bunch of other human rats. But then I am the guy that requires three feet between me and others, particularly in the grocery store. So I shop late or very early. And I avoid crowds like the plague. I am opposed to fracking for petroleum and drilling more holes for whatever. A population of 9 billion let alone 30 billion seems dastardly evil. Must be my early religious training that made me say evil, kinda like invoking the devil. But then I was an atheist until I thought I might be god, so now I am just a militant agnostic. Wonder if that makes me eligible for a drone hit. So I will keep reading and once in a while respond with something my tiny brain can get around, like Chapo for President. I am off to a place with a TV so I can watch the PBS program on Prohibition by Ken Burns.
Hasta luego
Cal and his dog Spot in their motor home somewhere in the great Sonoran desert.

[Emil Pulsifer]

phxSUNSfan wrote: "We pay under $1000 each toward rent..."

Good heavens: no house, roommates, and rent at close to $1,000 a month each? Must have money to burn...

My understanding (from Wikipedia) is that 44 Monroe was originally a "long vacant Arizona Bank 11-story building built in 1961". It was razed and a 34 story tower (including 7 stories of above-ground parking) built on the land occupied by the old building.

Now, who was the land/building purchased from? The Wiki article mentions that Grace Communities (no Wiki entry) was the purchaser, but no mention of the entity that sold.

The primary lender on the new building project, Corus Bank, was taken over by the FDIC in January 2010. What did they do with this leverage? Apparently nothing: I've already mentioned the price range of the rental units (rather high during current circumstances), but Wiki mentions that "residential unit prices range from $480,000 to $3.2 million".

[Emil Pulsifer]

A bit of a digression but Mick's crazy calls for "armed revolution" reminded me of something that might stand current progressive protesters in good stead: I recently came across a USA Today article on Medicare reform that referenced an incident in 1989, when the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act, first unveiled by Ronald Reagan and intended to be funded primarily by a surtax on high-income seniors, resulted in a "gray riot" in which the powerful House committee chairman Dan Rostenkowski was chased down a Chicago street in his own legislative district by a gang of ferocious old rich people: "Eventually, the 6-foot-4-inch Rostenkowski cut through a gas station, broke into a sprint and escaped into his car, which minutes earlier had one of the elderly protesters, Leona Kozien, draped over the hood."

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/08/11/rostys-catastrophic-moment-over-health-care-was-a-first/

Meanwhile, in a Petro-fueled update on Occupy Wall Street protests, a few observations and reports:

The media, of late, has taken to reporting the protesters as a heterogeneous gathering of modern day hippies, anarchists, and losers, who can't agree on anything except vague platitudes against the rich. However, there is a vast difference between a community with politically divergent goals and a community that has no common goals. The periodical Business Insider (citing source n+1) reports that the protesters agreed on 10 demands, the most important of which was the repeal of the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling that lets corporations and other third-party organizations spend unlimited amounts in elections. They also want widespread debt forgiveness, pay as you go military intervention, a Tobin tax on financial transactions, preventive-care universal health centers, the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall, paid sick leave, increased political transparency, an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit (aka a negative income tax), and full-employment policies.

http://www.businessinsider.com/finally-specific-demands-from-occupy-wall-street-2011-9#

Meanwhile, 700 of these scalliwags were arrested for trying to cross the Brooklyn Bridge. What's next? Maybe trying to walking down the street! (Oh, wait, 100 were arrested for that, with some pepper-sprayed for good measure.)

[azrebel]

@cal
"I am the guy that requires three feet between me and others."

I'll bring a tape measure to lunch on Thursday.

[cal lash]

Azrebel, i will turn up my hearing aid.

[Rate Crimes]

"18th floor."

I was certain it would have been the 7-1/2th floor.

[Rate Crimes]

Q: What is the lowest (hypothetical) floor one would have to rent in a downtown Phoenix tower in order to raise oneself above the toxic, brown cloud?

A: "18th"

Q2: What energy is required to vertically move people, water, and all human needs to and from the 18th floor?

A: Water is heavier than even obese Americans.

Q3: From where is Arizona's energy primarily derived?

A: Coal and nuclear power.

Entropy in action.

[Rate Crimes]

Q4: What's next?

A: Cloud cities. :)

[eclecticdog]

Hmm, cloud cities. Hope I get my flying car by the time they're built!

[cal Lash]

Blade Runner is here?

[Emil Pulsifer]

I neglected to mention: the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act was repealed shortly after the Rostenkowski "chase".

Also just wanted to remark, re the 700 Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested for trying to cross the Brooklyn Bridge, that during the entire two weeks of the Selma to Montgomery marches during the 1960s (including the crossing of the Edmund Pettus Bridge) "only" about 300 arrests were made. (True, the police were considerably more brutal, but it's nonetheless remarkable that 700 arrests were made.)

[CDT]

Eclectic dog wrote:

"When will the City of Phoenix use imminent domain to seize the wasted space on the NE corner of Central and Indian School? It's just banked land, why not add it to the park? And the city will have the added bonus of putting on the other land bankers on notice."

That 15-acre parcel was held back by the Barron Collier Company in the three-way land swap with Phoenix and the feds that led to Indian School Park, the conferral of Everglades land to the federal government, and the development of the Collier Center downtown. Collier has a deadline for developing the Indian School parcel, but it was 25 or 50 years or so.

Here's a GAO report on the exchange:

http://www.legistorm.com/score_gao/show/id/21290.html

[eclecticdog]

Thanks for the link and info CDT. For some reason, this sentence stood out for me:

"GAO does not question the right of the City of Phoenix to decide how privately-owned property should be used. Yet the city's action in this case raises questions about whether a locality should have the authority to use zoning as a way of acquiring land in federal disposition programs without compensation to the federal government."

Future poison pills for local govts to swallow?

[azrebel]

We're number one. We're number one.

Maricopa county is the leading county with vacant homes, condos, apartments.

Russell Pearce in yesterdays debate, "We are leading the way for the nation."

With delusional "leaders" like Pearce, is it no surprise we are in the pickle we're in???