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MIDDLE MARKET HIGHLIGHT, FEBRUARY 2006
GREEN BAY
Karen Stone, CCIM
On a regional basis, Green Bay's economy has been outgrowing other Wisconsin metro areas for the past decade. Although the city's National Football League team, the Green Bay Packers, may have given the city name recognition, it has been manufacturing that has historically been, and continues to be, the cornerstone of the city's economy. “We are very conscious of the global shifts in manufacturing,” notes Paul Ehrfurth, vice president of economic development for the Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce, “and we are very focused on business retention, as well as on fostering entrepreneurial activities that will grow into new businesses.” To this end, the Chamber has created Advance, a public-private partnership committed to improving and diversifying the economy, which Ehrfurth heads.
“On December 14, 2005, we opened a business incubator, known as the Business Assistance Center (BAC), in partnership with the Northeast Wisconsin Technical College,” Ehrfurth says. The BAC is located in a 50,000-square-foot building on the college's campus. The $5 million facility was designed by Green Bay-based Somerville Inc. Miron Construction, also of Green Bay, was the general contractor.
After an uphill climb, interest in revitalizing Green Bay's downtown has reached a critical peak. According to Jeff Mirkes, executive director of Downtown Green Bay Inc., “There is more happening now in our downtown than there has been in the past 20 years.” The current trend was born back in 1995, when a group of citizens organized On Broadway Inc., and undertook the renovation of a struggling area of downtown Green Bay along Broadway Street. In 2000, an old downtown bus station was demolished and the site was cleaned up. After sitting vacant for a few years, the site is now home to the three-story, 32,000-square-foot Johnson Bank Building, and St. Brendan's Inn, a 23-room inn and pub.
In 2002, the historic Fox Theatre reopened as the 1,000-seat Meyer Performing Arts Theatre. In 2004, Best Western spent $2 million on interior and exterior renovations of its downtown facility, and then sold the property to Quality Inns. Also in 2004, John Vetter of Milwaukee-based Vetter Denk Architects, entered the Green Bay development scene. He was awarded the bid to build a residential building along the Fox River on the site of a former parking garage owned by the city. Today, the $10 million, 26-unit condominium project known as the Riverfront Lofts is under construction and scheduled for completion this summer. Of the 26 units, which range in price from $275,000 to $475,000, 23 are already presold.
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A view from the Plaza of the proposed River Center project from John Vetter of Milwaukee-based Vetter Denk Architects.
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Encouraged by the community's response to the Waterfront Lofts, Vetter partnered with StoSS Landscape Urbanism, headquartered in Boston, and designed a $12 million comprehensive waterfront revitalization plan that covers a three-block area from the Nitsche Bridge to the Walnut Bridge along the east side of the Fox River. The revitalization plan includes three Vetter projects that were given the go-ahead by the city redevelopment authority in December. The Astor Place Condos, a $33 million, 17-story project, will bring 88 condominium units to downtown. The first level will feature an open market retail venue and the third floor will be a conference hall overlooking the Fox River. Groundbreaking is scheduled for this summer, with opening to occur late 2007. Of the 88 units, which range in price from $180,000 to $230,000, 69 have been reserved.
A second Vetter project will involve the redevelopment of the former Younker's Department Store site. The proposed mixed-use project, to be called River Center, will include a 150- to 160-room hotel, a water park venue, 84 apartments and 70 condos. The Green Bay Children's Museum has announced it will remain downtown and occupy space in the River Center project. It is estimated that Vetter will take possession of the property this summer and that construction of the project will take approximately 30 months.
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The Nicolet Bank Building is a new $16 million, 84,000-square-foot office building in Green Bay.
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The third Vetter project is the possible development of an office building on the site directly south of the new $16 million, 84,000-square-foot Nicolet National Bank Building that opened in September 2005 and is already 80 percent leased. Vetter has requested a 1-year option to work on possible designs for the site. Other developers are also seeing the potential in Green Bay's downtown. Bayland Bank of Green Bay recently renovated the 140,000-square-foot former Boston Store, an anchor space in an old mall that has been vacant since 2003. The bank will occupy 30,000 square feet on the first floor of the building, which sits in the heart of downtown on Washington Street one block from the riverfront. APAC, a customer service incoming call center and one of the city's major employers, has decided to maintain its office in Green Bay and will be relocating from the suburbs to 70,000 square feet on the second floor. APAC plans to occupy the space in May.
According to Mirkes, “There is no doubt community pride is building and there appears to be a growing sentiment that, when it comes to investing, downtown Green Bay is a winning location.”
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