(Because of a reporting error compounded by a miscommunication with a source, an earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that the developers of New Vision Lansing had reduced the number of "workforce" housing units in the projects by 66.7%. The error resulted from erroneous reporting by City Pulse last August that the project would comprise 450 units of "workplace" — or middle-income — housing. Unfortunately, the developers, who were the source for the story last August, did not point out the error to City Pulse. Moreover, when City Pulse learned from one of the developers that only 150 units would be workforce, as a precaution City Pulse called a spokesperson for the developers to ask if City Pulse's original reporting was accurate. The spokesperson said by telephone that it had been. City Pulse then published an earlier version of this story that began by saying there was a large reduction in workforce units. After it appeared, the spokesperson texted City Pulse that today's story and the story in August were incorrect in reporting that the plan originally called for 450 workforce units. City Pulse regrets the error.)
TUESDAY, Feb. 27 — The Lansing City Council delayed taking action last night on accepting a $40 million state grant for New Vision Lansing, a major downtown housing development.
The Council also delayed action on another resolution that would have accepted an additional $40 million state grant to move City Hall into the old Masonic Temple on Michigan Avenue.
The Council voted to set aside both resolutions after City Attorney Jim Smiertka advised the Council that it had to appropriate the grants if it accepted the money from the state. The two resolutions only sought to accept the two $40 million grants without determining how the money would be spent.
The Council could take action on two new resolutions to accept and appropriate the funds as soon as its next meeting, which is scheduled for March 11.
During the Committee of the Whole meeting before the regular Council meeting, Vice President Adam Hussain questioned why the $40 million grant from the Michigan State Housing Development Authority should go for the $228 million New Vision Lansing plan.
Language in the state budget for the current fiscal year said the grant is to “increase new affordable or workforce housing units or implement corridor improvement activities.”
“The way they actually wrote this line item in the budget was very generic,” Hussain said after a presentation on the New Vision Lansing plan by Paul and John Gentilozzi, whose local firm Gentilozzi Real Estate is the major developer behind it.
“I’m not certain that the Legislature contemplated us absolutely giving these dollars to this particular developer for this particular development,” Hussain added.
Hussain said the state awarded the funds without any bidding process and suggested that the city should consider bids on the best way to use the grant.
Mayor Andy Schor said, “I do believe that was the intention” of the Legislature for the city to use the grant specifically for the New Vision Lansing. But he said that the administration would institute a bidding process if the Council chose not to accept the money for that purpose.
The New Vision Lansing proposal calls for housing in three buildings, including a residential glass tower that would be the tallest building in the city.
The Gentilozzi family, in partnership with JFK Investments, architecture firm Hobbs & Black and the Christman Co. construction firm, were scheduled to present new designs to the Council, whose agenda included an action item to accept the Michigan State Housing Development Authority grant that was approved as part of this fiscal year's state budget.
Through its development firm, Gentilozzi Real Estate, the family went public with its initial plans for the project in August.
“We’ve easily put in over a thousand hours of architecture since we put out our first concept,” John Gentilozzi told City Pulse in an exclusive interview last week. “It’s not as if we said, ‘Hey, let's put all this on hold until we're able to secure the appropriation.’ The engineering and the architectural work have been continuous and ongoing this entire time.”
“Though a lot of that effort isn't necessarily reflected in the renderings or the floor plans, our understanding of the project's constructability has increased by orders of magnitude,” he added. “That isn't the sexy thing to say, but the sexy thing to say is that we're ready to start.”
The three-building project would create 460 downtown residences, including 150 designated as “workforce” housing, plus 530 parking spaces, with 417 of those either underground or in parking structures. The proposal would encompass 440,000 square feet of development, including 17,800 square feet of retail space, and 76,500 square feet of “new or existing office space.”
The state defines workforce housing as affordable to people with no more than 120% of “area median income.” According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the median household income in Lansing in 2022 dollars was $50,747.
The original development plan was projected to cost $13 million less at $215 million.
The centerpiece of both versions remains Tower on Grand, at 215 S. Grand Ave., south of Michigan Avenue near where Allegan Street dead ends.
Originally planned to fit about 300 units in 300,000 square feet of space, Gentilozzi said a few revisions have been made to the building to make it more efficient, cost-effective, and tenant-friendly. Most visibly, its original curved-glass design has been axed.
The new version, he said, would be 26 stories and would include 292 apartments in about 250,000 square feet of living space with sweeping views.
“To give everybody the best view of downtown and maximize the site, we wanted to curve the front of the building. But the problem with curving things is curved glass, curved framing is expensive. So, we decided to look at breaking it down into segments, which is what we did,” Gentilozzi said.
They also halved what was originally planned to be an acre’s worth of rooftop amenity space.
“Originally, we showed this amenity deck spreading out a little bit further. We concluded that it doesn't connect well enough to the tower, and it doesn't flow through to the river, so we took the larger deck, but we pushed out more toward the river so people can enjoy that space,” Gentilozzi said.
The building will still include a handful of lounges, private work and meeting rooms, a gym and space for fitness courses, a game room and other outdoor amenities like firepits, a pickleball court, and a pool.
“These are things we’ve seen in other cities,” Gentilozzi said, referring to a two-year window leading up to the New Vision Lansing announcement where he and his team visited hundreds of comparison projects in Midwestern cities like Cleveland, Cincinnati, Kansas City and Indianapolis.
“We've been looking at what some of these projects look like in terms of the amenities that they have and how people use the space because we don't have a lot of comparisons in Michigan,” Gentilozzi said, adding that his team has decided to make the amenities at each of the three developments available to residents of all three.
They’ve also opened more sidewalk space to create more public access to the riverfront. Those inside the tower can also walk around its entire base from the entrance to the outdoor riverfront gathering spaces on the other side.
The tower was originally set to include indoor parking for up to 500 cars. This has now been cut to 315, which will be in an attached parking structure on the west side of Grand Avenue. The structure would serve both the tower residents and workers at the Atrium Office Center, 215 S. Washington Square.
The parking component would also involve demolishing “the back half of the Atrium,” Gentilozzi explained. An above-street bridge would cross over Grand Avenue, connecting the Tower on Grand to the Atrium and parking facility.
Though that tower is the kingpin of the trio, the most substantial changes come in the Capitol Tower, 201 N. Walnut St.
“On this one, we genuinely did start all over again,” Gentilozzi said of the building planned to be constructed just northwest of the state Capitol Building, with its main entry facing Heritage Hall, 323 W. Ottawa St.
The six-floor, 110,000-square-foot building will include 10 more housing units than originally planned. It will feature 80 in total, ranging from studio to two-bedroom options, plus eight three-bedroom, 650-square-foot rental townhomes on the building’s east side that weren’t a part of the initial designs. If the demand is there down the road, Gentilozzi said they’ve set aside enough space to construct seven additional townhouses on the building's southwest corner.
It will also include 36,480 square feet of office space, set to be shared by two tenants that Gentilozzi said have already expressed interest. An underground parking structure would accommodate as many as 102 vehicles, or eight fewer than the initial proposal, with another 47 spaces of surface parking available on the northwest corner.
“We liked our original design, but the more we sat with those plans, it just didn’t seem to feel right in that spot, it felt like there was too much mass too close to the Capitol,” Gentilozzi said. “It kind of turned into a giant glass middle finger facing the Capitol, and we didn’t want to do that. Architecturally, this building fits within the neighborhood and complements the Capitol much better.”
The Capitol Tower’s new centerpiece comes in the form of a large column that accents its main entrance. The original, which Gentilozzi described as “a modern-looking office building,” was four stories taller and much more compact, highlighted by curved glass windows facing the Capitol Building. The initial plan also didn’t feature the new townhouses and had an additional 11,5000 square feet of office space.
Gentilozzi said adding the column was a matter of adding more character to the new design. It will extend through to the upper floors, where a patio space will provide tenants with a scenic view of the Capitol.
“This is one of those spots where you can't go sort of too obvious with it, but you have to make a strong statement, especially with the location,” Gentilozzi said. “We decided that the giant column, or the ‘monumental column’ as we call it, fit much better here.”
The project's final leg, the Washington Square Apartments, is the only one of the three that won’t require new construction. Instead, the team plans to renovate the 10-story, century-old building at 100 S. Washington Square to make way for 60 one and two-bedroom apartment units — all of which are “scheduled to be workforce rents,” according to Gentilozzi.
“The neatest thing about Washington Square is that, for all our discussions about converting office spaces to apartments, we're doing it a block from the Capitol. We want that to send a message that it's possible, that you can deliver a really good product and provide people a nice place to live here,” Gentilozzi said.
The Washington Square Apartments will total 55,000 square feet, with 3,800 square feet of retail space. The nearby building at 108 S. Washington Square is set to become a mixed-use parking structure with space for 100 vehicles and 5,000 square feet of additional retail space.
If all goes according to plan, construction of the Washington Square Apartments would begin in the second quarter of this year, followed by the Tower on Grand in the third quarter and the Capitol Tower in the fall. Washington Square could be completed in less than a year, while the Tower on Grand and the Capitol Tower may require more than two years of development.
Gentilozzi anticipates needing 500 to 700 workers to pull it off and expects to pay them as much as $60 million in construction wages.
The idea behind New Vision Lansing is to reverse engineer the city’s downtown growth by bringing new residents in.
“We can't force those things, we have to bring the people to downtown first and then let the businesses come to the people,” Gentilozzi said. “Also, the businesses that are already here, that have stayed here and stuck it out, they deserve a chance to be rewarded, to thrive in a true downtown.”
“At the end of the day, you have to have people,” he added. “Because it's the people that make downtown.”
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