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Tag: Broad Street

Broad Street gets another large apartment proposal

An eight-story apartment complex is planned for the Broad and Second/Third Street block, which is mostly a dirt parking lot with three wooden houses (rear). Photo by Teya Vitu.

Broad Street’s fourth multi-story housing project in the past two years surfaced Aug. 28 with a proposed eight-story mixed-use project at Third and Myrtle streets.

The 142-unit 3rd & Myrtle or Boise Caddis would fill the block bounded by Broad, Second, Third and Myrtle streets in the city’s Central Addition. It would join the 159-unit The Fowler apartments that opened earlier this year and the proposed 160-unit The Cartee and Boise City Councilman’s two-tower 60-unit proposal with an elevated garage over Broad Street.

River Caddis Development of East Lansing, Michigan, applied Aug. 28 for a zoning change from residential-office (R-ODD) to central business (C-5DD).

GGLO Architects of Seattle is the architect but the company is well versed in Boise buildings. GGLO did the initial design for The Afton condos, the Fifth & Idaho Apartments, the River and Ash street apartments – all under construction now – and it designed the new Boise City Hall Plaza and Indian Creek Plaza in Caldwell, plus the preliminary plans for the proposed park across from Boise Plaza.

River Caddis Development has acquired, developed or redeveloped multi-family and commercial projects in Michigan, Texas, Ohio, Florida, and Iowa with pending projects in South Carolina, Arizona, Wisconsin and Colorado, according to the company website.

The newly proposed Broad Street apartments would be directly behind WinCo (right). Image courtesy of GGLO Architects.

River Caddis has developed several student housing projects, including the 57-unit Trowbridge Village near the Michigan State University; the 1,071-bed Campus Village at College Station Texas A&M University; the 186-unit The Domain at Waco near Baylor University; and the 148-unit The Domain at Cleveland serving Cleveland State University.

The Boise project will include ground floor retail and structured parking, according to filings with Boise Planning & Development Services.

Officials at River Caddis did not immediately return calls to the Idaho Business Review.

Editor’s Note: This article was updates with images at 11:56 a.m. Aug. 30.

 

Broad Street has a new face

Broad Street now has a festival block between Fifth and Sixth streets. Photo by Teya Vitu.
Broad Street now has a “festival” block between Fifth and Sixth streets, so called because of its wide sidewalks sloping down to the concrete street. Photo by Teya Vitu.

As big buildings have arisen on Broad Street this past year, the street itself has undergone a down-to-the-dirt overhaul.

Five blocks of Broad between Capitol Boulevard and Second Street now offer pedestrian-friendly, event-friendly and environmentally-friendly features. Broad is the main street through what the city of Boise calls its LIV District, where the city seeks to exemplify “lasting environments, innovative enterprises and vibrant communities.”

The street now has wider sidewalks, two rows of trees, and brick pavers that drain storm water into the ground. Out of sight, the city’s geothermal system was extended down Broad Street and additional fiber optic lines were installed, said Karl Woods, the Broad Street project manager at the Capital City Development Corp., which undertook the Broad Street improvements.

Karl Woods
Karl Woods

A “festival” block akin to the Basque Block, which is closed to traffic for public events, graces Broad between Fifth and Sixth streets. On that block, the street surface is concrete, the rolled curbs slope up to the sidewalk, the sidewalks are 26 feet, 7 inches wide and there is no parking allowed.

The festival block presents an outdoor extension for Boise Brewing, the Boise, and, opening later this year, The Fowler Apartments. The apartment building will include a street level The Wylder pizza shop and Form & Function coffee shop.

“We’ve been doing Hoptober Freshtival every years since we opened (in 2014),” Boise Brewing founder Collin Rudeen said. “It was an old street and beat-up sidewalks. Now it looks like the real deal. We’re looking to do more block parties during the year. That’s something we would not have done before.”

Only half the festival block is done – the other half will be finished in fall – but the first street event is slated for Aug. 26 with the Boise Weekly’s Big LeBoise event.

The reconstructed Broad Street comes with two rows of trees and parking space pavers designed to drain storm water into the ground. Photo by Teya Vitu.
The reconstructed Broad Street comes with two rows of trees and parking space pavers designed to drain storm water into the ground. Photo by Teya Vitu.

The $6.5 million Broad Street improvement is a CCDC project in collaboration with the Ada County Highway District, which owns the street, the city of Boise and private property owners. Work started in September and won’t be done until the end of October, but much of the five-block stretch is completed.

The street work ran concurrent with construction of the 185-room Residence Inn by Marriott and the 159-unit The Fowler Apartments, both with a Broad Street frontage.

“It’s been coined the ‘coolest’ street in Boise,” Woods said. “It’s a big placemaking improvement. Now it’s a place, a destination.”

The ‘coolest’ refers to the trees that eventually will fully shade the street. Trees are on the sidewalk and a second row of trees are installed in sidewalk extensions between parking spaces. Artistic bike racks, light fixtures, manhole covers and benches set the new Broad Street apart from all other Boise streets, Woods said.

“It will be a big urban park,” Woods said.

The city is seeking to replicate the idea elsewhere of mixing Broad Street’s mix of commercial, residential and entertainment within an eco-friendly setting, said Haley Falconer, the city’s environmental division manager and former project manager for the LIV District.

“It is the first true, vibrant, urban neighborhood we have,” Falconer said. “The space is a public space now. Broad Street gives the space back to the public by instilling it with all of the unique features of the district.”

The key was bringing together multiple projects at the same time, she said.

“This makes a transformational change that is better than with one-off projects,” Falconer said. “It is a very visible representation of what can happen when more than one of us come together.