Before anything has gotten underway, there's already revised plans for a proposed development on the State Fair grounds at 8 Mile Road and Woodward in Detroit, Laura Berman of the Detroit News reports.
Last fall, Magic Plus LLC -- which is Magic Johnson and company -- signed a purchase agreement for the 157-acre site to development a massive commercial and residential development. The group signed on Redico as the developer.
Berman reports that critics of the project were able to pressure the state to hold off on selling the land to the developer. She writes that critics hated the vast open-air parking lots, scant green space and “strip mall” feel of the early plans.
The opposition apparently worked.
Now, Berman, writes:
Redico, the Southfield-based developer, has unveiled preliminary new plans and has hired SmithGroup, an architectural firm, and another global firm, Parsons Brinckerhoff, as a mass transit consultant — signaling that the firm is aiming higher aesthetically and conceptually as it prepares to meet a state requirement for a transit plan.
SmithGroup CEO Carl Roehling says the intention is “to do something special” that honors people’s memories of the fair and other events held on the site in the past, and to make the site walkable and exciting. He’s so enthusiastic about the project’s potential that he drove to Lansing last week to pore over the archival records.
Berman reports that the the latest plan includes an American House senior center, 650 rent apartment and use of of three or four historic buildings on the site, including the Coliseum and the poultry building.
The developers are also talking about an artisanal food hall out of old state fair exhibition space and attracting colleges to use the site as a campus, Berman reports.