A Re/Play of Some of The Plans For The Transformation of Downtown Mesa

Let's pause for a while at this point-in-time to take the time to look back at what's been presented to the public eyes in the past four years to transform our downtown Mesa. So far, except for only one that has broken ground just a few weeks ago one block east of the original central business district, there's little to show and nothing to brag about.
Time for an Inter-Mission to see what's next.
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Final Design Concepts Unveiled for Arizona’s

Mesa City Center

01:00 - 5 September 2014  by Katie Watkins 

Blogger Note: What's remarkable in all these plans from 2014 is that the uninspiring non-descript 8-story building now called

Mesa City Hall,  'the seat of government'  in this city of almost 500,000 that once housed a foreclosed failed bank is central to these plans right across from International Design-Award winning Mesa Arts Center on Main Street. The juxtaposition in quality of two visual extremes in architecture is jarring in close proximity right across the street from each other. City Hall is an eyesore. 

Mesa City Hall  not an example of  world-class architecture by any far stretch of imagination.

Neither are the other 1970's-era low-slung municipal buildings with parking lots behind it.    

This is taken from Arch Daily the world's most visited architecture website

 

Design by Colwell Shelor + West 8 + Weddle Gilmore. Aerial Context Future Growth.

Image Courtesy of West 8

The final design concepts for the redesign of Arizona’s Mesa City Center have been unveiled by the competition's three finalist design teams:
Colwell Shelor + West 8 + Weddle Gilmore
Woods Bagot + Surface Design
 Otak + Mayer Reed.
The Mesa City Center redesign project aims to develop an 18-acre site in the city’s downtown and enhance the urbanization of the area.

When complete, the city center will be transformed into a public space with both programmed and passive space that can be used for informal gatherings as well as events. “The signature public space will be a key element in the activation of the downtown core and will be a catalyst for high intensity redevelopment surrounding City Center with a variety of uses that activate the public space,” the competition website states.
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> From Colwell Shelor + West 8 + Weddle Gilmore:
Our design is not development-dependent to make it activated, can be built in one phase, can be built quickly and will cost the public less than a design that has multiple phases. This strategy will leverage City Center project in a way that is similar to the way other great cities have grown around great public spaces.
The Mesa City Center design combines the City and community’s wishes for a setting for its major events and festivals; a shady, green welcoming setting; and an iconic, world-class space. Conceived as "a town square with a twist,” the design makes City Center an events space that will be the City’s ‘green heart’ and catalyst for the next 100 years of urban growth in downtown Mesa.

The design features a central gathering space, the Events Plaza, which encompasses the centerpiece and icon of the project, a beautiful copper shade structure, called The Wind Dancer. The Mesa City Center design creates a destination that during different seasons, events, and times of day will feel like a lively downtown hub and an inviting public place._________________________________________________________________________
> From Otak + Mayer Reed:

After learning from the community what currently defines Mesa and what should define it in the future, the Otak team re-imagined the project site as the heart of a bustling, revitalized downtown, filled with people.

Team Otak envisions a “Living Room Plaza” surrounded and enlivened by eight acres of mixed-use development.
This vibrant, new Urban District will serve as the catalyst for downtown revitalization.

Team Otak’s approach considers the site as the key piece of a larger puzzle, connecting existing downtown destinations to the new light rail station opening in 2016.
The Living Room Plaza features:
a mirror pond and interactive water fountains
a multi-purpose event lawn
an interactive digital light bar
an iconic shade structure
an elevator to a public observation deck.
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> From Woods Bagot + Surface Design:

Inspired by nature and shaped by culture, Mesa Central is a contemporary park that blends civic landscape appropriate for the seat of city government with a variety of experiences and amenities for all ages. Through a program of landscape features, varied pathways, new structures, strategic renovations, and parking options, Mesa Central’s plan offers the city the option of phased implementation to achieve this vision for a new civic public space within the project budget.

The design sets the stage for significant development opportunities that can include housing, retail, office, and possibly a hotel.
These uses will attract people—residents, workers, students, and visitors— to Downtown Mesa, not just during special events, but every day.
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WHAT'S NEXT:
A surprise-to-some, an announcement and a flurry of press releases not from City Hall and not from Mesa - but from The Mormon News Room in Salt Lake City in May/June 2018. Here in the image to the left is the former Mesa City Manager Mike Hutchinson at the center of announcing the plans by a for-profit investment affiliate of the LDS Church to remake the LDS Temple Area, just east of Mesa Drive on the south side of Main Street and two blocks away from City Hall into a 9-acre mini-version of the 23-acre City Creek Reserve urban revitalization project in downtown Salt Lake City.

Here's what's in-the-works now at the SEC of Main Street and Mesa Drive >
The plan has nearly doubled in size from the initial 4.6-acre project that was presented to the public and quickly approved in some fast-tracking maneuvers prior to developer agreements arranged with the city.
The original $5.9M set aside for Pioneer Park Improvements also somehow managed to double to more than $12,000,000.

< Here's a schematic plan for the Temple Area where even more developments might get planned or are in-the-works farther south of Main Street.
The for-profit real estate holdings of The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints are enormous on the eastern fringe of the downtown area, extending to Southern Avenue.
It's not just a religion with closely-held family connections going back six generations here in Mesa with politics, insurance, and real estate in a network of cohorts, families- and- friends who have controlled this city for more than 145 years.
If readers of this blog want to find out more details and information about Massive Mormon Downtown MakeOver in the Temple Area Transformation, just use the SEARCHBOX at the top of this site.

No financial details were ever disclosed.

It's most definitely a site that needed some work as you can see in this image  > 
just after Valley Metro Light Rail service rolled into downtown Mesa as far the station platform at the Mesa Drive where there's also a 500-car Park-N-Ride lot on the north side of Main Street.  
In addition to the park-and-ride lot, City Creek Reserve is excavating for a 450-car underground parking garage.
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All this leaves other plans for downtown on-the-drawing boards for now.
< 8 historic commercial properties built between 1910-1954 have been swooped up by holding companies, now waiting to see if their Salvation Train will arrive when the Opportunity Zone tax incentives might kick things into fast-forward high-drive.
As of October 19, 2018, new guidleines and regulations were issued by the U.S. Treasury and IRS. Another set is expected.