Plans have been in the works for years to redevelop Staten Island's north shore. Now, there are some visible signs of progress at one site, where a residential and retail space is expected to rise. NY1's Amanda Farinacci filed the following report.

At one time it was home to the U.S. Navy, a 36-acre space known as the Staten Island Homeportbut don't call it that anymore.

With plans to open next summer as a retail and residential space, the site has a new vibe and a new name: URL.

"Urban Ready Living. And it's kind of a new paradigm for living in the cities and we're excited to bring it to Staten Island. I think it's going to be new, and fresh, and different," says David Barry of Ironstate Development.

Ironstate Development bought the site back in 2008 with plans to build 900 units of housing and 30,000 square feet of retail space.

The first phase includes some 571 housing units meant to keep 20-somethings on Staten Island by giving them a place to rent that's affordable.

Renting at URL comes with a host of amenities, like an outdoor pool, a community garden and a 4,000 square foot gym and yoga studio.

There's also a cafe in the lobby, called Coffeed.

"We are locally sourced. We have a rooftop farm through the Brooklyn Grange that we use a lot of our produce from. We are very community-based, community-focused, community-centric," says Coffeed's Turtle Raffaele.

That's good news for the entire waterfront, because Raffaele will also serve as the site's social programmer.

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Staten Island Living, Retail Development Taking Shape on North Shore

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -

The long awaited La Entrada de Santa Barbara hotel and retail project is expected to become a reality in the next two years, but construction permits are still a few days off.

The city says the developer, known as 35 State Street Partners, are cleared to begin. The group involves Los Angeles businessman and developer Michael Rosenfeld who has been to Santa Barbara to usher the project through after several setbacks over the last 20 years involving other owners.

The project will encompass three of the four corners at State St. and Mason St. This is a block up from the watefront and near the popular "funk zone." There will be 123 rooms, over 20,000 square feet of retail space, along with paseos, and 243 parking spaces. The remaining corner will be a boutique hotel that will be developed by the Romasanta family after a widening project for Mission Creek and a new bridge are completed by the city.

The city says the Entrada project has a completion deadline of June 2016.

One key component is the integration of the Californian Hotel, a 1920's era landmark that has been gutted except for the front facade.

All three aspects of the Entrada project will be completed together.

The last large scale project in Santa Barbara that would come close to this in the downtown or waterfront area was the Paseo Nuevo mall in 1990.

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La Entrada de Santa Barbara Hotel-Retail Project Closer but Permit Still a Few Days Off

Raleigh, N.C. (PRWEB) September 22, 2014

A new upscale, off-campus student housing community is coming to North Carolina State University and will open in Summer 2015. Kane Realty Corporation, a Raleigh-based development and management company focused on mixed-use properties, began construction on the $78 million project this past spring. Stanhope will continue the revitalization of Hillsborough Street with 822 beds and 25,000 square feet of retail space.

Located just steps from NC State University and less than one mile from Meredith College, Stanhope is situated at 3001 Hillsborough Street. Named to honor the historic Stanhope neighborhood, the mixed-use community will offer students a wide range of amenities, including an oasis saltwater pool with splash deck, outdoor courtyards with televisions, fire pits, grills and open green space, integral parking deck, hi-tech cyber lounge, study lounges on each floor, art studio, two-story game room, fitness center with cardio mezzanine and two tanning rooms, ground level retail, restaurants and services and more.

Uniquely, the community is heavily focused on green living, offering electronic car charging stations, recycling rooms on every floor, a bicycle storage room, energy efficient windows, sustainable landscaping design with organic fertilizer and LED lighting used throughout the grounds and more.

We identified an opportunity to create a truly unmatched type of student living that focused on not only amazing amenities and convenience, but also the importance of being environmentally-friendly, said John Kane, CEO of Kane Realty Corporation. We are confident that Stanhope will be a one-of-a-kind living destination for University students.

Residents will be able to choose from a variety of spacious floor plans including studio, one-, two-, three- and four-bedroom options. The individual apartments will come fully furnished and will include televisions with cable and HBO, Energy Star appliances, granite countertops, wood plank style flooring, smart key unit entry system, washer and dryer and more. The entire property is also equipped with high-speed Wi-Fi, and will employ an on-site maintenance and management staff.

Kane Realty Corporation has hired Asset Campus Housing(ACH), the largest management and privately held student housing company in the U.S., to manage the residential community.

We are very excited to partner with Kane Realty Corporation to manage the successful lease-up of Stanhope, said Joe Goodwin, senior vice president of marketing for Asset Campus Housing. We look forward to helping bring this community to life in Raleigh and to foster a fun and interactive environment that promotes success for every resident.

Kane Realty Corporation will lease and manage the retail space. The project team also includes Little Diversified Architectural Consulting and Clancy & Theys General Contractors. Financing is provided by Wells Fargo Bank and Federal Capital Partners.

Stanhope student apartments will open for students Summer 2015. For more information, please visit http://www.livestanhope.com or in-person at the residential leasing office, located at 2408 Hillsborough Street, Raleigh, NC. Retail inquiries can be directed to Kane Realty Corporation, 919.833.7755.

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Construction Underway on Kane Realty Corporation's $78 Million Student Housing Community at NC State University

Developers broke ground a few days ago at 16th and N Streets for the new Eviva Midtown apartment building. But in reality, most of the complex will be built miles away in a former aircraft hangar.

The six-story project formerly called The Warren will be constructed piece by piece out of prefabricated housing units assembled by Zeta Communities at McClellan Park in North Highlands. The modular units will be trucked to the building site, where a crane will lift and stack them atop a concrete podium.

The individual units will roll off the assembly line at the Zeta plant complete with bathrooms, kitchens and flooring. They will be bolted together, connected to utilities and covered with a roof and external skin to create five stories of apartments above street-level shops and underground parking.

Theres tremendous time saved because were working on what will go on top of the foundation while (the general contractor is) doing site work and utilities, said Dennis Gleason, project manager at Zeta. By the time they finish the foundation, we have units stored here that are ready to be shipped to the site and put in place.

Its the first time the method has been used in the capital, though several structures in Davis, San Francisco and Silicon Valley have been assembled from Zetas prefab units.

The midtown structure is also a first for Atlanta-based developer The Integral Group, which intends to build more Eviva-brand apartments in San Francisco, Denver and Atlanta. The Sacramento building is a prototype of sleek inner-city apartment buildings that will replace urban eyesores.

The word Eviva is literally the center of the word revival, Chris Martorella, president of Integrals investment management division, told an audience at Thursdays groundbreaking ceremony. He called the projects modular construction the future of efficient building techniques, although he said it wont be used in the other Eviva projects.

When completed in late 2015, Eviva Midtown will feature 118 high-end rental units, a yoga studio and a movie-screening lawn, among other amenities, Martorella said. Plans for the ground floor include more than 5,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space.

Rents will range from $1,600 a month for a one-bedroom apartment to $2,150 for a two-bedroom unit, and premium corner units will rent for more, said Marc de la Vergne, deputy executive director of the Capital Area Development Authority, the city-state agency that initiated the project.

They (Integral) view Sacramento as a great place to launch the Eviva line of apartments, de la Vergne said.

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Cutting-edge building in midtown Sacramento will use ...

Officials from the city and the National Park Service are nearing an agreement on a land swap in which the city would get the Park Service's parking lot off Dutton Street for further development in the Hamilton Canal District. In exchange, the city would build a parking garage in this area abutting the lot. See a video at lowellsun.com. SUN / DAVID H. BROW

Sun staff photos can be ordered by visiting our SmugMug site.

LOWELL -- After nearly two years of negotiation, officials from the city and the Lowell National Park Service are poised to announce a land-swap proposal that would call for construction of a 950-space garage in the Hamilton Canal District on land directly abutting what is now the Park Service parking lots on Dutton Street.

The garage would include retail space on the ground floor -- much like the Early Garage on Middlesex Street -- as well as high ceilings to accommodate National Park Service buses.

In exchange, the Park Service would turn over the parking-lot space to the city, which in turn would allow for further development in the $800 million Hamilton Canal District. One possibility for such development: a new headquarters for the Lowell Five Cent Savings Bank, which has received an offer for its space at One Merrimack Plaza and is looking to move out by next spring (see related story).

"There's been a lot going on, but a few things have broken loose," said Peter Aucella, assistant superintendent of the Park Service's Lowell operations. "It's an elaborate process."

"Everyone I've talked to has expressed the need for a parking garage," said City Manager Kevin Murphy. "That will pave the way for further development there."

It was nearly two years ago that President Barack Obama signed into law a bill filed by U.S. Rep. Niki Tsongas, D-Lowell, that enabled the National Park Service to exchange land with the city, state or UMass Building Authority.

Aucella said the law requires that the land swap be equal in value. And getting to equality has proven to be tricky, particularly because the city needs to accommodate not only parking for passenger cars but also for up to 11 charter buses.

Adam Baacke, who headed the city's Department of Planning and Development before taking a similar position at UMass Lowell in February, said accommodating the 158 passenger-car spots was easy -- the city would simply reserve that number of spaces in the new garage.

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Canal-district land swap in works

Years after completion of the Bridge to Nowhere, developers dreams are still hanging on a three-quarter-mile stretch of road between Mercy Regional Medical Center and the Highway 160 interchange at the bottom of Grandview Hill.

But those dreams soon may be coming true. The city is requesting contractors bid on the project this month, and construction is planned to start soon after, City Manager Ron LeBlanc said.

The estimated $8.2 million Wilson Gulch Drive is key in wooing large retailers to move to the space, developers said.

The city is hopeful new big box stores will help stem the flow of Durangoans going to Farmington to shop, which is redirecting $40 million in sales-tax revenue, LeBlanc said.

The city has approved a development called The Gateway at Three Springs that would consist of 256,000 square feet of retail space. But no stores have officially signed on to come to the shopping center yet, said developer Patrick Vaughn, president of GF Real Estate Group.

He said his company has spoken with more than 60 different stores. But they all have said essentially the same thing: Show me the road. Without the road it is impossible for retailers to access the site and start construction.

However, Vaughns company already has brought in all the necessary utilities to the site such as water and sewer lines, he said. But each of the businesses still must pay to hook up to the infrastructure.

Crader Properties LLC owns two parcels totaling 71 acres that could be developed. It has submitted preliminary site plans for some of the property, said Tom Caver Jr., real estate broker for the property.

But the company also is waiting for construction to start before getting back in touch with big box stores, said Rowean Crader, managing member of Crader Properties.

Its just something you cant do until its a sure thing, she said.

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Will they come?

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Westward view from corner of 4th Street and 6 Avenue SE

CALGARY Two new residential towers and a retail podium are part of the design plans for Calgarys oldest community.

RioCan Investment Trust and Embassy BOSA announced their commitment Thursday to build 500 new condominiums in East Village.

The project will also include approximately 200,000 square feet of retail space. An urban Loblaws Market is the first committed tenant.

Construction is expected to start in the summer of 2015 at 6th Avenue and 3rd Street S.E.

Development of the retail space and 40-storey residential tower will take approximately three years.

The second phase a 23-storey residential tower is expected to take an additional 12 months.

The concept for the towers includes sheets of glass, layered to open up to views of the city and Bow River. It will also include a rotating balcony.

The development is part of the greater master plan for the East Village. The area, on the east end of the downtown, is expected to become home to more than 11,000 residents upon completion in 2027.

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$300 million dollar multi-family project coming to East Village

AURORA Construction on a new, full service Hyatt Hotel and conference center in the Fitzsimons Village across from the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora began Wednesday after a groundbreaking on site.

The City of Aurora partnered with Kentucky-based commercial developer Corporex Colorado on the $90 million project nearly three years ago, shortly after Corporex opened a 153-room Springhill Suites Hotel by Marriott at 13400 E. Colfax Ave.

The new Hyatt Hotel and city-owned conference centerwill go up directly south of the Springhill Suites, on about three acres of land. The Fitzsimons Village project is about 20 developable acres of mixed use and retail space on the south side of Colfax Avenue, between Peoria to Potomac streets. Corporex is the developer for the Fitzsimons Village project.

"This is something the Corporex has always envisioned since we started working out here," said Mark Witkiewicz, chief operating officer of Corporex. "It's something that that Aurora has always wanted, too. The city is truly our partner in this project."

Aurora issued just under $28 million in bonds to help pay for the development. All of the money will be paid back to the city through property and sales taxes on the 249-room Hyatt Hotel.

The city will own and operate its first business-centric conference center, which tops off around 30,000 square feet, as well as an adjacent, 500-space parking garage.

"This hotel and conference center will only add to the betterment of the neighborhood, the campus and the city,"Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan said. "I think when we look back on it, this is what we'll say really marked a change in what's happened in this part of Aurora."

In February, the Aurora Urban Renewal Authority was authorized to slice the Fitzsimons Village project out of the original, more than 500 acre Fitzsimons Health Science District urban renewal plan and create a new urban renewal plan for what it now calls Fitzsimons Boundary Area II.

A new, 25-year tax increment financing option was then set in motion to help fund all Fitzsimons Boundary Area II projects, which will eventually include 490 apartments and a seven-story, 208,000 square foot office building by Corporex.

John Harney, president of the University of Colorado Hospital, said the hotel will help to fill a dire need for temporary patient and family accommodations around the medical campus, as well as keeping teaching seminars and business conferences on site, instead of in Denver.

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Construction on Hyatt Hotel, conference space in original Aurora begins

Projects Proposed

1. Residential and commercial project. Timothy Brandywine Investment 1 & 2, Crofton. A site plan was submitted for proposed grading and infrastructure work at the Villages of Timothy Branch. The 334-acre project calls for 1,200 residential units and 305,000 square feet of commercial space on the east side of Route 301, south of Short Cut and Brandywine roads, Brandywine.

2. Student housing. Knox Village Partners, Horsham, Pa. A building permit application was filed to construct an $8million student housing complex, called Terrapin Row, with 445 units and 12,000 square feet of retail space at 4301 Hartwick Rd., College Park.

3. Lodge. Facchina Construction, La Plata. A building permit application was filed to construct a $4.75million lodge for the Alice Ferguson Foundation, based at 2201 Bryan Point Rd., Accokeek.

4. First Watch Restaurants, Rockville. A building permit application was filed to construct a First Watch restaurant that will serve breakfast and lunch at 15606 Emerald Way, Bowie. Another restaurant is planned at the Towne Centre at Laurel, on Route 1.

Projects Approved

5. Hotel and retail. Buena Vista, Lanham. A rezoning application was approved that will change 30.6acres of industrial and residential land into mixed-use space. The property owner plans to build a hotel and retail space on the land that forms a triangle at Martin Luther King Jr. Highway, Route 450 and Business Parkway, Lanham.

6. McDonalds. McDonalds Corp., Bethesda. A building permit application was approved for a 4,000-square-foot restaurant on the south side of East-West Highway, opposite Toledo Terrace, adjacent to Home Depot, in Hyattsville.

7. Senior living. Conifer Realty, Columbia. A site plan was approved for a 120-unit apartment complex for senior citizens on 4.3 acres at 2011 Brooks Dr., District Heights. The property will offer rents capped at affordable rates.

8. Casino. MGM National Harbor, Las Vegas. A site plan was approved for a 1million-square-foot entertainment and casino complex south of the Wilson Bridge, along the Potomac River, National Harbor.

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Prince Georges County development projects

Exterior view of H&M Store in New York. (Provided by H&M)

H&M, a Swedish international apparel brand known for its discount prices on trendy clothing for young men and women, will open two stores in Sarasota County within a year, a move that baffles some retail analysts, but shows that there may be enough business to support more than one mall in the region.

H&M will open its second store in Sarasota County inside Westfield Groups Sarasota Square Mall.

The chain committed to its first store inside the Mall at University Town Center, a $315 million mall opening at Interstate 75 and University Parkway on Oct. 16.

This is a surprise to me. H&M is the type of retailer that, usually, would wait to open a second store until after they can see how the first in the market was doing, said Jeff Green, a Phoenix-based retail analyst. Westfield must have offered them a very good deal.

The second store will take over a 21,000-square-foot space inside the Westfield Group mall, officials confirmed Thursday morning. Westfield has been preparing for months for H&M. Building permits filed with the county show that several of the malls tenants, including a Verizon Wireless store, Bond Jewelers and the mall management offices, have moved to make room for the new H&M space.

Construction is ongoing, and the retailer is set to open in the spring 2015, well after the opening of the Mall at University Town Center.

H&M has grown in size and popularity in the U.S. during recent years and has expanded into Florida.

The first store to open south of Tampa on the Gulf Coast was in Naples during 2012. Tampas Westfield Citrus Park also will see an H&M soon.

The chain has 2,500 stores in 53 countries worldwide.

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H&M to open in Sarasota Square mall