Entrepreneurs have big plans for stretch of Woodward but some have been down that road before
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Louis Aguilar / The Detroit News
A stretch of Woodward Avenue that's home to the Majestic Theatre complex, the new Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and upscale restaurants such as The Whitney always seems to be on the verge of becoming something -- either a great destination spot or another failed attempt to overcome Detroit blight.
And 2008 brings a new round of entrepreneurs with big plans to set up restaurants, nightclubs and other retail operations in the same buildings where many others have failed.
Several of the projects have received millions of dollars in promised tax credits and, in one case, a $19 million federal block grant. Still, the recent credit crunch is causing some financial institutions to give pause before investing in the Woodward projects.
"If this was Royal Oak, this would have taken us a year to get these projects going. But this is Detroit," said Greg Jedda, owner of Union Street restaurant and bar, which has survived for 22 years and counting on the Woodward strip between Wayne State University and Max M. Fisher Music Center, home of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
"We flip-flop between big positives and negatives. It's like being in a wild relationship," Jedda said.
For now, the seven-block strip is simultaneously bustling and abandoned, with hipsters and middle-class professionals sharing the neighborhood with more than a few aggressive panhandlers. Many investors are working hard to make 2008 the year the strip becomes almost totally gentrified -- if they can convince bankers and sometimes even landlords that they are the ones who can succeed.
All told, five deals are in the works. Another may be revived.
• In the early part of this year, one developer should know whether his six-year attempt to buy an entire block of buildings between Alexandrine and Selden will succeed. The block once housed the Blue Moon bar and is home to an historic theater last used to screen X-rated movies. The city already has granted the project a $21-million loan.
• By end of January the owner of Vicente's Cuban Cuisine downtown should know whether he finally comes to terms on a lease of a building on the corner of Canfield where three other restaurants have failed. The last was Agave, which abruptly shut two years ago in a rent dispute.
• Also by end of this month, the family behind Fishbone's restaurants and The Atheneum hotel in Greektown should know what kind of eatery they will open in what is now the 13th Precinct of the Detroit Police Department. It won't be a Fishbone's. The Gatzoros family bought the building for $1 million in April.
• The influential University Cultural Center Association, a nonprofit development group, is also in the act. Last year, the group completed its purchase of an empty corner on Willis and seeks to finalize $7 million in funding to construct a building of rental units and retail and commercial space.
• Jedda spent two years trying to buy the building that takes up much of his block between Willis and Canfield. His effort has stalled, he admits, but he still seeks a partner to make it reality.
More than one person has told the entrepreneurs they are crazy. The economy is too weak, they have been told. Detroit is still too distressed, and the strip has a checkered past.
The entrepreneurs say they've heard all it before.
"If the economy scared us and we listened to all the people through the years who told us we were crazy to run businesses in Detroit, we wouldn't have opened a single business," said Maria Gatzoros, matriarch of the family business. "We've been in Detroit for many, many years.
"We have believed in that area of Woodward since my husband and I were students at Wayne State," Gatzoros said. "There's too much going on from the renovation of the Detroit Arts Institute to the new things downtown to ignore it."
A cauldron of development
The seven-block stretch of Woodward was a busy place indeed during 2007. The Whitney, the elegant restaurant in a 113-year mansion, was purchased and renovated by former Chrysler executive Arthur "Bud" Leibler.
Next door, Wayne State University ventured into a private partnership with a developer and began construction of South University Village, a $36-million development that includes 130-rental units and 26,000-square-feet of retail, which may include a restaurant. And the former car dealership that is the new museum of Contemporary Art enjoyed its first full year, drawing an estimated 25,000 visitors and adding a cafe.
That's more than enough activity to convince Vince Vasquez, owner of the downtown Cuban restaurant Vicente's, to open Café Barcelona in the former Agave space. The cafe would serve Spanish tapas and include a nightclub. Vasquez already has secured more than $300,000 for the venture and has architectural drawings. Now, after months of negotiations, he just has to convince building owner Eliot Charlip to finally offer him a lease, he said.
"You just got to believe you can do it. And, I know it. I'm telling you, I know it," Vasquez said.
Vasquez said if he can't reach a lease agreement with Charlip, he hopes to set up in the former Blue Moon site, which is part of the most ambitious plan on the strip.
Detroit native George Stewart has spent six years on the plan for the 3500 block of Woodward. Stewart hopes to restore the theater, built in 1912, to a live performance venue with a capacity of 700 to 1,000. He hopes to renovate 25,000 square feet of retail and commercial space that likely would include a restaurant, and build a parking garage.
His project has been awarded $2.2 million in state brownfield tax credits for redeveloping a possibly contaminated site, and $19 million in federal block grant money. Now, the final hurdle is the banks, he said.
"I had hoped to finally close on everything in December," Stewart said. "It's been a great challenge. I've been carrying the costs for some of these buildings that I already own, but we're still above water."
Union Street owner Jedda has gone through hoops in his effort to buy much of his block. He obtained city and state approval for tax breaks. But he was stymied after some of the credits awarded to his deal were later cancelled because they would have gone toward buying out a liquor store. The rules of the tax break forbid the purchase of businesses with a certain amount of sales in booze, Jedda said.
Survival begins with hope
If any of the plans do not pan out, it won't shake Joe Zainea's faith. His family has believed in the Woodward strip since 1946 when his father bought the Garden Bowl. Over the years, they've continued to expand and now the Majestic Theatre Center is a mix of a bowling alley, bars, music venues and food. They have plans to add a rooftop deck this year.
Zainea admits it's a "tough area for many," he said. "Sometimes the property owners think they're the stars of the show when it's really the businesses who have leased the property and doing all the work. Sometimes it's been people who opened restaurants and thought it was going be all fun and ego. And it is fun and ego, sometimes, but, to be a real restaurateur it takes an incredible amount of work and perseverance.
"Will everything pan out? I hope so. But if not, you regroup and live to fight another day. That's how you survive in Detroit."
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Louis Aguilar / The Detroit News
A stretch of Woodward Avenue that's home to the Majestic Theatre complex, the new Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and upscale restaurants such as The Whitney always seems to be on the verge of becoming something -- either a great destination spot or another failed attempt to overcome Detroit blight.
And 2008 brings a new round of entrepreneurs with big plans to set up restaurants, nightclubs and other retail operations in the same buildings where many others have failed.
Several of the projects have received millions of dollars in promised tax credits and, in one case, a $19 million federal block grant. Still, the recent credit crunch is causing some financial institutions to give pause before investing in the Woodward projects.
"If this was Royal Oak, this would have taken us a year to get these projects going. But this is Detroit," said Greg Jedda, owner of Union Street restaurant and bar, which has survived for 22 years and counting on the Woodward strip between Wayne State University and Max M. Fisher Music Center, home of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
"We flip-flop between big positives and negatives. It's like being in a wild relationship," Jedda said.
For now, the seven-block strip is simultaneously bustling and abandoned, with hipsters and middle-class professionals sharing the neighborhood with more than a few aggressive panhandlers. Many investors are working hard to make 2008 the year the strip becomes almost totally gentrified -- if they can convince bankers and sometimes even landlords that they are the ones who can succeed.
All told, five deals are in the works. Another may be revived.
• In the early part of this year, one developer should know whether his six-year attempt to buy an entire block of buildings between Alexandrine and Selden will succeed. The block once housed the Blue Moon bar and is home to an historic theater last used to screen X-rated movies. The city already has granted the project a $21-million loan.
• By end of January the owner of Vicente's Cuban Cuisine downtown should know whether he finally comes to terms on a lease of a building on the corner of Canfield where three other restaurants have failed. The last was Agave, which abruptly shut two years ago in a rent dispute.
• Also by end of this month, the family behind Fishbone's restaurants and The Atheneum hotel in Greektown should know what kind of eatery they will open in what is now the 13th Precinct of the Detroit Police Department. It won't be a Fishbone's. The Gatzoros family bought the building for $1 million in April.
• The influential University Cultural Center Association, a nonprofit development group, is also in the act. Last year, the group completed its purchase of an empty corner on Willis and seeks to finalize $7 million in funding to construct a building of rental units and retail and commercial space.
• Jedda spent two years trying to buy the building that takes up much of his block between Willis and Canfield. His effort has stalled, he admits, but he still seeks a partner to make it reality.
More than one person has told the entrepreneurs they are crazy. The economy is too weak, they have been told. Detroit is still too distressed, and the strip has a checkered past.
The entrepreneurs say they've heard all it before.
"If the economy scared us and we listened to all the people through the years who told us we were crazy to run businesses in Detroit, we wouldn't have opened a single business," said Maria Gatzoros, matriarch of the family business. "We've been in Detroit for many, many years.
"We have believed in that area of Woodward since my husband and I were students at Wayne State," Gatzoros said. "There's too much going on from the renovation of the Detroit Arts Institute to the new things downtown to ignore it."
A cauldron of development
The seven-block stretch of Woodward was a busy place indeed during 2007. The Whitney, the elegant restaurant in a 113-year mansion, was purchased and renovated by former Chrysler executive Arthur "Bud" Leibler.
Next door, Wayne State University ventured into a private partnership with a developer and began construction of South University Village, a $36-million development that includes 130-rental units and 26,000-square-feet of retail, which may include a restaurant. And the former car dealership that is the new museum of Contemporary Art enjoyed its first full year, drawing an estimated 25,000 visitors and adding a cafe.
That's more than enough activity to convince Vince Vasquez, owner of the downtown Cuban restaurant Vicente's, to open Café Barcelona in the former Agave space. The cafe would serve Spanish tapas and include a nightclub. Vasquez already has secured more than $300,000 for the venture and has architectural drawings. Now, after months of negotiations, he just has to convince building owner Eliot Charlip to finally offer him a lease, he said.
"You just got to believe you can do it. And, I know it. I'm telling you, I know it," Vasquez said.
Vasquez said if he can't reach a lease agreement with Charlip, he hopes to set up in the former Blue Moon site, which is part of the most ambitious plan on the strip.
Detroit native George Stewart has spent six years on the plan for the 3500 block of Woodward. Stewart hopes to restore the theater, built in 1912, to a live performance venue with a capacity of 700 to 1,000. He hopes to renovate 25,000 square feet of retail and commercial space that likely would include a restaurant, and build a parking garage.
His project has been awarded $2.2 million in state brownfield tax credits for redeveloping a possibly contaminated site, and $19 million in federal block grant money. Now, the final hurdle is the banks, he said.
"I had hoped to finally close on everything in December," Stewart said. "It's been a great challenge. I've been carrying the costs for some of these buildings that I already own, but we're still above water."
Union Street owner Jedda has gone through hoops in his effort to buy much of his block. He obtained city and state approval for tax breaks. But he was stymied after some of the credits awarded to his deal were later cancelled because they would have gone toward buying out a liquor store. The rules of the tax break forbid the purchase of businesses with a certain amount of sales in booze, Jedda said.
Survival begins with hope
If any of the plans do not pan out, it won't shake Joe Zainea's faith. His family has believed in the Woodward strip since 1946 when his father bought the Garden Bowl. Over the years, they've continued to expand and now the Majestic Theatre Center is a mix of a bowling alley, bars, music venues and food. They have plans to add a rooftop deck this year.
Zainea admits it's a "tough area for many," he said. "Sometimes the property owners think they're the stars of the show when it's really the businesses who have leased the property and doing all the work. Sometimes it's been people who opened restaurants and thought it was going be all fun and ego. And it is fun and ego, sometimes, but, to be a real restaurateur it takes an incredible amount of work and perseverance.
"Will everything pan out? I hope so. But if not, you regroup and live to fight another day. That's how you survive in Detroit."
1 comment:
I didn't think that restaurant loans were that readily available that there could be a "restaurant row." I guess, all things considered, that this is probably better than it is worse. I approve, anyway.
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