Adaptive Reuse of Big Box Stores and Warehouses

[SFUVancouver]

One of the legacies of this past economic boom is a continent littered with big box stores. What will happen to them as consumer demand wanes and their owners beat a hasty retreat from their expansion plans or simply go bankrupt? These immense, widely spaced buildings simply cannot be discarded, nor can they be as easily renovated and repurposed as more conventional buildings.


I have a couple of current examples from Vancouver of adaptive reuse of these types of buildings.

Art Institute of Vancouver – new campus (approx 1,600 full and part-time students in film and tv, graphic design, computer animation, etc.)

Taken by SFUVancouver, April 12th, 2009.

This building used to be part of the now-bankrupt Great Canadian Wholesale Club and was purpose-built as a lumber wholesaler. The structure of the building remains intact but windows have been added and the cavernous interior has been totally rebuilt as a two-storey academic building. Three office buildings, including an 11 storey tower, and a plaza are planned for the remainder of the site and the developer is going through the rezoning steps now so that it is prepared when market demand warrants it. The site, I should add, is adjacent to a SkyTrain station. SkyTrain is Vancouver's regional rapid transit system and this site is about 10 minutes by train from downtown Vancouver.

This area of Vancouver is in a state of transition since this SkyTrain line was opened in 2001. The immesurable increase in accessibility offered by SkyTrain has led to changing land economics and the development pedestrian-friendly commercial, retail and office space at much higher densities. This includes a multi-storey big box complex with half a dozen large format retailers all situated above underground parking. Previously the site was home to a modestly sized Costco big box store.

Across the street from the site pictured above is another adaptive reuse project, this time of a warehouse. The building used to be the distribution centre for now-bankrupt Eaton's Department stores and it had its own railway siding and loading docks. Several office buildings for high-tech and general office tenants were recently built behind the warehouse and now two additional office buildings are being built above the warehouse. After construction is complete the warehouse component will continue in that role with the new office buildings above it. In time a total of four office buildings will be built above the warehouse and its roof will be landscaped as part of the larger seven-building urban office park campus.


Taken by SFUVancouver, April 12th, 2009

[hammersklavier]

I think there was one in Texas that was turned into a library.

[Masudkarim]

Adaptive reuse project transforms warehouse for ceramic technology, freight
shipping ... The large, single-story "big box" furnace, used as a rest oven for
RckD ... a warehouse and a large retail store, the building's layout was simple:

[Nowhereman1280]

There are some really neat developments in Chicago that reuse modern warehouses that were formally sitting empty. They are often subdivided and turned into small business incubators and the such. Chicago doesn't seem to have a problem redeveloping its older warehouses from the 1800's and early 1900's into things like lofts, but its a relatively new fad for mid-1900's warehouses to be reused, in the past they were almost invariably torn down.

I happen to work in an example of this in Skokie, IL an inner suburb of Chicago.

Here is the building while it was under conversion as seen on Google Maps:

http://maps.google.com/maps?sourceid...64596273291951

[photoLith]

They turned a big disgusting wal mart here into an office building. At least they are reusing them and not building more sprawling messes.

[urbanlife]

this will be the big redevelopment projects for architects in the future. The current generation of architects got old industrial sites along waterways, and the ones currently in college will get to redevelop the dead big box sites. It will be interesting to see what comes from them, it buildings will be preserved, if old patterns will be expressed in new reuses, or if they will be scraped clean and started over as if nothing was ever there.

[LMich]

Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280

There are some really neat developments in Chicago that reuse modern warehouses that were formally sitting empty. They are often subdivided and turned into small business incubators and the such. Chicago doesn't seem to have a problem redeveloping its older warehouses from the 1800's and early 1900's into things like lofts, but its a relatively new fad for mid-1900's warehouses to be reused, in the past they were almost invariably torn down.

I happen to work in an example of this in Skokie, IL an inner suburb of Chicago.

Here is the building while it was under conversion as seen on Google Maps:

http://maps.google.com/maps?sourceid...64596273291951

That's the same around where I live. Because of their relative uniqueness, historic warehouses don't have much a problem with being reused or at least people showing interest in buying them. It's the post-war warehouses that seem to attract the least interest, here.

Recently, though, high-tech companies have been growing into them here in Metro Lansing and using them as laboratories and server houses.

[LSyd]

back in my hometown of Knoxville TN i've seen a few good ones; there's a strip mall and a big box within a quarter mile of each other that have been continuously rehabbed:

big box which was a grocery store - became a gym (i think,) then storage, then a youth skate park, then the front half of it lengthwise was demolished and converted into offices.

strip mall which over the years has turned into lifestyle esque mall - continuous big-box type tennants have come in and rehabbed it over the past 20-30 years. it started out as kroger, revco, a laundry place and stein-mart; then books-a-million and big lots; then cvs, books-a-million and a gym and big lots; the gym took over the big lots space. the laundry became a chinese restaurant. the cvs has become an asian grocery store.

there's also always been a bank office in the corner of the parking lot; and another part of the parking lot had construction on it (not sure what was built or opened.)

-

[hammersklavier]

An old postwar warehouse near where I live was recently rehabbed into office buildings...

...A new strip was put in less than a mile away on greenfield, though, so I'm not so sure what our townships' policies are.

[photoLith]

Do you guys ever think that these big box stores will ever be seen as historically important in the future and preservationists will want to preserve them or do you think people will always view them as just trash architecture and just destroy em?

[Wolfmanfromsufu]

Originally Posted by photolitherland

Do you guys ever think that these big box stores will ever be seen as historically important in the future and preservationists will want to preserve them or do you think people will always view them as just trash architecture and just destroy em?

I doubt too many modern, suburban buildings will have much historical importance years down the road. It's mainly only going to be your artistic or major project buildings that have a "story" to them that will survive historically.

On the original topic, a vacant Walmart building in Yankton SD that was abandoned a couple years ago when they moved to a new location, was bought by a local Baptist Church and turned into their new church. They currently have about 2/3 of the building occupied with a 800 seat main sanctuary, offices, library, classrooms, and a smaller prayer chapel. Future plans include a gym and large eating area.

taken from here http://www.calvarybaptistyankton.org...directions.php

Unfortunately a old Save U More grocery store still sits vacant.

[Nowhereman1280]

Originally Posted by photolitherland

Do you guys ever think that these big box stores will ever be seen as historically important in the future and preservationists will want to preserve them or do you think people will always view them as just trash architecture and just destroy em?

Well I think they will be viewed similarly to post-war warehouses. I'm sure some subculture will pick up the culture of today's suburbs as a sarcastically exaggerated aesthetic. I'm sure somewhere down the line the "huge, gaudy, and spread out" aesthetic of today's suburbs will be considered "retro" and become popular in some way. This is just like how warehouse space is considered cool and popular right now. The same thing is starting to happen to post-war warehouses. The box store is the warehouse of the 90's and 00's. Some will probably be appreciated and preserved in some way though most will probably be trashed just like the hulking industrial and commercial structures of the past.

[Celebrity maniac]

The 8522 National Boulevard Complex in Culver City, California is an early (1990) work by architect Eric Owen Moss. Five adjoining 1920s and 40s warehouses have been adapted into a single building united by a new entrance and a public corridor creating varied and light filled working spaces.

Links: Eric Owen Moss

[spyguy]

Originally Posted by Wolfmanfromsufu

On the original topic, a vacant Walmart building in Yankton SD that was abandoned a couple years ago when they moved to a new location, was bought by a local Baptist Church and turned into their new church. They currently have about 2/3 of the building occupied with a 800 seat main sanctuary, offices, library, classrooms, and a smaller prayer chapel. Future plans include a gym and large eating area.

Yes, I've seen something similar outside of Chicago.

[nixcity]

However renovated, these large buildings have large roofs that should be used for solar panels.

[SFUVancouver]

Another potential use would be to turn them into greenhouses.

These are a big industry in Vancouver and the acerage contained in a big box store is comperable to some of our smaller greenhouses. Perhaps entire power centres could be converted into urban farms.

Much of our produce, such as tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, etc., comes from these "hot houses". In fact methane gas from the Vancouver landfill is burned in a co-gen facility to produce electricity and the waste heat and CO2 are then pumped into an adjacent greenhouse complex [see picture below] to accelerate the growth of veggies.


This aerial shows only about one quarter to one fifth of this one greenhouse complex.

[mpetryni]

Hi,

I found this page while looking into the issue of big box reuse for the City Council of Bellingham, Washington (just a hop-skip across the border from Vancouver).

I was wondering if anyone knew much about cases where the city governments have spearheaded adaptive reuse of "zombie boxes," or if that was the intention with the earlier-mentioned SkyTrain location decision. We have a big problem with zombie boxes, especially as they weather changing market trends, and we're looking to create policy that helps to discourage or re-use them in the future. It inspired us to outlaw big boxes altogether a couple years, with a focus on generating a stronger, locally-based economy instead of attracting in box stores. Nonetheless, we'd like to see if we can't relax the ban but in a way that requires adaptive re-use of big boxes, among other stipulations.

Thanks!