Provo MSA Development Thread

[delts145]

Saturday, December 09, 2006
HEIDI TOTH - Daily Herald


If the ancient Egyptians used a crane and steel and had drivers rubbernecking as they drove past, their pyramid-building might have looked very similar to the scene at the Gordon B. Hinckley Alumni and Visitors Center on Friday.

The scene at noon was the topping-off ceremony, as the pyramid-shaped, 23,000-pound tower cap was raised over the highest part of the building in front of dozens of administrators, alumni, construction workers and visitors. Applause swept through the onlookers first when the structure got off the ground and again as it was slowly lowered onto its permanent home.

"We are doing our best to get out of the way," King Husein of Span Construction and Engineering, one of the two contractors, said during a celebratory and aromatic barbecue.

The groundbreaking on June 23, Hinckley's 96th birthday, started the fast-tracked building process; the 80,000-square-foot building should be done in the spring or early summer, although that time frame isn't set.

"I think they're just trying to get it done as quickly as possible," said Grant Madsen, a spokesman for the university.

Husein and BYU President Cecil O. Samuelson, along with Randy Okland of Okland Construction, the other contractor, commended the construction crew on their work and asked them to stand; half the guests filling the large white tent did. Then they recognized others.

"I just want to thank the person I assigned to take care of the weather," Husein said, noting the sun shining outside and the relative lack of precipitation since construction began. Even the winter weather hasn't slowed them down much.

During his turn, Samuelson, who was assigned the weather, added an apology and a disclaimer to Husein's comments; his attention deficit disorder kicked in during a couple of days at the end of November with temperatures in the single digits, snow and sleet. He couldn't promise sunny skies until the construction was done, either.

"I'm old enough to know that that recurs," he joked.

The roof went on, again, with no major problems. The first time was during a practice run on Wednesday with no fanfare; the second time was full of showmanship.

Dozens of visitors and BYU officials signed the base of the roof, some so large they could be clearly read from across the street.

Then the massive crane sputtered on, followed by cheers from the crowd, and slowly lifted the roof and its accoutrements -- an American flag, a BYU flag and Christmas tree -- up several hundred feet.

As of Friday, more than 64,000 BYU students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends had contributed to the building.

Related Story:

Steel pyramid crowns the Hinckley Alumni and Visitors Center as it nears completion
By Todd Hollingshead
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:12/09/2006 01:24:42 AM MST


PROVO - Hundreds of spectators looked toward the sky Friday as workers topped off the latest building at Brigham Young University.
Crews hoisted a 23,000-pound steel pyramid more than 100 feet in the air and gently secured it atop the rapidly rising Gordon B. Hinckley Alumni and Visitors Center during a noon ceremony to celebrate the completion of steel work on the new structure.
"This is a terrific milestone," BYU President Cecil Samuelson said, "in less than six months, to see what has already occurred."
Workers broke ground on the 80,000-square-foot building June 23, Hinckley's 96th birthday.
King Husein, president of California-based Span Construction, said crews are working at a "breakneck speed" to finish the three-story building on the northwest end of the Provo campus.
Initial estimates called for a fall 2007 completion.
"We're going to get it done even faster," Husein said. "The prophet is not getting any younger."
Hinckley, who will turn 97 in June, was not present for Friday's ceremony.
The LDS Church president expressed thanks to construction workers through Husein, who met with Hinckley earlier Friday.
The alumni building is being fully funded through donations from faculty, alumni, students, and friends of the university. Though school officials won't reveal how much has been raised or the project cost, they said more than 65,000 donors have contributed.
"We're not quite there yet," BYU spokesman Grant Madsen said. "There has been a great deal of generosity to date, and we hope that will continue."
The steel portion of the building consists of 14,000 pieces of steel, weighing roughly 800 tons together. The crowning pyramid piece took about 10 minutes to be raised the 122 feet and fastened to the top of the clock tower.
toddh@sltrib.com

[kpexpress]

Originally Posted by delts145

I-215, I agree with you as far as the squeezed tootpaste tube look. I would like to see the rendering of the project for Lehi though. I can't imagine it would be designed along the same theory as the, "Squeeze Look".

I know Brandt Andersen personally, he comes into the store that I work everyday to shoot the breeze and has hired my step father to manage the marketing and selling of all the units that he develops. My step father has given him an office to use for the NBA D League in Orem.

One thing I can tell you about Brandt is that HE IS THE FREAKIN' MAN!! I TRUST THAT ANYTHING THAT TOUCHES WILL BE SWEET.

Most people don't like developers cause all their concerned about is how big they can build for the lowest price. Brandt Andersen is not cheap! He is mostly concerned with bring an architectural masterpiece to the valley and help boost the value of the area. He is a very passionate person.

Hiring Frank Gehry to do the masterplan and architecture is a gutsy move. Reading the post it seems that not a lot of people like his work, but I assume that no one can say that he is not gusty or afraid to do something amazing.

I have full trust that Brandt will deliver, and all of you will be left breathless struggling to pick up your jaws at the unveiling of the renderings.

Next time I see him I will ask if he has any sort of renderings or plans that I could peek at. I assume it is to early on in the process to see anything, as for last week was when Gerhy and the crew were in town to brainstorm and visit the project location.

Oh yeh..... I know that the cheesecake factory will be there and others.

[delts145]

kpexpress, thanks for the great inside info. Man, now you have me drooling over the prospects of this whole development. Wow, see what you can find out.

[delts145]

Where's our Leebuddy when we need him? He would be all over this. I miss the guy dammit. Wasatch or I-215, are you guys going to be able to get some shots of this?


Stuart Johnson, Deseret Morning News
Crews begin demolition of W Hall at Deseret Towers Tuesday on BYU campus. After W is gone, V Hall will be next.

BYU starts demolition of dorm W

7 Deseret Towers halls are destined to vanish from campus

By Tad Walch
Deseret Morning News
PROVO — The beginning of the end arrived Tuesday for seven Brigham Young University landmarks. And it turned out the last was first.
Denied a permit last week to implode two of its seven Deseret Towers student dormitories over the Christmas break, BYU decided not to wait any longer. A crew began to tear down W Hall with a trackhoe Tuesday morning.
Completed in 1978, W Hall was the last of the Deseret Towers. BYU plans to begin knocking down V Hall, built in 1969, next week. The two towers have been vacant since August.
The other five towers were completed in 1964 and are still in use. They will be vacated in August 2007 and eventually razed, university spokeswoman Carri Jenkins said.
BYU wanted to implode W Hall and V Hall to minimize the impact on the campus, Jenkins said. Planners hoped to bring the buildings down and clean up the debris while students were gone for Christmas break, Dec. 22-Jan. 7.
The Utah Division of Air Quality board denied BYU's request for a permit to implode the buildings. Jenkins said cleanup now won't be completed until mid-February.
Jenkins said using a trackhoe and wrecking ball will cost about the same as implosion would have, but she did not disclose the amount.
BYU has not decided what it will do with the Deseret Towers area after all of the towers are demolished. The university is working on two pilot programs that will help it understand the needs and desires of students before the administration completes its housing master plan.
One program is chartered housing. BYU has signed charters with two off-campus apartment complexes — Alpine Village, which is under construction on Freedom Boulevard, and Centennial Apartments. The two complexes have agreed to accept only BYU students.
The other pilot program involves an on-campus housing complex, Wyview Park. The university converted half of the married student complex to single-student use this year. The rest will be converted for single students in July.
The two programs allow BYU to study student reaction to apartment-style living in on- and off-campus settings, Jenkins said.
Students nationally and at BYU have shown a growing lack of interest in dormitories like Deseret Towers, though Jenkins said Helaman Halls on campus continues to draw well.
Wyview Park was seeing high vacancy rates as a married-only complex. In fact, there were dozens of vacant married apartments at Wyview when school began in August. Jenkins said there are now more than 20 vacancies expected when the next semester begins in January.
Students in Wyview who desire on-campus married student housing will have first priority for moving into Wymount Terrace, which will be BYU's only remaining on-campus married housing complex.
Beyond the growing disinterest in dorm living, maintenance costs have made Deseret Towers too expensive to justify continued operation, Jenkins said.
BYU hired Arnell-West Construction to manage the job. A subcontractor, Grant Mackay Construction, is handling the demolition.
The original five Deseret Towers were constructed by what is called the lift-slab method. All the concrete floors and ceilings were poured on the ground, then hoisted into place.
Those five buildings were initially intended solely for female students and cost more than $6 million, according to "Brigham Young University, the First One Hundred Years."
W Hall, finished 14 years later, cost $2.7 million.

[i-215]

Man! I wish my video camera hadn't died, I'd post something on YouTube. It's actually not all that exciting. As for last night, they had about 1/4 of the building on the ground. It appears they are slicing the building in half, and then they'll tear down the other side. They say from start to finish (all the rubble cleared) won't be until February.

An implosion still would've been cooler. Maybe on the other towers.

[delts145]

Just an afternoon photo bump. This guy is mushing up the mountain along the alpine loop above American Fork Canyon.

[i-215]

That's hilarious! That's one cool thing about Utah... you don't have to drive 100 miles to see the outdoorsy stuff.. it's just a few minutes up one of our many canyons.

Is that photo current (today) or during the last snow storm?

[delts145]

That photo was actually taken in January several years ago. But dog sledding is a fairly common hobby/sport along the Wasatch.


Looking across Utah Lake toward Mount Nebo. Taken from Northwest corner of Utah Valley/Lehi area at sunset

[Ute_City]

Originally Posted by delts145

Where's our Leebuddy when we need him? He would be all over this. I miss the guy dammit. Wasatch or I-215, are you guys going to be able to get some shots of this?

I've been out of it for a while, what happened to LeeBuddy??? He was a great asset to SLC postings.

[kpexpress]

So back to the project in Lehi that Frank Gehry will be designing...........

So I just barely spoke with Brandt Andersen (CEO of G Code Ventures) and I showed him this thread we have going on Utah Valley, particularly about his project in Lehi.

Coming from his mouth......

"Some of you don't like the projects that Frank has done in other places, for Utah and that area especially, would you rather see another Trophy Homes development?"

I would have to completely agree with him.

I say Cheers to Brandt for beeing bold and hiring Gehry to do the work.

Let me ask you this..... in a conservative, prodominately mormon culture like we have here, who else would do something bold like and hire a world renowned and famed architect? (Gehry, Pei, S.O.M., or anyone like that)

I see land values going up and people finally being influenced by architecture in Utah.

Brandt did mention that it will be some time before we see some renderings of the project.

[SLC Projects]

Originally Posted by kpexpress

So back to the project in Lehi that Frank Gehry will be designing...........

So I just barely spoke with Brandt Andersen (CEO of G Code Ventures) and I showed him this thread we have going on Utah Valley, particularly about his project in Lehi.

Coming from his mouth......

"Some of you don't like the projects that Frank has done in other places, for Utah and that area especially, would you rather see another Trophy Homes development?"

I would have to completely agree with him.

I say Cheers to Brandt for beeing bold and hiring Gehry to do the work.

Let me ask you this..... in a conservative, prodominately mormon culture like we have here, who else would do something bold like and hire a world renowned and famed architect? (Gehry, Pei, S.O.M., or anyone like that)

I see land values going up and people finally being influenced by architecture in Utah.

Brandt did mention that it will be some time before we see some renderings of the project.

That's a good point. This project could put the city of Lehi on the map. It will be a one of a kind project that's for sure.

[delts145]

Plans are part of effort to lure 2 major retailers

By Jeremy Twitchell
Deseret Morning News
SPANISH FORK — While some residents are still questioning the deal, city officials in Spanish Fork are moving forward with plans to relocate the city's North Park as part of an effort to bring two major retailers to the north end of town.
Deseret Morning News graphic If approved, the deal would move the city's 15-acre North Park a few hundred feet to the northeast in the 40-acre plot located just south of the interchange between I-15 and U.S. 6. The move is intended to free up the frontage space along 1000 North for retail development.
Some residents have questioned whether Spanish Fork Mayor Joe Thomas, whose family owns a little more than 3 acres of the 40 acres in question, has a conflict of interest in the deal. His family's land has a market value of just over $250,000, according to county records, and contains a mobile home park with 15 homes on it, whose residents would be displaced.
The potential conflict has been brought up by residents in city meetings, but in an interview last week with the Deseret Morning News, Thomas emphatically denied that such a conflict exists.
"There is no conflict of interest ... this is for the city," he said. "This has nothing to do with me making a dime. I couldn't care less about that."
Thomas said the city had been approached by the would-be developer before he was elected last November. After attending a meeting with developers prior to being sworn in, Thomas said he was convinced it would be a positive development for the city and returned to his father, who had previously rebuffed inquiries regarding the land's availability, in the capacity of mayor.
"My family could have made this money any time, but I asked them to reconsider this time on behalf of the city," Thomas said.
Thomas added that he has not taken part in the negotiations between developers and his family, and every meeting on the issue he has attended he has done so in his capacity as mayor. He added that his father insisted that a provision in the contract be included that would require the developer to find places for displaced residents to go.
"I believe that's in the contract because (Thomas' father) is a good man," said Valerie Shepherd, a resident in the mobile home park.
Shepherd, like many of her neighbors, said she understands that business is business and can see the city's point of view in encouraging commercial development. She just doesn't understand why it has to be over their homes, and like others, is becoming frustrated with watching and waiting.
"All we've heard is that we'll be compensated," she said. "That doesn't tell us anything. What does compensate mean? I'd rather you just tell me what's going on and I'll deal with it."
Shepherd lives alone and works from home for the state. If she had to move, she said, she probably could afford it. The same isn't necessarily true for other residents, however, such as Brenda Vaifo'ou, a single mother who works at Sam's Club to help care for three children and three grandchildren. Her home is paid off, but she pays $250 rent each month for the spot and utilities. Her home cannot be moved.
"My fear is that I could never rent a place or find a home for $250 a month," she said. "If (the development) comes in, it comes in. I just want to be taken care of. That's what it boils down to."
Thomas said the city has been as open as it can about the process, and made the information public the first chance it got. One of the unnamed retailers has already signed to build on the site, and negotiations with the second retailer are progressing, he said. Once that is in place, he said, residents of the mobile home park will be the first priority, though the developer has already been working on finding a spot for them to relocate.
"They'll know as quickly as possible," Thomas said.
The bottom line, Thomas said, is that the deal is a win for the city overall.
"The tax revenue benefits everyone, but that's not my primary concern here," Thomas said. "I like the idea of being able to shop here in Spanish Fork."


-------------------------------------------------------------------------

[i-215]

Rats! I wish I had a camera. W hall, pictured, is not completely on the ground.

[i-215]

Rats! I wish I had a camera. W hall, pictured, is not completely on the ground.

[SLC Projects]

Demos are fun to watch. How many buildings are there down at Byu that are coming down? I can see at least two builidings in the pic above.

[delts145]

Wal-Mart applies again to Cedar Hills



By Amy Choate-Nielsen
Deseret Morning News
CEDAR HILLS — Three years after Wal-Mart's first application to set up shop in Cedar Hills was denied, the mega-retailer has returned with a new plan that's making some city officials excited.
Deseret Morning News graphic The store on Tuesday filed an application for a new prototype of a Wal-Mart community store — and Cedar Hills officials wasted no time in making the possibility public.
"Our goal is to make sure residents know about this," said Councilman Jim Perry. "(Last time Wal-Mart applied) I know a lot of people in the community felt like they didn't get enough information early enough. That's why we're really trying to do this with a sense of transparency and communication and make sure we bring everyone along all of the way and resolve any concerns they might have."
The City Council and Planning Commission denied Wal-Mart's application in 2003 because it didn't meet enough of the city's already-existing architectural and design requirements.
At that time, Wal-Mart proposed a typical big box store of about 160,000 square feet, city manager Konrad Hildebrandt said.
This time, the store has approached the city with a concept that meets the city's requirements, with a store plan that is smaller, about 115,000 square feet, according to Wal-Mart spokesperson Karianne Fallow.
The store would be the first of its kind, a cross between Wal-Mart's neighborhood grocery stores and bigger supercenters that sell general merchandise as well as food items. The store is meant to have a specific community feel, instead of a regional pull, while still being full-service.
Fallow estimates the store, if approved, would have openings for 300-350 employees.
The store would go on a 14-acre block of land near Cedar Hills Drive and 4800 West that was purchased in March by Phillips Edison and Co., a development firm. The site will be required to have at least 30 percent landscaping, Hildebrandt said.
The land has room for three additional lots, two of which will be developed into a commercial retail center by Phillips Edison and Co. The third lot, which would be closest to residents in the area, will be used for businesses.
"We were certainly looking at the growth trends and the commercial developments within (that) area, and we felt that Cedar Hills, and not only Cedar Hills but Highland and Alpine, were underserved as far as retail," said Roy Williams, Phillips Edison and Co.'s vice president of development.
Williams said the company had been looking at the area for several years.
Neighboring Highland officials recently decided to create a commercial- retail zone on Alpine Highway, and Alpine officials are considering adding a similar zone, but Hildebrandt said he doesn't think the three closely situated cities will have a commercial conflict.
"I think there's enough for Highland and Alpine to have commercial in their areas, too," Hildebrandt said.
Because plans are still in early stages, the city has not yet discussed with the store its hours of operation, whether it can be open on Sunday or whether alcohol can be sold.
In 2005, a group of residents in the city asked city officials to ban the sale of alcohol within the city's limits. The initiative to ban alcohol was put to public vote and defeated, but Smith's, which had petitioned to open a store in the city, decided not to come anyway.
Some say previous opposition to establishments that function on Sunday and sell alcohol was so fierce it was enough to run any store out of town, according to postings on the town's public forum, www.cedarhillsforum.org. But city officials don't think the same uproar will occur this time, although those details are yet to be determined.
"I think our community's moved beyond it," Perry said. "We had the vote and moved on. It hasn't come up in any way in the city in a long time."
City officials say plans for the Wal-Mart might be presented to the Planning Commission for the first time on Jan. 25, but it depends on the store. Throughout the approval process, the public is invited to attend city meetings and may make comments during the public comment period.
Meanwhile, city leaders are looking forward to the potential of having an increased amount of sales-tax revenue flowing back to the city, although they're not sure how much it will be.
"We feel really excited," Hildebrandt said. "It's not every day that the No. 1 retailer walks through your door. We think we have a great community, but we're somewhat surprised that we're chosen by them to be where they want to develop. We're surprised and happy."


-----------------------------------------------------------------

[SLC Projects]

Hey delts145 with that last post you make about the new walmart being built in Cedar Hills got me wondering where is Cedar Hills? Is that down near Lehi?

[delts145]

In this photo you would be talking about the far lower left side. Also the Northeastern bench of Utah Valley,"before Highland and Alpine." Also to the right or south side of the mouth of American Fork Canyon, or between American Fork Canyon and the Timpanogos Temple. Does any of that make sense????

[SLC Projects]

Thanks for the info delts145.

The thing that surprise me in this story is the fact that Cedar Hills is no where near a freeway. I throught walmart only built stores that are just off of a freeway on/off ramps.

[delts145]

Yeah SLC, that whole Northeast sector of Utah County's population has exploded over the last ten years. Northeast Lehi, Northeast Am. Fork, Highland,Alpine,Manila,and of course Cedar Hills suddenly have large,upscale populations with hardly any place that is convenient to shop, except at the new commercial center in Highland. These towns are primarily filled with trophy homes,golf courses and new schools and churches. Their settings are incredibly beautiful and it is understandable why the well-healed populace is reluctant to allow anything that smacks of your typical strip-mall in their neighborhood. This will be a major coup for WalMart. I'm glad that the town council is forcing Walmart to rethink it's typical set-up.


Looking Southeast toward Mouth of Am.Fork Canyon. Just minutes up this Canyon is some of America's most spectacular scenery.



Looking North: A typical northern view from a Highland Yard


One of the things I miss most when I'm in L.A. are the common pink sunrises above Highland/Alpine