In a housing market like Roanoke's, public/private partnerships are essential to achieve difficult goals that strengthen the city's economy. Important questions have arisen with respect to the former Grand Piano building and that building's future use. This building was originally Hancock Dry Goods and is now referred to as the Hancock Building.
The question is whether the Hancock Building will go forward as an apartment building or become another condominium project. A difficult challenge exists because modern downtown apartment choices are a vitally important component of attracting and retaining talented young adults, yet apartment projects are much more difficult, risky and less feasible than condominium projects in markets like Roanoke. For these reasons you don't see any large-scale apartment construction projects under way downtown.
The decisions surrounding larger buildings like this one -- and how they are best used to benefit the city's urban core -- can have lasting and significant economic effects. Sometimes, maximizing economic impact requires private and public investment to achieve the greatest benefit for the city, especially when a particular building use (in this case, apartments) is disfavored and not sufficiently attractive to most private investors.
As a condominium project, the Hancock Building doesn't need a public/private partnership. The building is spectacular, and the construction is on time and on budget. It is one of the most compelling projects of its kind in the country. If the project doesn't proceed as apartments, it will proceed successfully and happily as condominiums that will sell out quickly and profitably. The developers' return will be higher than with apartments, and Roanoke will have lost a major opportunity in its ongoing effort to make itself economically stronger and attractive to younger professionals.
Apartments or condos -- does it really matter? Absolutely. To maximize continued economic development, the historic market area needs a high-quality apartment building to provide desirable, flexible and convenient housing to those young adults seeking the vitality and lifestyle of downtown living but who are not ready to buy. To compete better with Asheville, Charlottesville, Atlanta and Charlotte, we have to answer a typical 25-year-old's threshold question: "Where in downtown Roanoke could I rent a great loft apartment?" If we cannot answer that question favorably, Roanoke will have a nearly impossible challenge retaining and attracting the youth and intellectual capital it so desperately needs.
Well-educated and motivated young people are the lifeblood of any healthy city; we need to keep the few we have and attract as many more as possible. As a market group, these young adults insist on downtown living and its urban energy, restaurants and bars, live music and other cultural and lifestyle amenities.
Having more (and better) downtown apartments is essential for even a chance at attracting and retaining young professionals, and there is nowhere else many of them want to live -- it's downtown or nowhere. If Roanoke can't offer enough good downtown apartments, Roanoke will simply be crossed off the 25-year-old's list of prospective cities. There are so many positive economic effects related to a downtown with more apartments that appeal to young adults.
The city government is wise to use select public/private partnerships because they leverage community-minded developers' capital, time and expertise and make them absorb most of the risk, debt and difficulty for a project that is desperately needed and an important part of Roanoke's economic future.
If the fear is that wealthy developers are just going to get wealthier, fear not. As a business proposition, the financial return on apartments at the Hancock Building will do well to
Source: Roanoke.com