$50 million showcase on Main Street
Buildings to become offices and stores
By Sheldon S. Shafer
sshafer@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal
A block of century-old buildings that was once the heart of Louisville's downtown whisky district will be transformed into a $50 million commercial showplace with offices and retail stores selling clothing, jewelry and furniture.
That's what investor Todd Blue sees with his "Iron Quarter" project -- a 12- to 14-story glass and steel complex to be built incorporating some of the currently run-down facades along Main Street between First and Second, near the planned downtown arena.
Blue said he views Iron Quarter as "a retail, office and dining center for the intellectually savvy, urban pioneer … a destination that will be fresh, chic and sophisticated."
Blue, who recently bought nine adjoining tracts in the block for $4.75 million from a group headed by architect and developer Jim Walters, said he hopes to break ground on Iron Quarter by year's end and complete the project in mid-2010, right before the arena opens.
Mayor Jerry Abramson said he believes the project "is just the first of many investments that will be created because of the arena."
The project is the second attempt to rehabilitate the crumbling West Main block where a building collapsed six years ago. Walters announced plans in 2000 to convert the same property into a mixed-use development called Whisky Row, but the project, which was to feature a hotel, plaza and apartments, never materialized.
Walters, whose Bravura design firm is the architect for Iron Quarter, said his attention has been focused on completing the Waterfront Park Place luxury condo tower. He added that plans for the arena have only recently made the redevelopment of the West Main site feasible.
Blue said the name Iron Quarter is intended to reflect Main Street's traditional cast-iron storefronts and also that the Blue family made its fortune in the metals and scrap industry.
He said he will spend more than $1 million to save the existing buildings' facades to incorporate into Iron Quarter. Otherwise, the eight three- and four-story buildings, all built from 1877 to 1905 but now "rotting," as Blue put it, will be razed.
The project will feature approximately 110,000 square feet of offices on the upper floors and 120,000 square feet of retail space, as many as 25 stores, on the first and second floors, along with 500 parking spaces, half of them underground.
Although no leases have been signed, Blue said the stores will be high end, offering such goods as clothing, jewelry, furniture, home décor, art and accessory items. One or more restaurants, plus a coffee shop and ice cream shop, also are planned, he said.
Iron Quarter will anchor the West Main district and provide an activity center for not only arena visitors but also for residents of new housing springing up along Main Street and for gallery patrons, Blue said.
He said he expects the office space to be filled by a combination of new companies, firms already downtown that want to upgrade quarters and companies that will relocate from the suburbs. The space will rent for $22 to $24 a square foot per year.
Blue said he doesn't expect financing to be a problem, adding that he will talk to both city and state officials about financial incentives. He said that, for now, he is not seeking other investors but that he has been approached by what he described as a nationally known development company about undertaking Iron Quarter as a joint venture.
"All options are open," Blue said, adding that he has no intent to acquire four other storefronts on the west end of the 100 block near the approach to the Clark Memorial Bridge.
Along with arena visitors, Blue is relying on about 8,500 Humana workers within a block or two of the site as a primary customer base. Humana spokesman Jim Turner cited a lack of commercial development along that part of Main and said he is sure Iron Quarter "will be welcomed by people who work in this part of downtown."
Some businesses along the West Main corridor have been hanging on, waiting for a major development to come along.
Julius Wilkerson, who has operated the Big City Styles barber shop across the street from the Iron Quarter site for 10 years, said he is "banking on" the project bringing renewed vibrancy to the street. "I like the fact (Blue) is keeping the antique look" and saving the facades, Wilkerson said.
Blue said he has sought legal opinions from the city and Louisville Arena Authority on whether his position as an authority board member and his project plans would pose a conflict of interest.
Authority Chairman Jim Host said, "Our attorneys have said there is no conflict," adding that Iron Quarter "is exactly what the arena was intended to do. It is terrific."
And Abramson spokesman Chris Poynter said the mayor's attorneys also found no conflict for Blue.
Blue noted that he has been discussing with Walters the purchase of the property for several years, predating the arena plans, and that he was not a member of an earlier arena task force that recommended the riverfront site.
Blue's company also owns the nearby vacant block bounded by Floyd, Preston, Washington and Witherspoon streets. That block will be developed eventually, probably as a mixed-use project, "when the market dictates," Blue said.
Other projects by Blue and his company, Cobalt Ventures, have included, as either the sole developer or a partner: the Cobalt Marketplace, a mixed-use development on East Market Street; the Preston Pointe building next to Slugger Field; and Mercantile Gallery Lofts, a condo project near Floyd and Market streets nearing completion.
