Personally I'm pretty disappointed with the new design. What could've been a pretty cool looking building is now gonna be a generic soulless skyscraper towering over the whole city. It's like the developers catfished the city to get it approved.

It never was and never is getting built.

Wow I really understand what they mean by eye sore now. It’ll be so out of place in that section of Prov and will only be the beginning to ruining our skyline.

They should’ve made it not look like shit instead

As a mostly life long Rhode Islander, I hate to be the one to inform you but Providence doesn’t have a skyline.

Impressive that they somehow made it worse. Also just heartwarming to know that it looks like this because of cost saving design measures, just what we deserve. So every time you look at it you’re seeing a budget version. Gotta eat humble pie here because now the old version ain’t looking so bad.

They don’t have financing secured yet I don’t think, and with rates going up and the scale of this project I think the window is closing for this thing to pencil out.

Wasn’t the issue here that the city wouldn’t approve it, so the state intervened and gave the approval?

This thing sucks

oh wow ! that’s ,,, that’s interesting

I for one am glad we are building up. 10 more next to it plz

IIRC the city did give approval but bypassed it's guidelines in doing so and then a citizens group challenged the city's approval but lost in court.

Coming from a design field you give the, "to the moon" design that gets everyone super excited to get approval and over all positive sentiment. Then through DD it gets watered down due to cost and over all feasibility. This will probably not be the last iteration/concept.

Honestly, I prefer it. It’s a dumb idea, it should be banal.

The Senate wanted it, the Zoning Board didn't approve it, the Council overrode the Zoning Board, and the Senate was so annoyed the General Assembly stripped the City of zoning jurisdiction over the I-195 land.

>despite the complaints that it would be too high.

Why do NIMBY complain so much providence needs more units to bring costs down and maybe people to make the city interesting

where’s it supposed to go?

Depends on what angle you see it from. Coming up over the hill on Allens, by the small Dunkin...driving across the steel bridge near the new Trader Joes? Are you ignorant, or just trolling?

Beautiful view from the Cranston dmv

Still hideous.

🙏

In the park next to the Province River ped bridge. Yes, in a park. ☹️

Just lovely. Looks like a generic Miami Beach condo now. Just what any downtown in the Northeast needs for a signature structure. Ugh.

The new design looks significantly worse than the old one. Yuck.

Someone get this guy in every commercial architecture board room in America

No, in a grassy parcel next to the park, that was never part of the park.

If you’re against this, misinformation doesn’t help.

Yeah, I think PVD needs more tall buildings, but this design sucks. The horizontal window banding is totally against the Providence norm. And vertically-banded windows are a norm here for a reason.

why does the pedestal look different?

I prefer bland to leg-lamp.

My consulting fee is $69,420/hour, it's a real bargain

It should be called the feign tower.

i like the new one more for sure. it's generic tall skyscrapper but more housing is good. The rich folk that move into this less likely to price out the working class elsewhere.

We could use some generic condos to bring rents down

Your crazy to think a shiny new building will help regular people afford housing.

This design looks really really old to me.

“There’s a housing shortage and we need more” -builds more housing- “No not like that, it’s UGLY!!!1!”

Price = demand / supply,

It ain’t rocket science

Nice to look at things in such simplistic terms. U need to sell a lot of rice to Impact cost. One rice kernel doesn't change shit.

Increasing the housing supply is a necessity at this point. Hell, I’d prefer commie blocks to the current hellscape of homelessness and unaffordable rents

With either design I just want some color added.

Exactly, which is why much more than this is needed. Density needs to be legalized everywhere, we can’t just build one apartment block and expect it to fix anything

Where was this supposed to be?

This isn't one rice kernel. It's 500 apartments. It's also not the only higher density project of its kind.

You can't accuse other people of being overly simplistic and then say some bullshit like that.

500 units? Less than a rice kernel.

Please no. As much of the rest of the country is waking up to the benefits of "strong towns" and "new urbanism" and "liveable cities", we're going to build a huge standalone structure completely out of human scale? I sure hope not.

Whoa, that's not bad. Think you can do some ed consulting too?

How much would impact Providence then?

I remember all the protests of, "Fane, Fane Go Away." I like the irony of him coming back another day.

This design is flawless. It fits in with the soulless incubator garbage across the river. The time it takes to construct the building will improve traffic and city ambience. 5 stars.

Fuck Fane

I love discussing these issues with people who care so little about them they can't spend even 10 minutes trying to educate themselves on the issue. It's like when you get to meet a six-year old child.

Pay attention to your local elections…

I know there is subjectivity to the statement, but lateroundpick is correct about the impact of the tower on overall supply… 500 units is sort of a drop in the bucket when you consider the scale of supply shortage.

Jakejanobs is also correct that any increase to supply is a useful contribution towards solving the accessibility crisis.

*Affordable or low-income housing proposed*

"NO! The poors will move in and spoil the charm of my coastal elite bubble!"

*Luxury condominiums proposed*

"Eat the rich! We should all continue to live in early 20th century housing that is built out of hazardous material, because that is somehow more egalitarian and feeds my fucked up addiction to being virtuously superior!"

Also - affordable housing is a false statement designed to fool poor people into thinking they have a chance to afford a nice place in a nice neighborhood. 'Affordable' is still very expensive - in most cities.

>I know there is subjectivity to the statement, but lateroundpick is correct about the impact of the tower on overall supply… 500 units is sort of a drop in the bucket when you consider the scale of supply shortage.

​

True, but the bucket never starts to fill unless you start putting drops of water. This, Superman, that other Water St area development, etc. We need a metric fuckton of stuff like that to make a difference. Dismissing the solution because it doesn't solve the problem is asinine and counter-productive.

Exactly what are they going to put in this monstrosity?

This is luxury housing. In what world will this free up market rate housing to alleviate the pressure? Hint, it won’t.

Great more overpriced condos that will saturate a market that doesn’t need them.

This happened back before the financial crisis where they built the water place condos, Westin tower and that original condo building near the train station. The condos by the train station ended becoming jwu dorms because no one wanted them.

Those JWU students are no longer clogging up other city apartments; sounds like a win all around. Unless they're getting government handouts, if some developer builds a tower and can't sell the apartments, that's their problem, not ours. I suspect anyone willing to plow millions of dollars into something like this will have thought of that ahead of time.

That’s awesome! If rich people wanna build new houses & pay property taxes, why not? This will stop them buying up everything in poor neighborhoods and gentrifying them. Let’s take property taxes from the rich and pay teachers/firefighters/bus drivers what they deserve.

If Lamborghini produced more cars then they could sell, would that raise the price of a new Civic?

Price = Demand / Supply. In what world is that not true?

Far too simplistic. We’re talking about the supply of affordable housing, which remains unchanged with the introduction of luxury units. Go back to Econ 101.

You’re advocating for a weird sort of trickle down housing which is almost offensive in how much it assumes the poor and working class stand to benefit from policies and practices that solely benefit the wealthy.

Downtown has added thousands of luxury units in the last decade. You’re telling me the guy looking to move in there is freeing up a unit of housing in silver lake? Give me a break.

‘“For each 100 new, centrally located market-rate units, roughly 60 units are created in the bottom half of neighborhood income distribution through vacancies,” the researchers write. Even more remarkable, 29 vacancies are created in neighborhoods in the bottom quintile of the income distribution’

From a published research paper, Source

You got a source on how new construction raises rents? Everything I can find says the opposite

These are not market rate apartments. They are luxury condo units.

Creating so-called “luxury” rental units is fine, and does relieve pressure across the board (not immediately, though). This isn’t that. Actual luxury condominiums aren’t going to do shit for the thousands of crappy multi family units controlled by slum lords.

Right on Dyer? By Ship Street?

Who exactly are they expecting to live here? We already know it’s going to be too expensive for the average person to afford, and just like all the other factory-turned-lofts they’ve built over the years, It’s going to remain mostly unvacated. I’m all for building new housing but make it affordable

They removed some of it. It was parking.

Yes. Parcel 42.

https://www.195district.com/about/district-land/

I should have said: whether you’re for or against this, misinformation doesn’t help.

The condos are often bought individually and then rented out just the same. Please cite your source for the “thousands” of luxury units added downtown? Define luxury please? Any supply is good supply. The top end of owners purchases newer/nicer construction and will often circulate their old housing back into the market. Not everyone who owns property is hoarding real estate to the extent of their ability. In fact many people want nothing to do with landlording, it’s a huge pain in the ass.

You are delusional.

https://www.census.gov/construction/bps/stateannual.html

^our state is dead last in terms of absolute permits for new construction issued, never mind Providence specifically. We build essentially nothing, and our housing stock is basically ancient on the average.

More housing supply is more housing supply. We need it. If "luxury" units are what are built, so be it.

Use your brain and think of what non rental condo units mean. And then keep thinking about it for like 1hr if you’re going to respond to me. And then don’t.

Awfully defensive, ProvBroker.

I am deeply engaged with the subject of housing accessibility and have an understanding of how poor our performance is in terms of new construction, our municipalities general zoning tendencies etc. I also manage several units of different types and affordability around town professionally. I am a renter and own no real estate despite being in the business. You’re allowed to have an opinion, and I’m allowed to have mine. I feel particularly entitled to mine because I’m a subject matter expert, but hey, what the hell does that mean anyways?

I respect that you’ve got an interest in solving the housing crisis, but catering and capitulating to multimillionaire developers in the private sector who milk public funding via tax breaks to build million dollar condo units inaccessible to 99% of Rhode Islanders is absolutely a bridge too far. Ridiculous that we even have to consider this. Bending over backwards to do their fucking PR for them. It’s absurd, insulting and everyone here advocating for it should be ashamed, even if it ultimately is a marginal plus for the market. Which I really don’t believe it is.

To be fair I am also personally highly critical of our governments giving these tax breaks and incentives. If I had a line item veto, or personal discretion over the matter, I absolutely wouldn’t tolerate it. I am with you on vehemently opposing these projects that are painted as “public private” partnerships, and the sweetheart developer deals that are regularly cut.

Now that that’s clear, and understanding the gravity of the crisis at hand, I would rather see something actually come out of the government spending and partnerships which will inevitably occur, and I see this as one of the better returns on investment in when forced to reckon with the inevitable.

It is completely possible to have a nuanced view, and to like/dislike some parts of a project more than others. Nothing is perfect. Nobody is doing PR for anyone, this is just how it goes with our particular political reality. Everyone is forced to jockey for flawed outcomes. I’m on your side dude.

It's never gonna happen. It's just a masturbatory fantasy. It doesn't fit this city and we don't have the populace for it.

lazy take. logged in just to say its not NIMBY to oppose this building, and it will do nothing to help rent. All units are luxury apartments (not even condos), and there are ZERO planned affordable units.

Study published in a peer reviewed journal: “The supply of new market rate units triggers moving chains that quickly reach middle- and low-income neighborhoods and individuals. Thus, new market-rate construction loosens the housing market in middle- and low-income areas even in the short run. Market-rate supply is likely to improve affordability outside the sub-markets where new construction occurs and to benefit low-income people.” Luxury housing (called market rate in this study) increases the availability of middle and low-income housing. All supply reduces prices, even if it isn’t affordable in itself

Adding luxury apartments to a city where the median income is $24,891 does not increase the housing supply. Sorry, but no.

Yeah, totally not buying that argument.

There would be a direct benefit to Providence residents to build straight-up affordable units near the city center/transit hub.

Source? You got any peer-reviewed, published evidence that increased supply somehow increases rents?

And yes! We need cheap housing too and we should absolutely be building that, if private developers are unwilling then the city should work with them or build it themselves.

Per the US census, Rhode Island built 1300 housing units in 2021. That’s the worst in the country by a long shot, both in absolute terms and per capita. Our population is growing, and our housing stock is not. Rents have no where to go but to the moon until we get our shit together and actually build something