Depending on which news sources you follow, Milwaukee is going through either a “renaissance” or a “reinvention.” However you want to define it, it’s safe to say that Milwaukee is currently building a lot of new and wonderful things! Here are some of them, brought to you by GTG Home Buyers!
• Lakeshore State Park is one of Milwaukee’s hidden-but-not-really-hidden gems. The 22-acre island park that sits across from Henry Maier Festival Park is a lovely and seemingly untamed space. (Never mind that the island was built from Deep Tunnel landfill in 1991.) And now, Friends of Lakeshore State Park are raising funds to build a $5 million visitors center there.
According to OnMilwaukee:
The 2,500-square-foot single story facility would include a classroom for visiting school groups, an educational display, a DNR office and a 2,500-square-foot outdoor plaza.
The plan is for bird-friendly glass, solar panels to power the facility and a green roof that in addition to providing natural insulation, would also help the wood and glass structure nestle into the landscape.
“From the south, because of the green roof,” you wouldn’t even be able to tell there’s a building there,” says Friends board member Bill Schmitt, who is also executive director of Rooted & Rising Washington Park, as we look at the site.
Oh, and be sure to read the full article for the part where Schmitt is like, “Schools are very hesitant to bring kids down here” with no visitors center, and then the actual park manager pops up and is like, “Um, no they’re not.” [OnMilwaukee]
• File the next two items under “New and wonderful things they’re forever studying in Milwaukee.” First up, forever studying the possibility of converting the endless parking lots around American Family Field into something else! [Urban Milwaukee]
• Next up, forever studying options for rebuilding the stretch of 794 between the Hoan Bridge and the Milwaukee River! [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]
• After months of meetings, bickering, and questions of legality, Milwaukee finally gave a thumbs-up to that 156-room, seven-story Moxy Hotel at 430 W. State St., next to Fiserv Forum in the Deer District. [BizTimes]
• And speaking of things next to Fiserv Forum, yep, FPC Live is still building that concert venue next to Fiserv Forum in the Deer District. [Urban Milwaukee]
• Remember that plan to put a big ol’ electronic billboard on the blank west wall of the Wisconsin Tower at 606 W. Wisconsin Ave.? Well, it ain’t happening. [Urban Milwaukee]
• A developer who wanted to build apartments on a vacant lot at 2860 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. has sold the lot to another developer who wants to build apartments there. [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]
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