[Vision2020] Developer Getting Things Done

[J Ford]

Now HERE is another developer who knows how to not only do things according 
to the City regs, but he ACTUALLY gets his projects started and going.  
There are certain developers in this city that could take lessons from this 
example.  Oh, and please notice how the parking issue was shown and accepted 
to be the problem it is and how the developer revamped his plans and still 
comes out ahead.  Another lesson that should be looked at...(Anyone see 
anything going on on the Mt. View property lately?  Oh, I mean outside of 
the machines and supplies being removed...)

This is an article that appeared in the Lewiston Trib:

    The tallest part of Moscow's skyline will soon be as flat as a pancake.

    Over the next few months, the unused grain elevators and other old 
agricultural buildings south of downtown will be razed to make way for 
projects to be determined, Moscow developer Rick Beebe said Monday. They 
could include a small hotel, ground-floor retail space with apartments and 
medical offices.

    But those are just ideas, Beebe said, and any new development will have 
to look at parking before it goes forward.

    "Parking is an issue that we've been talking about extensively," Beebe 
said of discussions with the city and neighbors Gritman Medical Center and 
the University of Idaho. "That's part of the discussion with any of that 
area down there that I consider urban blight."

    The wood and sheet metal part of the grain elevators on South Jackson 
Street is already being salvaged -- piece by piece. Once that is completed, 
Beebe said a crane will start demolishing the concrete portions of the 
elevators from the top down. Implosion wasn't an option due to the 
buildings' proximity to U.S. Highway 95.

    A 225,000-bushel steel silo will also be dismantled and salvaged, Beebe 
said. Buildings along the railroad tracks owned by Crites-Moscow Growers 
will remain, although Beebe said he has been trying to buy the property. The 
elevators on the corner of Main and East Eighth streets across from Gritman 
are also coming down, he said.

    There was an effort to save some of the buildings last year, when Beebe 
proposed converting the Jackson Street grain elevators into retail space and 
apartments. But that would have taken a zoning change with the added 
requirement that developers create adequate parking. "There just wasn't 
enough space to provide for retail, provide for apartments and provide for 
parking as well, and maintain the structures," Beebe said.

    Beebe added he and partner Larry Germer of Germer Construction in Moscow 
spent a lot of money trying to figure out how to save the elevators. But 
demolition emerged as their best option, he said.

    "It's sad to see it all go," Beebe said. "We'd like to have seen it all 
kept."

    Others in Moscow also said they are saddened to see the end of the 
buildings, some of which are more than 60 years old.



J  :]

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