(Photo illustration courtesy of ASU)
Roosevelt Row Community Development Corp., Downtown Voices Coalition, Evans Churchill Community Association, and the Thunderdome Neighborhood Association all explicitly state the desire to make downtown a more walkable place. Thousands of downtowners want the same. Thousands of Phoenicians beyond downtown also share that vision. Even City Hall supports this goal (though its execution to it is an entirely different topic).
It’s accurate to say that the downtown community’s mission is to create a vibrant, walkable place for people to live, work, and visit.
But it’s critical to be intellectually honest with ourselves that, in providing a quality urban environment, Phoenix is far behind nearly every other city we can name. And for economic (both global and local), environmental, and demographic reasons, we don’t have the luxury of time to catch up. Phoenix has to step up its game quickly, and we can’t afford any more screwups, because other cities have it figured out. At this point in Phoenix’s development, we must be aggressive, decisive, and smart in what we do next.
Two unconditional necessities
At the highest level, achieving walkability requires two fundamental ingredients which enable everything else that needs to happen:
- Multi-modal infrastructure driven by pedestrian design.
- High density (employment, residential, and ground-floor commercial).
Without those two things, a truly walkable environment simply isn’t possible. And for all the perception that Phoenix is awash in land — and for all the vacant lots scarring downtown — the truth of the matter is that we have sufficient but limited opportunities (in terms of land) on which to build this needed density. The largest single landowner in downtown is the city of Phoenix – land mostly earmarked for the Phoenix Biomedical Campus. Coming in a close second is ASU. So while downtowners are striving to convey our area’s needs to individual developers as they come to the table, there are two 800-pound gorillas that have to ‘get it’ lest it all be for naught.
ASU’s role
Taylor Place is wonderfully dense. Its 13 stories have more than 1,000 beds per acre, which far outperforms its otherwise modest Floor Area Ratio of just below 7. (FAR is a measure of how well a building utilizes the land it’s on, gross square feet/developable land. Think of it as the number of “effective stories” a development has once you factor out all the undeveloped space.) While obviously not matching the FAR of 44 Monroe, the tallest residential building in Arizona, Taylor Place actually does match it in density because of its smaller apartments. Densities like these are bright spots in our quest for a walkable downtown.
Buildings of classroom space are harder to measure in terms of density, so here we rely more on FAR. The Cronkite building has a FAR just over 5, which is as low as we can accept — if it’s not actually too low — to achieve walkable densities. Then there is ASU’s squat 4-story student recreation center by the YMCA currently under construction. That is entirely too low for precious downtown land, and should have had another 4 or more stories of student housing or classroom space planned above it.
But building low in our downtown is okay if a structure is made of wood-frame (because it’s easier to replace with a taller structure when the area’s development economics improve) or if its foundation is engineered to support more height that can be added in the future.
Build the law school, but…
Sorry Tempe, but I want ASU’s law school to come downtown. Adding a significant number of graduate students to our downtown mix will be a big positive for downtown. I’m also excited to hear that the parking for the new structure will be underground. (The only two places that we should be adding any more parking are underground and on the street.) But I’m also hoping against all hope that the building will be given a foundation that can support more height than ASU plans to build, because I guarantee it won’t be built in wood-frame and its currently-proposed design delivers a measly 3.5 FAR.
To be clear, 3.5 isn’t enough. To build what is currently being proposed would be a detriment to downtown because it would be $120 million dumped into a missed opportunity and a permanent ‘low spot’ in our density profile. There are two possible solutions:
- Build the foundation strong enough to support more than double the height so ASU can add more on top in the future when they need it (because they will).
- Cut the footprint in half and double the height, which will achieve a solid FAR of 7 and also preserve land for future opportunities.
Take the long view, and do it right
Either option adds a little more to the immediate cost, but long-term economic and financial benefits for both ASU and the city of Phoenix outweigh it. City Hall can insist that ASU make these changes on their own since Phoenix taxpayers already gave ASU all its land for free, or the two could split this marginal cost to the project. Either way, Phoenix taxpayers, downtowners, and Sun Devils all deserve a smarter structure that won’t ultimately hamstring us in our already-challenging efforts to create a competitive, walkable downtown. Instead, let’s make this new structure a part of the solution.
Contact the writer at sean.sweat@gmail.com or @PhxDowntowner
Sean Sweat is an urbanism expert and a supply chain strategist for Intel Corporation.
