Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum

Per Marriott Website:

AC Hotel Dallas Downtown opening April 2017
8 floors, 128 rooms

AC Kitchen (International)
AC Lounge (Tapas)


Residence Inn by Marriott Dallas Downtown opening April 2017
11 floors, 121 suites

Great to see these will be done by April!

They'll have to hurry. I don't think they're where they can start on the construction of the rooms/amenities yet, but I may be wrong. They don't want to set a date and can't make it, like the Hampton did (the Hampton missed their target by a few weeks, and had to bump countless guests to other hotels (as well as at least 1 wedding party), until they were finally able to really accomodate guests (and even then, no parking garage, no pool, and not all the elevators worked by opening either)). The articles said the Mercantile Commerce was either vacant 20 or 25 years (depending on which one you read)--either way, that's a long time, and there's no telling what (and how much) they've had to do to get it to this point.

6/4/17

Untitled by Around My City, on Flickr
Untitled by Around My City, on Flickr

I walk past this project every day and it has felt really slow. There will whole weeks where no one is working on the garage. It seems the garage project is not their primary concern yet. The Pizza place has not started so that may have dissolved since there is no parking if there is no garage.

cowboyeagle05 wrote:I walk past this project every day and it has felt really slow. There will whole weeks where no one is working on the garage. It seems the garage project is not their primary concern yet. The Pizza place has not started so that may have dissolved since there is no parking if there is no garage.

I'd say it pretty much full steam ahead now that the structure is starting to go up. It has been pretty slow going. Seems like they pushed dirt around for a hell of a long time.

I agree, the tract has stood in its current state for some time, but once they got the piers drilled and rebar in place, it seems to be moving along now. Anyone know if their are plans for ground level retail? dry cleaners? or is this just going to be the standard downtown parking garage.

dpl-1202 wrote:I agree, the tract has stood in its current state for some time, but once they got the piers drilled and rebar in place, it seems to be moving along now. Anyone know if their are plans for ground level retail? dry cleaners? or is this just going to be the standard downtown parking garage.

Parking and an inside pool there is a rendering around here somewhere...

Another exposed Garage that puts no effort in a exterior facade... This along with Butler bro's is really disappointing..

Literally that entire area is parking

They should really just change Jackson Street to Parking Street, because it honestly has more parking spaces than any other street in the CBD.

I'd gladly take a parking garage if it did anything to eliminate that sea of surface lots just south of here. Unfortunately, It probably won't do anything for that.

At least there's potential retail on the ground level, and I'm glad that surface lot is gone.

I'd love to see the lot behind Dalpark, next to Interurban Building get developed into something vertical (not a parking garage). That would be the game changer. There's really no point in putting any hope in new-build project on this side of town though. The low hanging fruit of remodeling old buildings has all been picked, with exception of the Drever (until 2018 - we hope). I just don't see anyone taking the risk on a new build south of Main and northeast of the Farmers Market due to a long list of factors, not to mention the homeless population.

From yesterday.

mdg109 wrote:From yesterday.

Looking good. Hard to believe that used to be the dumpiest bus stop downtown.

I'm amazed. I thought it would take a *lot* longer to get this building into shape, much less looking a hotel (or hotels).

They've done a good job with the entrance to the AC and Residence Inn hotels. Really complements the wider sidewalk/bulb-out that they added earlier this year.

I walked by this property this weekend - and the bar/lounge area looks fantastic. Can't wait for everything on Commerce to open.

Hopefully, this will help the retail/restaurant space on Commerce ramp up. Neiman Marcus needs to clean up their ground floor retail space in their Commerce street garage. It will now be the ugliest looking spot in this stretch of Commerce.

Is there also a retail/restaurant space in the corner of Commerce and Prather at the The Continental apartment building, currently covered by window leasing adverts, a la the Mercantile's empty retail along Ervay?

One day, presumably soon, this segment of Commerce will be quite nice.

dukemeredith wrote:Is there also a retail/restaurant space in the corner of Commerce and Prather at the The Continental apartment building, currently covered by window leasing adverts, a la the Mercantile's empty retail along Ervay?

One day, presumably soon, this segment of Commerce will be quite nice.

Yes there is retail space at The Continental. Though I'm not sure how it's actually accessed.

At the moment the Merc Commerce retail space has no door. Just a line of windows on Commerce and Prather street advertising it as retail space available. I imagine they weren't too concerned about making it build out ready until a number of tenants show actual interest. It is likely that to install one they will need to get approval because it would require modifications to the historic structure etc.

Looks like this is now open:

http://dallas.culturemap.com/news/trave ... -marriott/

That pic of the AC entryway on the Culturemap site is some other property. The DTD hotel doesn't look like that in front.

jrd1964 wrote:That pic of the AC entryway on the Culturemap site is some other property. The DTD hotel doesn't look like that in front.

Yeah if you look at the caption it says the image was provided by Marriot. I imagine they were sent a press release some desk writer wrote something up cause it wasn't as cool of a project as the Statler which just opened as well. Instead of hiring their own photographer they dropped in a standard provided image and called it a day.

Just checked the AC site and the Residence site. No coming soon/delay messages and they both are taking reservations. The Residence site needs to hurry and update their photos--the main facade one is of another Residence Inn property, while the others still have a computer-generated look to them. The property should avoid any misleading of guests if possible. Those looking for a driveway or sidewalk overhang along Commerce aren't going to find one. No special notice about parking other than their rates: $32/night for valet, $8/night for 'off-site' parking. No explanation as to where 'off-site' is (so the front desk will get umpteen phone calls about where guests can park). The $32 valet rate is one of the highest hotel-valet rates I've heard of in the CBD.

I'll leave the management of the hotel up to management company cause they will work it out eventually. Hotels always operate in some form like this. Some better than others but website images are not their first concern when they are trying to make sure all the new staff is doing their new jobs correctly. Some companies have different priorities when they are having a soft opening. The new Stater did a ribbon cutting with politicians and the press on site. These guys appeared to just open the books and unlock the doors. Different companies have different ways of doing a soft opening.

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?stor ... 3623110384

According to this Downtown Dallas post, the AC & Residence Inn celebrated their grand opening last night.

Untitled by Around My City, on Flickr
Untitled by Around My City, on Flickr

Thanks for the picture updates! What are they building here behind these hotels? Is it just a parking garage?

DPatel304 wrote:Thanks for the picture updates! What are they building here behind these hotels? Is it just a parking garage?

yeah its just a parking garage

It's the parking garage that had the fire. I walked past this about a week ago, and it looked like the garage work was still stopped due to the fire. I suspect it won't resume until whatever investigation/insurance issues are resolved.

The pool for the 3 hotels (including the Hampton) is supposed to be in or below the parking garage also.

Here's a rendering: http://realestate.dmagazine.com/wp-cont ... ceSt-1.jpg

^Perfect, thanks, I couldn't find information on it. Does it have ground-floor retail? Also, since this is adding more parking spaces to this particular lot, could this potentially result in the surrounding surface lots being re-developed?

Construction has started back up again on the parking garage. How many floors will the garage be?

From previous renderings and articles, it does seem to have retail space in the parking garage. You can kind of see the layout of it driving down jackson. They have a ramp that goes up from jackson to the second floor.

mdg109 wrote:Here's a rendering: http://realestate.dmagazine.com/wp-cont ... ceSt-1.jpg

I just threw up in my mouth.

These cheap exposed parking garages are disgusting. Between this and Butler bro's this side of town will feel like you're looking at gigantic hot wheels collector set.

Wow, that is really awful.

These parking garages are very contradicting. The city and these developers are trying to make Dallas more like a real urban city with urban density. Yet they keep building these buildings with parking garage podiums. The developers are still pandering to that god awful suburban, car-oriented mentality, which is thus only going to create even worse traffic congestion on the roads.

Too bad they couldn't have placed some residential on top of the garage.

I'm not loving that it's an exposed parking garage, but I see two bright spots. Ground floor retail and the fact that the floors are level. That means it would be easier to convert to office/hotel/residential in the future if demand for parking spots is less.

joshua.dodd wrote:These parking garages are very contradicting. The city and these developers are trying to make Dallas more like a real urban city with urban density. Yet they keep building these buildings with parking garage podiums. The developers are still pandering to that god awful suburban, car-oriented mentality, which is thus only going to create even worse traffic congestion on the roads.

It’s typically the finance side that demands parking in excess of the minimum. Developers generally prefer to be more aggressive.

Not sure what the capacity will be, but this will have to hold parking for 3 hotels, and the employees of each that drive. Also some Residence Inn guests may be extended stayers, so their guests might need the parking space(s) the longest.

And, as we've seen before, the finished product might not resemble the initial artwork.

Matt777 wrote:I'm not loving that it's an exposed parking garage, but I see two bright spots. Ground floor retail and the fact that the floors are level. That means it would be easier to convert to office/hotel/residential in the future if demand for parking spots is less.

I agree... Having the bottom floor with retail frontage makes all the difference. Sometimes, from ground level (you know... where pedestrians are), you cant even tell. I remember when staying in Chicago and walking along a ridiculously busy stretch of pedestrian activity, it took me three days to realize there were cars parked above a section.
While some renderings are good from far, others tend to be better up close. Im not saying this particular one is all good... The materials at ground level seem bland, but its certainly not as bad as many other garages we have in the CBD.

Plus they can almost always be covered later when things change. A garage like this would be perfect for green coverage and not the crappy vines that some developers plant and walk away. The last one pictured here is native grasses. So I imagine in our case a similar concept would be cool but be trimmed back once a year.

Tnexster wrote:Wow, that is really awful.

I work in Victory Park across the street from the Tom Thumb/Cineapolis project. The developers put some kind of screening over the parking garage and it really makes the garage less noticeable and gives a cleaner, more finished appearance to the building. I wish something similar was done here. This looks lousy.

cowboyeagle05 wrote:Plus they can almost always be covered later when things change. A garage like this would be perfect for green coverage and not the crappy vines that some developers plant and walk away. The last one pictured here is native grasses. So I imagine in our case a similar concept would be cool but be trimmed back once a year.

b021effeb7e66731c97ff11fab73825e.jpghabitat1.jpgShinjukuGardens_02.jpg

That'd be really cool. The fact that this garage has ground floor retail makes me hopeful that eventually something will be done to make this look nicer. Once foot traffic picks up in this area, the appearance of this garage could definitely have an impact on nearby retail, so it would be in their best interest to spruce it up a bit.

Yeah, right now most people are not going to be sympathetic to the idea that adding greenery or something else would matter the cause of the homeless and barren atmosphere that exists as soon as you walk towards city Hall. While the rest of many of us hope for someone to see the future of a pleasant walk from Butler Brothers to Neimans the hotel backers probably don't care for now.

Not sure when construction resumed on this one.

This one is moving along. About two floors to go I think.