City Plan Commission approves 3 projects
They also need to get zoning approval
An addition to Potawatomi Hotel & Casino, a new east side location for Stone Creek Coffee and a proposed apartment building overlooking the Milwaukee River are all being recommended for approval by the city Plan Commission.
The commission on Monday unanimously endorsed those projects, which also need Common Council zoning approval.
Construction on the 19-story hotel addition, with 119 rooms, is to begin later this year, pending council approval.
The Forest County Potawatomi Community, which operates the 381-room hotel and casino, 1721 W. Canal St., said the $80 million second tower is needed to meet continued strong demand.
The hotel has been popular with casino guests since opening in August 2014, expanding the casino’s customer draw from a 25-mile radius to a 100-
to 150-mile radius.
“They just need more rooms,” said architect David Stroik, president of Zimmerman Architectural Studios Inc.
The 180,000-squarefoot addition also would feature a spa and additional meeting and event space. It is expected to open in the spring of 2019.
The tribe expects to create 50 more hotel jobs through the expansion. Potawatomi Hotel & Casino has nearly 2,700 workers.
The Stone Creek Coffee project involves renovating and expanding a long-vacant building at 2650 N. Downer Ave. — providing a big boost for the two-block Downer Ave. business district.
Stone Creek’s plans include a partly covered three-season patio, as well as separate walk-up window for people to buy coffee and other items without coming inside the cafe, said Eric Resch, Stone Creek
“They just need more rooms.”
DAVID STROIK PRESIDENT OF ZIMMERMAN ARCHITECTURAL STUDIOS INC., SPEAKING ABOUT THE HOTEL
founder and director of development.
The main entrance would face E. Park Place, with seating for 100 people divided evenly between inside and the patio.
The cafe would bring life to a corner that’s been vacant since an Associated Bank branch moved out of the building to 2590 N. Downer Ave. in 2009.
In 2015, an investment group with ties to New York-based C-III Capital Partners LLC took control of the Downer Ave. building that will house Stone Creek, and several other buildings on the street, through a foreclosure sale.
Those buildings, anchored by such businesses as Boswell Book Co., Downer Theatre, Pizza Man and Cafe Hollander, have since added three new businesses. That includes two tenants, Robert Laurence Hair Studio and Salon Nova, which opened this month.
The Downer Ave. cafe is to be Stone Creek’s 13th cafe and its first on Milwaukee’s east side.
The five-story, 44unit apartment building would be built south of E. North Ave. and west of N. Cambridge Ave.
It would include a small amount of streetlevel retail space, said Kalan Haywood, president of project developer Vangard Group LLC
The site is now occupied by the former Judge’s Irish Pub, which has been closed for four years, and a duplex. Both buildings would be demolished to make way for the new building.
Vangard could begin construction as soon as this fall, pending city approvals. The apartment building, which would include underground parking, would take about one year to complete.