on February 9, 2016 / by Downtown Dallas Inc. / in Blog Posts, Economic Development and Planning

Full Bisnow article here.

Elm Street—one of the main thoroughfares through Downtown Dallas—was the hot spot for years before falling out of favor and watching buildings empty. Today, Elm is in the midst of a revival. Here’s a look at what’s happening.

The Hilton Garden Inn Downtown Dallas opened in September as the first mixed-use hotel and residential complex in Downtown with 171 guest rooms and 186 residential units. New Orleans-based owner HRI Properties sunk $80M into the 32-story former LTV building, which fronts Elm Street with a 1600 Pacific address.

Woods Capital bought the 1.4M SF, 50-story Thanksgiving Tower at 1601 Elm in 2013 and has since put $100M into the renovation. The improvements include blowing out the ground floor to add about 16k SF of retail. CBRE/UCR Urban EVP Jack Gosnell, who is leading the leasing team for Thanksgiving Tower’s retail, tells us there are several fab restaurants negotiating for space now. He says the lobby and ground-floor renovations will be stunning when they open this year.

Remember humming along with the radio when Deep Blue Something sang Breakfast at Tiffany’s? Well, the defunct band’s drummer, John Kirtland (with Kirtland Realty Group), bought the Tower Petroleum building (1907 Elm) and its neighbor, Corrigan Tower (1900 Pacific), in 2012 with a $45M plan to create residential towers. That was scrapped and the latest plan for 1907 Elm is a $40M, 150-room boutique hotel called Saint Elm. No time frame has been announced.

Developer Scott Remphrey is leading the effort to redevelop these three buildings (totaling 55k SF) at 1512, 1514 and 1516 Elm St in the Mid Elm Lofts. The plan calls for about 25 residential units above Mudsmith (a coffee and wine bar that originated on Greenville Avenue), Southpaw’s Organic Grill (a fast-casual restaurant with existing space in Uptown and Park Cities) and the Londoner Pub (a restaurant and bar with a pub in Addison). Jack tells us the project is on track, but is facing hurdles and approvals of historic redevelopment. All the restaurant tenants have stayed with the project through the obstacles. No time frame has been announced.

In about a year, luxury boutique Forty Five Ten should be opening near the Joule, adjacent to the eye sculpture between Elm and Main streets. The current location at 4510 McKinney Ave will be expanded to four stories in 45k SF with a rooftop space. The T Room is sticking around, too. The boutique’s owner, Brian Bolke, is partnering with Headington Cos on the project, which has encountered some controversy along the way because of lawsuits and building demolitions.

A one-of-a-kind mixed-use Westin opened in the 1M SF One Main Place last month. Developer KFK Group selected the Westin Dallas Downtown to anchor the redevelopment at 1201 Main St between Main and Elm streets. The vertical mixed-use property will feature a dedicated hotel entrance parallel to Elm Street and a second-floor hotel lobby in the former banking hall. In addition to the 326 guest rooms will be 50k SF of retail and 60k SF of Class-A office (which is still leasing up).

1401 Elm is hovering in limbo, but Jack tells us it will be redeveloped. Known as The Olympic, the 1.5M SF property was set for a $170M conversion to transform the historic 52-story skyscraper into a mixed-use complex that takes up an entire city block bounded by Elm, Field, Pacific and Akard streets. The Olympic would’ve featured 500 luxury apartments, 70k SF of retail space, 100k SF of office space and 950 parking spots. But, that plan is on hold as the JV between BDRC and Olympic Property Partners fell apart last fall. Just yesterday, the Dallas Morning News reported that the owners requested Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Jack is still confident that the deal will happen. It’s the only space in the CBD that can accommodate and park larger format retailers and the tower is an ideal floor plate for apartments, he tells us, and he has solid interest from well-known retailers that would come to the project when it happens.

The 18-story blue tower at 211 N Ervay (facing Elm) sat vacant for about two decades before developer Mike Sarimsakci saw opportunity to breathe new life into Downtown. He bought the Corrigan-built tower in 2012 with then-Alterra International Holdings (now called Alto Partners). By 2014, around $14M in upgrades attracted some of the hippest startups and entrepreneurs, including Tech Wildcatters.

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