Ithaca Builds

Mapping, photos and information for Ithaca construction and development projects

Amabel Project’s City of Ithaca Parcel Divestment

December 2, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Members at Wednesday’s Common Council Meeting will be discussing and voting on the divestment by sealed bid of a 3-acre subparcel of 617 Five Mile Drive, the 25-acre City-owned parcel that makes up a portion of the proposed “Amabel” project by Sue Cosentini and Rob Morache of New Earth Living. 22 acres sit on the east side of the railroad tracks, with 3 acres on the west (see map and resolution below).

The plan is to build five small pocket neighborhoods (in a similar vein to their recent Aurora Street Pocket Neighborhood project), consisting of 6-7 small homes per each pocket. The homes will share a common house, food gardens, bike and canoe sheds, and incorporate superior insulation, solar power, rainwater harvesting, and other green features.

Common Council Agenda Item for Wednesday, December 4th:

Seneca Way Updated Photos

November 29, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Still awaiting that section of facade to be finished, and also the column wraps to go around the exposed support columns on the ground and second levels, railings on the steps and along the walkway on the east side, and parking signage. I’m not sure of the status on the interior, but with apartments rented for January, it must be quite far along. Hopefully once Spring arrives, the landscaping along Seneca will come alive, but the building itself creates a nice new visual anchor on the way down State Street.

Breckenridge Place Updated Photos

November 27, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Service’s Breckenridge Place project is still going, with a goal of completion for early 2014. The Seneca Street-side glass bay pop-out has been completed, and there have been two lifts going at once on that side to work on the roof. I imagine by now it’s crunch-time to finish the roof, since too much snow would make the work quite a lot more time consuming. In the photo below there’s some fascia installation on the Seneca side. At night some of the interiors are lit up and I’ve seen some units that look complete on the first and second stories- windows are framed in on every story except the top story along the back portion used for loading materials from a lift to each floor.

Thurston Ave Apartments Begins

November 25, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

The Thurston Avenue Apartments project has a construction fence up, and has cleared all the site trees and brush in prep for site excavation.

The plan is to build four 3-story multi-unit buildings for a total of 2 one bedrooms, 15 three bedrooms, and 3 four bedrooms (44 beds total). Here’s a link to the previous post containing the full site plan review materials, and the project itself was given final City of Ithaca site plan approval back in June. The buildings have been designed to match the character of their surroundings, and I think HOLT Architects did quite a nice job on this one.

I’m not entirely sure, but since there’s a crane on site already and the floor plan layouts have some uniformly-spaced wall breaks, there may be some modular components to this project. Should be nice to watch either way- if it is modular, then once the foundations are in, we should expect to see these go up quite rapidly, much like houses at Belle Sherman Cottages.

Collegetown Terrace Construction Photo Update

November 24, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Got a chance to swing by each site today, so I’ll be releasing a bunch of photos this week. Even in the cold, everything seems to be moving along nicely.

The Collegetown Terrace project has kept pace with construction on Building 5 & 6. This phase has seen the project transfer from Hayner Hoyt to Welliver for general construction and management. Welliver is also working on Gates Hall for Cornell, and the Law School expansion/renovation project, which I haven’t covered much here, but there’s a brief write-up from Cornell here and some photos from Ithacating’s blog.

Facade-work has progressed on the southern face of Building 5, and has just begun on Building 6, where the wrap material (I think it’s one of the polypropylene woven types) is covering over the sheathing before panels are placed on top. There’s also new sheathing on the third level of the far east section of Building 5, where the concrete floor was poured not long ago. Building 6 has begun its final level of exterior wall framing, as the sixth level is being built-up on the southern face.

Building 5 also has a new section on the top floor of the northern side that has been covered in glass panels, so it must be a future common area, and I think the opening is for the landing of one of the bridges that will span across the gap. Mitchell Plaza now has painted illustrations in the window boxes- some plants and birds, looks nice.

Looking north from hillside:

Westward to Building 5:

Building 5 northern face:

Building 6 western and northern faces:

Building 6 southern face:

Building 5 northern face:

Breckenridge Place Paving, Landscaping, Windows & Pillars

November 12, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

INHS’s Breckenridge Place site has new paving, striping, landscaping, pillars at the entry, and the windows for the central popped-out bay along Seneca Street are going in. The two locust trees between Breckenridge and the property next door have been removed, giving a better view of the eastern facade. The 50 new units are still slated to open-up for early 2014.

Seneca Way Landscaping & Photo Update

November 10, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

The Newman Development/ Warren Real Estate project at 140 Seneca Way is set to open less than two months from now. There’s been considerable landscaping progress since I last swung around- new concrete poured for the western lot and ground-level parking beneath the building, as well as soil and plantings. Besides the fill-in of the missing section of facade, I doubt we’ll see much more change on the outside beyond this point. It’s been nice watching this one go up- definitely a swift pace. Browse the first project page here for photos going all the way back to the demolition of the former Challenge Industries building.
Not long from now, Ithaca will be welcoming 32 new one-bedroom apartments, six two-bedroom apartments, and 8,600 square feet of office space for Warren Real Estate and the Park Foundation.

Collegetown Terrace Updated Photos

November 3, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Here are some photos of the Collegetown Terrace project taken this past week. Building 5’s southern face has been filling-in with sheathing and facade panels, as is the north side, which is fully-sheathed and a bit further along. I’m not sure what to make of the lone cinder block wall at the eastern edge, but I assume it’s for an elevator/stair tower. The remaining stories above the parking section here may be on hold until the tower is complete.
Building 6’s framing has whizzed right along, and the steel framing on the western end is building up. It’s amazing to see how fast this building has been done- it was only about a month ago that the structural concrete for the first three floor levels had just been set.

Building 5:

Building 6:

Belle Sherman Cottages Lot 19 Foundation Set & Modular Pieces on Site

October 31, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Agora Development’s Belle Sherman Cottages Lot #19 (sold back in June) has a fully dug and set foundation, and the four modular pieces from Simplex Homes in Scranton, PA are on site. The first two pieces are carefully hoisted onto the foundation by crane, levelled and secured, then the next two are hoisted and set in place. The adjoining walls and ceilings are secured with steel plates and create a double-sized cavity space (which is actually quite advantageous for sound suppression), and I was very surprised at how non-modular the interiors were from a tour back in the Summer- the build quality is also superb. Carina Construction will probably be putting this up in short time.

Seneca Way Updated Photos

October 27, 2013 // by Jason Henderson

Here are some updated photos of the Seneca Way project from last week. The render below doesn’t show the window shades, and they haven’t been installed yet, so I imagine that they’ve been dropped. The steel support columns on the exterior will be wrapped to form a cylindrical shape, and the western lot will be due for walls shortly.
The website contains some nice interior renderings of what the apartments will look like (one shot attached below). The sidewalks have been in place for a while now, so they may open-up once all the work along the exterior has been completed.

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