Commercial Construction & Renovation

If Kansas City wants to keep up with the economic momentum in Nashville, Austin, Denver and other major Midwestern cities, it has to step up its hotel game. Read The Kansas City Star story here

Brookwood Village shopping center is "evaluating a considerable redevelopment" which could include additional office space and a hotel, the shopping center said in a statement. Read the AL story here

A developer is paying $10,000 a month for exclusive rights to build a hotel and conference center on about 25 acres of town-owned land on the former Letchworth Village campus. Read The Journal News story here

Atlanta Public Schools has selected JE Dunn Construction for a $27.6 million project to build a new school to house the Tuskegee Airmen Global Academy. The new elementary school building will replace a 43-year-old facility, which will be preserved for another use, and will give the school greater street visibility. Features of the 107,747-square-foot, three-story replacement building, which will accommodate a full-time enrollment of 753, include a main entry/lobby space with a gallery, media center, cafeteria, gymnasium with stage, specialty classrooms, STEM and flight simulator labs, and outdoor lab/classroom space.  (more…)

A $1.5 billion mixed-use development that would include 200,000 square feet of experiential retail is being planned for the area surrounding the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, N.Y. The project, from RXR Realty and BSE Global, will also include 500 residences, office space, biotech research space and parking; the goal is to create a live-work-play environment. Read the Construction Dive story here

Birmingham, Ala.-based Brasfield & Gorrie has begun construction on a $100 million expansion to the Georgia Aquarium and expects to finish work in late 2020. It will include a four-story building with a huge shark exhibit, additional office space and retail. Read The Atlanta Journal-Constitution story here

A 50-acre Under Armour office complex is the centerpiece of Baltimore's $5.5 billion mixed-use Port Covington project that will also feature residential units and a market. Construction is not expected to start until late 2019 or early 2020, once its surrounding infrastructure is in place, and the market will likely be the first building developed among the planned 3 million square feet. Read The Baltimore Sun story here

After its initial plans for seven stories of apartments atop Chicago's Union Station drew public concern, Riverside Investment & Development, Convexity Properties and architecture firm SCB unveiled a revised plan for the $1 billion redevelopment. They have forsaken the apartments for a separate, 50-story office tower adjacent to the city's old post office. Read the Curbed/Chicago story here

Austin ranks first among Texas' four major metro areas in the key hotel metrics of average daily room and occupancy rates, according to an analysis by Source Strategies Inc. Dallas, with a market more than double the size of Austin's, has managed to sustain its rate levels despite brisk expansion. Read The Dallas Morning News story here

Plans have expanded for a hotel tower that would sprout on a choice site in downtown San Jose, a short distance from a planned Adobe Systems campus expansion and proposed Google transit village. Read the San Jose Mercury News story here