At last, downtown Dallas tower to get $450 million redo

After a decade of starts and stops, the 1.5 million-sf First National Bank Tower—which occupies the largest vacant block in the core of downtown Dallas—is to be redeveloped. Todd Interests is the new developer. Andres Construction Services is the GC. Merriman Anderson Architects is the design firm.

Work on the 52-story tower at 1401 Elm Street quietly began ramping back up in recent days, while the deal with Todd Interests was still being ironed out. That’s because the project must hit a completion target of year-end 2020 to qualify for millions in entitlements.

According to a May 8, 2019, report by Jeremiah Jensen in Commercial Real Estate, the redevelopment will focus on four uses: apartments, hotel, restaurants, and retail. A 200-room hotel, which will serve as a Texas flagship for Thompson Hotels, is scheduled to open in September 2020. The residential component will feature 318 luxury apartments, including some on the 48th floor—the highest in downtown Dallas.

The landmark tower has been vacant for a decade, according to a report by Steve Brown, RE Editor of the Dallas News. Todd Interests is the fifth owner to tackle redevelopment of the 1960s office tower, which is the largest empty building downtown.

One of the hardest decisions multifamily developers and their design teams have to make is what mix of amenities they’re going to put into each project. A lot of squiggly factors go into that decision: the type of community, the geographic market, local recreation preferences, climate/weather conditions, physical parameters, and of course the budget. The permutations are mind-boggling.

A post-pandemic ‘new normal’ for apartments, Grimm + Parker, Building Design+Construction 2021 Exercise area

Multifamily Housing | Jun 30, 2021

A post-pandemic ‘new normal’ for apartment buildings

Grimm + Parker’s vision foresees buildings with rentable offices and refrigerated package storage.

Resiliency | Jun 24, 2021

Oceanographer John Englander talks resiliency and buildings [new on HorizonTV]

New on HorizonTV, oceanographer John Englander discusses his latest book, which warns that, regardless of resilience efforts, sea levels will rise by meters in the coming decades. Adaptation, he says, is the key to future building design and construction.