Stalled $1.5 billion Miami mixed-use redevelopment project advances

A long-delayed $1.5 billion mixed-use development in Miami moved ahead after city planners approved the project’s first phase. Phase one of Miami Worldcenter will feature three mostly residential towers of varying heights, a shopping complex, and three public plazas on 27 acres.

Phase two, which includes building a convention center and hotel, has yet to be approved after the city planning board did not agree to rewrite zoning rules for the project. The project has endured eight years of planning and delays.

Three mostly residential towers will crown the retail center and share a nine-acre amenity deck 13 stories high. The towers, at 56 stories, 47 stories and 34 stories, will have 1,200 units. Planned shops, including Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s, and restaurants would cover 765,000 sf of space.

Retail developers The Forbes Company and Taubman will jointly develop the shopping center. Architects Elkus/Manfredi of Boston is designing the master plan along with the retail center and the tallest tower. ADD and Nichols Brosch Wurst Wolfe of Miami will design the other towers.

(http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/06/30/4211508/plans-submitted-for-miami-world.html)

New York City has two very large buildings dedicated to answering the 911 calls of its five boroughs. With more than 11 million emergency calls annually, it makes perfect sense. The second of these buildings, the Public Safety Answering Center II (PSAC II) is located on a nine-acre parcel of land in the Bronx. It’s an imposing 450,000 square-foot structure—a 240-foot-wide by 240-foot-tall cube. The gleaming aluminum cube risesthe equivalent of 24 stories from behind a grassy berm, projecting the unlikely impression that it might actually be floating. Like most visually striking structures, the building has drawn as much scorn as it has admiration.