Bedrock says its $1.6 billion RenCen plan is the only realistic route at second community meeting

Bedrock, Dan Gilbert's real estate firm, argued at a second community meeting on September 1 that its $1.6 billion plan to remake the Renaissance Center is the only realistic path to reviving the riverfront towers.

The firm ran through the alternatives it had rejected: an estimated $800 million conversion of the two riverfront towers to housing, refilling all the office towers with tenants, or waiting for a future developer. The session at the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center, as first reported by BridgeDetroit, was the second stop in the city's Community Benefits Ordinance process for the project, which Bedrock is developing with General Motors.

Under the plan, three of the five 1970s towers would remain and be reworked into a blend of hotel, residential, and office uses, with the other two coming down.

According to the City of Detroit's Planning and Development Department, the broader project covers more than 40 acres of the east riverfront and would add 934 mixed-income residential units, an 858-room hotel, 675,000 square feet of modernized office space, and 17 acres of new civic space including parks, plazas, and a marina.

Jake Chidester, a Bedrock vice president, said the market cannot absorb the towers as they stand. "There is just no projected demand for 2.7 million square feet of office space, today or forever," he told BridgeDetroit. He pushed back on waiting for another developer, telling BridgeDetroit that "Michigan Central sat vacant for 35 years" before becoming what he called "a fantastic success story."

Steve Ogden, a Bedrock vice president, told BridgeDetroit, "We heard you after the last meeting." The current plan calls for roughly 380 apartments in Tower 100, and Chidester told BridgeDetroit it would take "about three years to lease up 400 units per tower."

For a downtown landmark that has stood largely empty, the argument is really about what happens to a signature stretch of the river. Bedrock's pitch is that a smaller, mixed-use complex gets built, while the alternatives leave the towers dark.

At the next session on September 15, Bedrock and GM are expected to reveal the tax incentives they are seeking.

Residents at the September 1 meeting also elected two members to the project's Neighborhood Advisory Committee, Teron Haynes Jr. and Gail Perry-Mason, with the rest of the nine-member committee still to be seated.

If the plan clears its approvals, construction is targeted to begin in 2027. Detroiters who live in the impact area, which covers parts of Downtown, Greektown, Rivertown, and Lafayette Park, can follow the meeting schedule and apply to serve through the Planning and Development Department's project page.