Buffalo Rising Online

Feb 9th 2007, 7:33am By Chris Malachowski

By now most of you who read this are aware that our oft-maligned city has been undergoing a dramatic rebirth in the last few years. As a Commercial Real Estate Agent it has been exciting to watch and participate in the revitalization process and I thought it would be interesting to give you a report from the trenches, literally.

First though, for those who need a quick refresher course, Buffalo has been a city mired in a spiral decline dating back to the end of the great steel mill era. A steady loss of population and decades of bad press badly bruised the psyche of all those who dwell here and hope was in short supply. Nothing typified the region's ills more than the downtown area itself: sparsely populated and generally deserted after the 9 to 5-ers hit the road to the 'burbs, downtown stood as the symbol of the desperate region.

Fast forward to the present, where the tangible evidence of progress is unmistakable. There has been a veritable explosion in the apartment market with many still in the works. Public outcry for condominiums has developers scrambling for sites to fulfill the demand. Several major projects are also underway such as the rehab of the regal Statler Towers and the former AM&A's Building, fueling a steady rise from the ashes.

The most notable result of all this activity has been the increased amount of people calling downtown their home. People make up the fabric of any city and finally Downtown Buffalo has enough of a healthy population to take revitalization to the next step, the development of service and retail infrastructure in order to sustain these new settlers. For now downtown is lacking in many of the perceived essentials, including a large supermarket type food store, retail shops with clothing, a home improvement store as well as simple daily-life services such as dry cleaning or auto repair. With the many new apartment buildings in the works these missing elements will seem more dramatic in the near future. The question is will there be new entrepreneurs to come fill these gaps and if so where will these new business' go?

The most obvious answer for new retail development is Main Street. Not only does it shoulder the majority of the foot traffic, but it also either holds or skirts the bulk of the new apartment projects, old and new. There are many spaces available here for sale or lease, however most that remains are in varying states of blight. The good news, though, is that there are many available programs to help with funding for these projects including Empire Zone benefits, low cost loans (through the Community Preservation Corporation) and various other avenues too many to mention here. These can help ease the developer's burden when it comes time to "crunch the numbers" and decide if a project is feasible.

Of course not all attention needs to be focused on Main Street, as Buffalo prides itself on the wonderful architecture found in it's many busy secondary arteries such as Pearl, Franklin, and Washington Streets (to name just a few) which I feel would also be great places to also land new retail shops (By the way, developers' are also looking into these areas for the next wave of apartment conversions). These smaller streets may also provide the opportunity for specialized areas such as a market or clothing district. The wildly successful Chippewa Entertainment District, for example, illustrates the power businesses can achieve if they band together in a specific geographic area providing similar services.

In summation, it is truly exciting to see Buffalo take its first baby steps towards recovery but there is still a long way to go. While talks of a casino and the beginnings of waterfront plans slowly progress, I feel it is important to service the one area of tangible success the city can boast about, its new residents. Keeping them happy, safe and comfortable will bode well for the long-term success of the Buffalo downtown area.

Chris Malachowski Hunt Commercial Real Estate Corp. 716.880.1914

The above originally published in a recent edition of New York Real Estate Journal. Reprinted here by permission. Founded in 1987, the Journal reaches over 30,000 subscribers weekly. Photo credit: CitySky Photography by Nate Farnsworth.