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Permalink Reply by EJW on February 19, 2008 at 1:08pm

They're going to be residential units - lofts mostly.

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Permalink Reply by John on February 19, 2008 at 1:14pm

Does anyone know what the project is called? What was that building used for before? Who's funding it (city or private developer)?

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Permalink Reply by Maggie on February 19, 2008 at 3:38pm

I did a project on the Bell Tower development for a graduate Housing class in the planning school a few years ago... it used to be a wholesale Native American jewelry manufacturer and is being renovating for housing. There's a lot of contamination issues at the site due to the jewelry production uses, so it's taking a while. The actual Bell Tower building will be loft and live/work-style spaces, but another piece of the development is the vacant lot behind it, which is being used for single-family housing. There's a fairly decent affordability component to the project as well- I seem to remember 30-40%. The funding framework that I saw was the city in partnership with a non-profit affordable housing developer. I have all the files on a different computer, and as I said this info is all three or so years old, so if anyone has anything newer please update. Looked like a good project from what I saw three years ago.

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Permalink Reply by brendisimo on February 19, 2008 at 7:36pm

I just noticed this rehabilitation project a few days ago. FINALLY! I was wondering about that spot for awhile. Another boarded up/empty lot space in a really desirable location. I'm glad something is happening and if there are any updates out there, let us know! And I'm happy that it might be affordable housing...

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Permalink Reply by killbox on February 19, 2008 at 10:35pm

well this spring i did a little Urban-Exploring there, and then did a little research on it. Its called "The Bell Trading Post" it was in operation from the 1947's up until the 1992 and it has been abandoned since then. they made and sold southwest jewelery there.

I made a little blog post about it, and myself and others have flickr'd photos.

http://killbox.livejournal.com/446857.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/killbox/tags/belltradingpost/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/barjack/archives/date-taken/2007/05/20/

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Permalink Reply by brendisimo on February 20, 2008 at 9:40am

nice photos!

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Permalink Reply by orange you glad on February 21, 2008 at 8:21pm

Thanks, everyone for the info.

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Permalink Reply by Phil_0 on February 22, 2008 at 9:20am

Work here has actually been underway for quite a while; the new houses on the lot behind the Bell Tower are finished and appear to be occupied. (They're pretty nice, too!). I'm glad to hear why the construction on the Tower building has been so slow...I guess smelting silver, gold and copper produces a lot of nasty chemicals.

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