Yesterday the Raleigh downtowner released some renderings for the new, scaled-down vision for the Davie Street side of The Edison. Previously the plans for Gregg Sandreuter’s development called for four towers of 30-40 stories each, containing office and residential components on a retail base.

It is disappointing to see the project being scaled down, but frankly, with the bath that Sandreuter ended up taking on the oversized West at North Project, it is obvious that banks are putting pressure on Sandreuter to do something with the land. The truth is that the economy is worse than the media is portraying, and a project like the one originally proposed for The Edison is now probably more than 20 years away for Raleigh. In fact it will be at least 12 years before anything changes the Raleigh skyline.

With conditions as they are, we are lucky to see something proposed for this land. As it stands now, the block stands as a blank and a few run-down old buildings in the middle of a downtown that has much organic energy. We are now at the 3-year mark of a development drought in downtown Raleigh, and if we get too arrogant, we will lose all of the roaring momentum that Raleigh had six years ago. In other words we cannot afford to be too choosy now about downtown projects. Given the number of empty lots in downtown, we can afford to put up some bad projects because the momentum is what will eventually bring good projects, not our own stubbornness. Too much of that will make us a has-been. We need energy on the street, and this project does that.

Much hand-wringing has been going on over the last two days regarding the design of the project. I will caution readers, though, that the proposal looks more like a massing portrayal than a specific design, so even with this sized project, it can be something appealing. That said, the images look waaaaay too much like the horribly bland project on Glenwood where Tobacco Road is.

Hopefully the mass of building can be broken up with varied materials, colors, window frames, and window heights. Designers at North Hills East attempted this kind of breakup with windows and color on an EFIS-faced building, but forgot that relief also has to be in the design. Some sections should set back, others protrude. Another facet ignored is massive projects is the window height. North Hills is a godo project, but could have been great if the windows for each section were at differing heights. IT would have added some authenticity badly needed over there.

Nevertheless, I’m glad to see something going forward. I just hope that developers will still have some sense of pride in their developments while they try to please banks. Perhaps the name of the project should be renamed The Gillette, as the focus has clearly gone from being a brilliant idea to being something serviceable that we will one day throw away.