Progress Continues on the $40+ Million “The Beacon” Project in Grand Forks

GRAND FORKS, ND (trfnews.i234.me) We have an update regarding construction of “The Beacon” in Downtown Grand Forks.
uh Neil Berg here on the phone with me is lance johns to the rapid companies out of uh west fargo the developers of the beacon in downtown grand forks the former site of the townhouse uh motel so uh lance said bring us up to speed for folks don’t know what the beacon is all about what is this well the beacon is going to be a three building development we have three seven story buildings that are planned to go up on site the first one is under construction right now building two will start later this spring or early summer and building three will probably come on construction will probably start above it a year after that the developmental also have a city-owned plaza in the center very similar to the lights development in west fargo and that plaza will host you know mostly community events some concerts a skating rink in the winter and a lot of family and community type programming okay so this building is a mix of what apartments and retail and a little bit of everything or yeah well building one and two are a little bit different building one the first two stories are commercial so uh retail restaurant bar that type of thing uh office space the second three floors are as far as three four and five are single story apartments and the top two floors are two-story apartments which uh we’ve had some success in other areas and we think it’ll be something new in apartment layouts for grand forks we’re excited to bring that in the second building will have the two stories of commercial three stories of apartments and the top two stories of the second building will be condos so we’re going to have i believe 18 condos in building number two and and looking at those uh seven eight or excuse me sixth and seventh floor uh views which would be pretty neat for uh for the grand forks region okay so what we’ve got a couple years before this is done well you know i think uh probably in february or march of uh 2023 the first building will come online we’re looking to start some activities in the in the plaza area possibly in the winter but maybe even in the spring of 23 and sometime in the summer of 23 that second building will come online and the plaza should near completion and uh we’ll hopefully be starting on building number three and 23 as well and uh you guys i i take it what was the price tag in this somewhere around 30 million is that right you know it’ll it’ll be north of 30 million uh when all is said and done it’ll probably be you know that 40 to 50 million dollar range for the overall development okay and so what’s the philosophy behind this kind of you’re trying to mix the community into retail space and living space or yeah you know it’s kind of that whole uh you know live work play concept um in west fargo we have the lights and that’s been just a great uh gathering space for the community and we’ve got some great businesses over there so um it’s really uh you know capitalizing on the great downtown grand forks already has and and the fact that we’re a little bit to the west to i think we helped expand that downtown footprint a little more which will uh be good for the community as well all right sounds good it’ll be interesting to see all this when it’s completed yeah it’s it’s great to see it’s going up okay all right thanks for talking to me okay thank you i’m Neil Berg reporting for trfnews.i234.me