Ann Arbor’s “proximity” to the airport will be less and less important in the future. Airlines lost billions this year and are expected to lose billions next year as well, as fuel production begins its inevitable decline and prices rise. If the boom times of the ’90s didn’t result in a conference center in SE Michigan, the near-depression decade(s) to come certainly won’t be the right economic climate for it, especially with the technological group communication options that have become available in the meantime, not to mention those to come.

Since I didn’t have the wherewithal to submit a proposal, I appreciate the chance to indulge in my fantasy here:

The rush to build on this site might eliminate the opportunity for a more centrally located downtown transit center (possibly incorporating the Greyhound station–I’m not giving up on that yet.) Breaking up this block only to close 4th Avenue for a revamped Blake Transit Center, thereby creating a new massive block wouldn’t be much of an improvement. If the library lot site is big enough to get all the buses off the street and still add some retail space along at least part of 5th Ave., that might be an improvement for the library. A pickup/dropoff lane might not be out of the question either.

Then the old BTC and old Y sites could be redeveloped to fill in that block with some worthwhile mixture of office, housing and retail. (I get the impression from the article that moving the library to that block isn’t a possibility.)

Of course, there’s a future underground parking structure that might create traffic issues in this scenario. Maybe not, though. If it ends up being underutilized, we could try to convince the post office to move the mail trucks into it, then that federal building dead space could be revitalized as well.

Anybody see a way that this would provide some financial benefit to the city?