The Wisconsin Center District began construction on a $456 million expansion of downtown Milwaukee’s convention center two years ago, and its completion this year will be one of the most notable additions to the region in 2024. Once the project is complete, the Baird Center will have a total of 1.3 million gross square feet
The Wisconsin Center District began construction on a $456 million expansion of downtown Milwaukee’s convention center two years ago, and its completion this year will be one of the most notable additions to the region in 2024.
Once the project is complete, the Baird Center will have a total of 1.3 million gross square feet of space including a 300,000-square-foot of exhibit hall, 52 meeting rooms, 400 indoor parking spaces, and a rooftop ballroom with outdoor terraces.
Perhaps most notably, the expanded venue will be done in time for the 2024 Republican National Convention this summer, when the city can show it off to the estimated 50,000 convention visitors. Wisconsin Center District and VISIT Milwaukee officials hope to leverage the RNC to help attract more conventions to the expanded facility.
The Baird Center is expected to open this spring with a gala on May 16.
While the Baird Center expansion project wraps up this year, construction on four other large-scale entertainment venue and cultural center developments is expected to kick off in Milwaukee.
The largest is the soccer stadium planned for the Iron District, a $220 million development led by Kenosha-based Bear Development and Grafton-based Kacmarcik Enterprises. The planned professional soccer stadium would anchor an 11-acre mixed-use development, located northeast of the Marquette Interchange in downtown Milwaukee.
Yet to close on financing, construction of the 8,000-seat soccer stadium and approximately 200-room hotel could begin this spring, developers said, eyeing a 2026 completion.
Another project to look out for in 2024 is the long-awaited live music venue planned in the Deer District. Originally billed as a complex housing two music venues, Madison-based concert promoter FPC Live has scaled back its plans to a single 4,500-capacity venue, to be built on the northeast section of the former Bradley Center site, just south of Fiserv Forum. With its second round of city approvals complete, the venue is expected to break ground this year.
Contingent on meeting its fundraising goals, dirt could also start moving for the new Milwaukee Public Museum this spring. The $240 million project will bring a 200,000-square-foot, six-story museum to the corner of North 6th Street and West McKinely Avenue in the Haymarket neighborhood.
In addition, the Milwaukee Rep will rebuild its downtown Milwaukee theater complex. The $75 million project is more than 90% funded and construction is expected to start in May.
[caption id="attachment_583831" align="alignnone" width="1280"] The Iron District, a mixed-use entertainment district in downtown Milwaukee’s Westown neighborhood, could break ground this spring. [/caption]
Changes in office
Amid a softer office market, largely driven by the work-from-home trend, office conversions are a story to watch in 2024.
One of downtown Milwaukee’s largest office towers, 100 East, is slated to undergo such a conversion. Plans were made public in 2023 of developers’ intentions to convert the 35-story building into 350 luxury apartments. Remaining office tenants in the building are seeking new homes.
While developers have said that work on 100 East is unlikely to begin this year, the building is just one of many office properties that could see major changes this year.
Development firm F Street has plans to replace two empty office buildings in Brown Deer with 148 market-rate apartments. The Milwaukee-based firm is expecting to begin demolition this year.
In Brookfield, a California developer is planning to start construction this year on its project to replace two mostly empty office buildings in the Bishop’s Woods Office Park with 203 workforce housing units.
Also, Kenosha-based Bear Real Estate Group could lock in its redevelopment concepts for Johnson Controls’ block in downtown Milwaukee as the building equipment manufacturer consolidates its area workforce at its Glendale campus, leaving behind a 430,000-square-foot multi-building campus downtown.
But despite cultural shifts around office work – leading some companies to downsize or eliminate their office space – there are still notable strong spots in the Milwaukee metro office market.
Financial technology firm Fiserv is moving from Brookfield to downtown Milwaukee. The Fortune 500 company will occupy 160,000 square feet of space in the HUB640 building, where build-out work has been ongoing in recent months. The office, which will be home to 780 workers eventually, is above a new Kohl’s store that opened in November, replacing a Boston Store that closed in 2018.
Last year, Fortune 100 financial services company Northwestern Mutual announced and began construction on a $500 million project to transform its North Office Building downtown to match the company’s Tower and Commons building, just south of the north building. The transformation has been called “skyline defining” and will result in the move of 2,000 employees from Northwestern Mutual’s suburban Franklin office.
While not expected to be completed until 2027, parts of the new building could start to take shape this year.
[caption id="attachment_583830" align="alignnone" width="1280"] The Concordia 27 project, expected to be completed this year, will bring affordable housing, support services, retail and office space to Milwaukee’s Near West Side. [/caption]
Affordable housing
Even as underutilized office properties are being converted to residential, adding to Milwaukee’s housing stock, it’s estimated that Milwaukee County alone needs upwards of 46,000 below market-rate housing units. Experts say it will take decades to reach that number at the current rate of development, but some of Milwaukee’s emerging developers are hoping to put a dent in it.
Milwaukee-based KG Development Group will have its hands full with three affordable housing projects under construction this year: a 91-unit mixed-use apartment building in Milwaukee’s Riverwest neighborhood that’s expected to be completed in 2024; a 55-unit apartment building in the city’s Five Points area that is expected to break ground early this year; and a 67-unit mixed-use apartment building in the Harambee neighborhood that’s also expected to break ground this year if the development team wins low-income housing tax credits from the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority.
Rule Enterprises is looking to break ground this year on a 140-unit apartment building at Freshwater Plaza in Milwaukee’s Harbor View neighborhood and Cupid Development is looking to begin work on a 50-unit project in the North Division neighborhood.
The Near West Side will get a boost this year with the addition of Concordia 27, which will have 33 affordable apartments, along with commercial and office space, and support services in a historic building.
Milwaukee can also expect to see significant progress on the state’s largest private affordable housing development in history as Bear Development continues work on its 576-unit affordable housing project, Filer & Stowell Lofts, in Bay View. The first units are expected to be completed in 2025.
There are also local developers hoping to start work on affordable housing projects in the suburbs of Milwaukee County, such as AK Development with a 60-unit affordable housing project in South Milwaukee and Jewish Family Services with a 56-unit project in Brown Deer.
