Oh Edgewater, why must you tempt us? Time and time again the Common Council schedules a vote to possibly overturn a Landmarks Committee ruling against the Edgewater, and time and time again the vote gets delayed. This week it appears to have happened yet again, as the items dedicated to the Wisconsin Avenue hotel redevelopment were referred. Apparently our city alders missed the memo, Groundhog Day was three weeks ago.
But it hasn't been hard to guess why the vote has been delayed more often than ""Duke Nukem Forever."" In the past few weeks, Hammes Co., the developers behind the project, have made some serious revisions to their previous design, which already encompassed some serious updates from the project's original design. The first design called for the new Edgewater to include an 11-story tower, which has now been lowered to eight stories. Also, the tower is now going to be built 15 feet farther away from Wisconsin Avenue than in previous designs. They have planned for additional underground parking at the site. There is a considerably different decision to face now than previously, and the earliest possible final approval date, once several other bureaucratic hoops have been jumped through, is looking to be some time in April. Clearly Hammes Co. is practically bending over backward to appease the city and get this project through.
Well, maybe not clearly.
In all likelihood, Hammes Co. is simply using one of the oldest tricks in the negotiation book: Aim for better than what you hope to get. It's entirely possible that lead developer Bob Dunn and the rest of his corporate development pals at Hammes knew full well they were never going to get that 11-story tower, or at least not without a serious fight. Eight stories and a few yards further removed from the street was probably perfectly satisfactory for the company. Now they look like they are doing their best to work with the community and do what's best for Madison, business be damned.
Granted, many of the opponents of the Edgewater project still aren't pleased. Many Mansion Hill residents, including prominent local attorney Fred Mohs, still think the tower is too high and the building does not fit in with the historic district in which it will reside.
This is still an argument we fail to understand. Go to the Edgewater as it currently stands and judge if the atrocious architecture of the building's 1973 addition fits in with the area. Ask whether the blocky modern buildings residing next door to the Edgewater fit in with the area. The new Edgewater addition, as seen in spec drawings, is a truly well-designed building. If this vast aesthetic improvement does not fit in with the surrounding area and shouldn't go forward in order to preserve the neighborhood, we question exactly what the worth of having a historic district is.
The whole process the Edgewater has gone through has not exactly been transparent and it has not exactly been pretty. But the final product will add something worthwhile and beneficial to the Madison isthmus. So Common Council, let's get the ball rolling, and get this project going. As current students at UW-Madison, we may never see this building's completion, but we want to make sure future generations of Madisonians do.
