The next major construction project in Milwaukee will be the Pier Wisconsin complex, which will become another jewel on the city’s lakefront.
Construction of the Pier Wisconsin is scheduled to begin in the spring.
The $30 million project includes a $25 million building and a $5 million operational endowment.
Pier Wisconsin, which will be the home of the Denis Sullivan schooner, has ambitious plans for the 65,000-square-foot building, which will be constructed 150 feet from Milwaukee’s municipal pier, in and over Lake Michigan.
The center, which will be a fresh water resource educational center and exhibit, will feature 25,000 square feet of interactive space, aquariums, a theater, a café and more.
The project is building momentum, as it most recently received a $300,000 grant from the Wisconsin Coastal Management Program to serve as a stormwater runoff demonstration site. Earlier this year, it received a $1 million grant from the Northwestern Mutual Foundation.
Organizers of Pier Wisconsin hope to complete negotiations for a lease from the Milwaukee Board of Harbor Commissioners by the end of the year.
Pier Wisconsin is designed by McClintock Architects, Mequon, and the developer is Grunau Project Development, Milwaukee. A general contractor has not yet been selected for the project.
Frank Steeves, chairman of the litigation section of the von Briesen & Roper law firm, Milwaukee, is the chief executive officer of Pier Wisconsin. Terence McMahon, principal of The Boerke Co., is the vice chairman of the project. Steeves and McMahon recently discussed the progress of Pier Wisconsin with Steve Jagler, executive editor, Small Business Times. The following are transcripts from that interview:
SBT: Let’s start with some basics. Regardless of the best intentions, in projects like this, it comes down to money. Where are you in terms of fundraising?
Steeves: We’re more than halfway to our goal. We’re at about $17 million.
SBT: Do you think the community overall understands the scope or the significance of what this project could be on the lakefront?
Steeves: Every person who has taken even a small amount of time to understand the mission and how we’re going about this mission has been incredibly enthusiastic about the project. The answer is the community is coming to understand.
SBT: What will it take to finish this off, to get to the $30 million? Are you focusing your fundraising efforts locally? Is the well dry locally with the Milwaukee Art Museum project?
McMahon: Actually, I think we’re just starting to see the momentum build locally. Things softened here with the economy and the Art Museum, but I think we’re starting to see results from our efforts on a local scale and national scale. We’re starting to see some of our (grant) applications get serious consideration at the national level.
What we’re trying to do with this fresh water awareness. … It’s more than just a maritime museum. It’s becoming a subject of international discussion.
SBT: It is. There are futurists who predict that in this century, the critical global infrastructure issue is going to change from fuel to fresh water.
McMahon: Absolutely.
Steeves: There is no natural resource in the world that is as important or as threatened as the fresh water resource. And as important from our standpoint, because we both love living in the city of Milwaukee, this location on Lake Michigan affords this community an opportunity to move way out in front of something, rather than follow the lead of other cities.
Because of the commitment of people and businesses here, we can move Milwaukee to the front, to the head of the curve, as the rest of the country understands the importance of the resource. Milwaukee will already be in a leadership role. It will be a huge boost to our community, both to our image and our self-image.
SBT: Is there anything like this elsewhere in the country?
McMahon: Not in this country. Next year, the United Nations will announce that they’re on the same bandwagon, that fresh water is a huge issue worldwide. If we can pull this thing off, we can become the universal focus of this subject matter, right here in Milwaukee.
SBT: So, this will become a think-tank?
Steeves: We want to be the advocate of fresh water resources, right here on the Great Lakes, which is 20% of all the (unglaciated) fresh water in the world.
SBT: Walk us through Pier Wisconsin. What will be in this center?
Steeves: We have 22 educational programs around water that we run almost year-round, from kindergarten through college, on the Denis Sullivan. The challenge to our designers was, "How do you combine all of these topics into a cohesive exhibit area, where they can all be taught without being disjointed?"
The way it was resolved, is that if you take a look at the building itself, you’ll see that it runs vertically up on several different levels. So, the building itself represents the water column.
When you first walk into the building, you essentially walk in under water, with all of the underwater features: the marine life, the fauna. It will be 43,000 gallons of water tanks, showing all the different types of water. As you move vertically in the building, until you move up to the surface of the water, where you get into the navigation, weather, the stars, man’s use of the water.
By using the reality of the water column and mirroring that in the building, you combine all the different subjects.
McMahon: The simplistic view of getting to the design is in what we were going to teach. We didn’t want to be a museum. We didn’t want to be a lecture (hall). What we wanted to do is take a look at fresh water, at how man has used it and abused it, where we are today. When you come out of this exhibit, if we do this right, you’re not forced, but hopefully you make a decision for yourself, as to the way you treat the resource or the way that you view this resource.
If we can do that without being preachy, we’ve succeeded, because we’ve essentially altered the way people look at the world without threatening them. We would create entertainment and education at the same time.
SBT: How have you been able to get the business community involved with Pier Wisconsin?
McMahon: The business leaders woke up to the fact that if we don’t do this, somebody else is going to, somewhere else, in some other city.
SBT: What kind of relationship do you have with the leadership of the Milwaukee Art Museum next door?
Steeves: I think we’ve had an excellent relationship. We’re still feeling our way along with them. The connections with them are unavoidable and can be totally positive. We want to work with the Art Museum as best we can.
SBT: You know the criticism, that your building would detract from the uniqueness of the Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum. What’s the status of the design?
Steeves: The Art Museum received our designs earlier this year and then wrote a letter of support in February or March. Then, later, it wasn’t the Art Museum, it was some other people who expressed some concern in the vein of what you said. What we were a little disappointed with was the reporting of the project that made the architecture the news.
McMahon: There are people who think that because Milwaukee pulled off this Calatrava addition as a world attention-getter, that you can’t have another attention-getter.
Steeves: We’re working with the site. Our plan is to have the maximum amount of green spaces. We are a demonstration site for stormwater runoff.
SBT: So, the criticisms aside, your plans are to go ahead with the building, as designed?
Steeves: Yes it is. The building was designed around its program. We’ve had many, many architects who have come down and given unsolicited support, that we should not get sidetracked.
SBT: So the Milwaukee Art Museum and the Pier Wisconsin building, as designed, can coexist in a cohesive lakefront?
Steeves: It’s even better than that. The sum of both will help either one. The synergies will be there. There will be a physical link (between the two) and an economic link.
Oct. 25, 2002 Small Business Times, Milwaukee
