The sound of heavy construction machinery echoed through downtown Milwaukee Monday morning as crews have started work to build The Edison, the next high rise apartment building soon to rise in the city.
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Daniel Glaessl[/caption]
The 31-story tower, a project being led by Madison-based development firm
Neutral, is expected to be the tallest mass timber high-rise building in the state and deliver 378 apartments to the riverfront site at 1005 N. Edison St.
Daniel Glaessl, chief product officer of Neutral, confirmed in a post on LinkedIn that construction began last week on the
$133 million project, which was first proposed in 2021. The firm announced earlier this year that it
had closed on financing for the project.
Neutral had previously said construction could start in spring 2024 and fall 2025, but work was postponed both times.
Under current construction timelines, the building would open in the spring of 2027.
Working with Fond du Lac-based general contractor
C.D. Smith, Neutral began some site work, including test piles, last year.
Crews are now focusing on repairing the dock wall between the site and the Milwaukee River, which is a project that's expected to take about 10 weeks, according to Glaessl.
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In addition to the apartment units, The Edison will include two public plazas at the north and south ends of the development site, 7,000 square feet of retail space on the first floor, an amenity floor and 288 parking spaces.
Neutral is also planning to lease 100 spaces at a city-owned parking garage at 1024 N. Water St., which is connected to the 1000 N. Water St. office building that is owned separately. That agreement was recently approved by the Common Council.
Founded in 2020, The Edison would be Neutral’s first Milwaukee project. The beginning of construction on that project comes as the firm is nearing completion of its first project, a 206-unit mass timber apartment building in downtown Madison that will open this spring, and has broken ground on a second, a 33-unit apartment building also in downtown Madison that will open this summer.
Last year, Neutral stunned Milwaukee with an ambitious $700 million proposal at the Marcus Performing Arts Center (MPAC) parking garage site, which is across the street from where The Edison would be built. That project could deliver hundreds of hotel rooms, thousands of square feet of retail and office space and hundreds of multifamily housing units in a 55-story tower if completed. Neutral has not yet been awarded its one-year exclusive negotiation period with the city for that project.
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