Officials say about $640 million worth of projects that are in the pipeline could be completed in the next two years, and most of that investment is outside the downtown geography.
Dayton staff say the city has been seeing $12 worth of private investment for every $1 the city has spent on economic development projects.
“City dollars are used to leverage private and other public funding,” said Veronica Morris, Dayton’s economic development supervisor.
Downtown Dayton
The city says about $172 million was invested in downtown in the last year. This includes Windsor Companies’ $50 million investment in the Grant-Deneau Tower at 40 W. Fourth St., which has been renamed the Deneau.
The Deneau is a 22-story office tower that has been converted into 147 new luxury apartments and co-working office spaces. Tenants started moving into the building on April 1.
Last year, Crawford Hoying and Woodard Development, the developers of the bustling Water Street District, opened the Delco, which is the massive, former Mendelsons Liquidation Outlet.
The seven-floor building has been turned into 160 apartments, a parking garage, offices and other commercial and amenity spaces. The project cost was around $100 million.
Also, a new boutique hotel called Hotel Ardent recently opened at 137 N. Main St., across from the Victoria Theatre. With this addition, downtown now has three hotels in operation, with several more on the way.
According to the city, $219 million worth of projects are under construction or making progress in downtown.
Credit: Tom Gilliam
Credit: Tom Gilliam
This includes the $45 million renovation of the Dayton Convention Center and the $41 million rehab and expansion of the northern part of the Dayton Arcade.
The northern section of the Arcade is being turned into a hotel, called the Hilton Garden Inn Dayton Downtown, and a retail marketplace. The convention center is getting its first large-scale makeover since the late 1980s.
Kentucky developer Weyland Ventures is working to transform an empty church and parish hall on Wayne Avenue in the Oregon District into a boutique hotel. The project is expected to cost about $22 million.
A couple developers who helped rehab the Dayton Arcade plan to spend about $110 million to renovate the vacant Centre City building at East Fourth and South Main streets. They plan to convert the 21-story tower into about 217 housing units.
But the city says the investment downtown accounts for less than half of the investment in Dayton.
West, north central
The city says more than $40 million in projects were completed in West Dayton in the last 12 months.
Homefull in January opened a new facility that has a full-service grocery store (called Gettysburg Grocery or GG), a Ziks Family Pharmacy location and a Kettering Health primary care physician’s office.
This $20 million project is the first phase of Homefull’s plan to redevelop the former Carlson school site at 811 S. Gettysburg Ave. The nonprofit plans to redevelop the rest of the 16-acre property in southwest Dayton into a healthy living campus that is expected to have housing and other services and amenities.
Ohio’s first QuikTrip store opened in June at 2121 S. Edwin C. Moses Blvd. The roughly $9 million project brought a new fueling station and travel center to the Edgemont neighborhood.
Malt Products, a family-owned business that manufactures and distributes natural sweeteners, recently spent about $15 million to expand its facility along Wolf Creek Pike. The project should create about a dozen new jobs and retain more than 70 positions.
The city estimates there are about $79 million in projects in West Dayton that could be completed in 2025 or 2026.
Dayton Children’s is expected to start construction soon on a new $10 million pediatric clinic that will be across the street from DeSoto Bass Courts at Germantown and McCall streets. The clinic, located in the Miami Chapel neighborhood, will offer after-hours and on-demand care for acute illnesses, minor injuries and health care support.
“This will be the first urgent care within city limits,” Morris said.
The Boys & Girls Club is going to tear down its longtime home at 1828 W. Stewart St. in West Dayton and replace it with a brand new facility. The organization has been working to raise about $18 million to build the facility and provide funding for an endowment.
Greater Dayton Premier Management (GDPM), the local public housing authority, is in the process of constructing a new apartment building called Germantown Crossing.
The $16 million project will create 50 units of subsidized rental housing at 1520 Germantown St., which is down the road from DeSoto Bass. Germantown Crossing is part of GDPM’s efforts to replace outdated apartments at DeSoto Bass, some of which have already been demolished.
Additionally, the city started construction last year on a new police station along West Third Street in West Dayton. Officials say they hope the multimillion-dollar facility will improve safety in the area as well as police response times.
City leaders also hope the station will help anchor the Wright brothers airplane factory site, which is being targeted for redevelopment.
In northwest Dayton, tens of millions of dollars have been spent renovating apartment properties, including Grand Place, Hoover Place and Hallmark Meridian. The city calls this area the north central land use area.
Work is underway to construct a $70 million workforce housing project that will create 260 new apartments in northwest Dayton.
Magnus Capital Partners plans to build a collection of new apartment buildings on a 13-acre vacant site along Homewood and Forest Avenues in the Five Oaks neighborhood.
“They anticipate to begin construction this year‚” said Tony Kroeger, Dayton’s planning division manager. “This is going to be fundamentally impactful for Five Oaks I think in a very, very good way.”
Windsor Companies, the main developer of the Fire Blocks District, is revitalizing the vacant Commodore Apartments at 522 W. Grand Ave, in the Grafton Hill neighborhood. Windsor is converting the 10-story apartment building into about 43 apartments.
United Church Homes plans to invest about $50 million to transform the former Longfellow school campus on lower Salem Avenue into 125 new apartment units for older individuals, including LGBTQ community members.
Other parts of the Gem City
In southeast Dayton, Miami Valley Child Development Centers Inc. last month held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for its new $12 million Lincoln Hill Early Learning Center.
The center, located at 200 Dover St. in the Twin Towers neighborhood, will provide a variety of early learning and child care services.
Restoration work recently began on the historic Roundhouse at the former Montgomery County Fairgrounds on South Main Street, south of downtown.
onMain, a partnership between the University of Dayton and Premier Health, plans to spend about $133 million on the first phase of redeveloping the old fairgrounds property.
In phase 1, onMain plans to build a new five-story Digital Transformation Center and about 170 new housing units.
UD also plans to spend millions of dollars expanding its RecPlex to include new state-of-the-art student health and counseling centers.
Meanwhile, investments in the northeast part of the city include Dayton Children’s Hospital’s kinship care housing project.
This $13 million project that broke ground late last year will create 26 housing units designed for kinship family members like grandparents, aunts and uncles.
Dayton Children’s also is investing more than $100 million into a new behavioral health facility on its main campus in Old North Dayton.
And nearby, Dayton’s Ronald McDonald House Charities is replacing its old building in Old North Dayton and with a new $29 million facility.
Finally, in the northern most part of Dayton, Sierra Nevada Corp. has spent more than $46 million to open a second hangar at the Dayton International Airport.
The company’s second facility, which opened in September, helped create 50 new jobs and retain 64 positions.
Credit: contributed
Credit: contributed
Sierra Nevada expects to build and open two additional hangars in October of this year and February of 2026. These projects are expected to cost around $100 million.
The $365 million in new investment last year was aided by $28 million in public funding, said Dayton City Manager Shelley Dickstein.
The city says that means there was $12 in private investment for every $1 in public money.
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