Three local design firms picked as finalists for $67-million Event Center project

CEDAR RAPIDS - Three local architectural firms have been picked as finalists among nine firms competing to design the city's $67-million Event Center project, project manager John Frew reported on Wednesday.

Each of the firms, Shive Hattery Inc., OPN Architects Inc., and Novak Design Group, has teamed up with an architectural firm outside of Iowa, Frew said.

A City Hall selection team will interview the three design teams on July 8, with the City Council slated to approve the winning team at its meeting on July 27, said Frew, a principal with Frew Nations Group, which has offices in Tempe, Ariz., and, now, here in Cedar Rapids.

The Event Center Project, which has secured a $35-million grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce and a $15-million grant from the state I-JOBS program, consists of upgrading the existing U.S. Cellular Center arena and building a new convention center next door.

At the same time, the city is bidding to buy the long-struggling Crowne Plaza Five Seasons Hotel, which is attached to the arena and is currently owned by its creditors.

Frew said he has recommended that the city get control of the hotel now so it can be upgraded along with the arena and the construction of the new convention center.

Mayor Ron Corbett on Thursday said what he earlier has said: It didn't make sense to have a new Event Center project complete in 30 months and have a hotel still in need of renovation and refreshing next to it.

Frew said construction is expected to begin on the project in the third quarter of 2011 with construction to be complete by the end of 2012.

The proposal for the new convention center calls for it to sit on what is now Third Street NE at First Avenue East. The hotel ballroom that now sits atop Third Street NE will be demolished as part of the convention center construction.

Frew said the proposal does not call for the aged private parking ramp on First Avenue between The Roosevelt and the Crowne Plaza Five Seasons Hotel to come down for the Event Center project, but he said he's gotten plenty of requests to include the demolition of the ramp in the project.

Frew and City Council member Chuck Swore, who was chairman of the city's Five Seasons Facilities Commission back in 1979 when the arena first opened, said the new convention center is designed to attract convention and trade shows that the city has given up on over the years as other venues have become more attractive than the U.S. Cellular Center.

The configuration of the U.S. Cellular Center, Frew added, might change and become more elongated so it can attract shows that it has not been able to attract because of its size.

He said he is planning to take a local contingent of leaders on two different bus trips so they can see existing venues in the eastern part of the state and then can see those in Omaha and Des Moines.