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I was playing around this weekend and learned out to take an image and make Google Map tiles out of it. I took a great downtown map and used this approach with it and you can check it out below. If you want a full-screen version, try here.
Would you like to submit a post or article for publication here on Living Downtown Des Moines.com? If you have a passion for living in downtown Des Moines or just experiencing the many things to do when visiting downtown, we’d love to hear from you. Sharing your own experiences with others can be very rewarding. William Shakespeare said it best, “What is the city but the people.”
So, the rules to be a guest blogger are really simple, a few article guidelines are listed below as well as the five-step process to getting your post published.
Article Guidelines
Submission Process
We look forward to hearing from you and to sharing your experiences about Downtown Des Moines with our readers.
The next business opportunity we will be discussing is another restaurant idea. I know, some people say we already have plenty of restaurants downtown, but I’ve never found anything like this here downtown or even in the Des Moines metro area. Having moved here from South Florida, one of the most popular food items there was grilled chicken. There were numerous chains that specialized in grilled chicken, but one of my favorites was the franchise called Chicken Kitchen.
Opportunity: Chicken Kitchen franchise
Business Case: One of the healthiest meals you can eat is grilled chicken and there isn’t really anywhere to get this style of food currently in Des Moines. Chicken Kitchen offers a menu featuring freshly marinated grilled chicken entrees, fresh salads and homemade side orders. Chicken Kitchen is renowned for its focus on high quality, nutritious, made-from-scratch fresh food, with a strong emphasis on taste and recipes that adhere to the strict guidelines established by the American Hearth Association, with regard to fat, calories and cholesterol.
They offer a multitude of chicken entrées, ranging from chicken on the bone, skinless boneless breast platters, Pita-Pockettes™ and Panini Grillers™ artisan sandwiches to the now World-Famous “Chop-Chop™” – freshly marinated chopped boneless breast of chicken topping a bowl of rice and mixed with various ingredients and a choice of our Signature Sauces™, such as the Mustard’nCurry.
Sales have been a little slow the first four months of 2009, only 10 units selling this year compared to 19 during the same first four months of the year in 2008. To help catch up in May, it appears that 20 properties in 50309 have reduced their asking price.
| Date of Sale | Property Address | Sales Price | Condo Building |
|---|---|---|---|
| 04-10-2009 | 300 Walnut Street #2303 | $285,000 | The Plaza |
| 04-09-2009 | 300 Walnut Street #1101 | $135,000 | The Plaza |
| 03-27-2009 | 119 4th Street #106 | $176,500 | 4th & Court Condominiums |
| 03-27-2009 | 119 4th Street #205 | $212,000 | 4th & Court Condominiums |
| 02-26-2009 | 119 4th Street #108 | $182,000 | 4th & Court Condominiums |
| 02-26-2009 | 119 4th Street #201 | $225,900 | 4th & Court Condominiums |
| 02-24-2009 | 112 11th Street #503 | $166,860 | Mulberry Lofts |
| 02-16-2009 | 100 Water Street #404 | $232,000 | Water Street Brownstones |
| 02-05-2009 | 300 Walnut Street #706 | $103,500 | The Plaza |
| 01-02-2009 | 112 11th Street #605 | $149,200 | Mulberry Lofts |
Continuing with our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week, this week’s picture comes from Tina Johnson and is a view from her bedroom room in the 418 Liberty Condo building.
Tina says “I could take a hundred pics outside my window and see something new every time. I love how everything changes around me and appreciate the opportunity to realize a different perspective each time I look through the camera. Downtown is like a playground per say when it comes to taking pictures. I’m fortunate to call it my neighborhood.”
Check out previous pictures in of our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week.
Searching for just the right photo on Flickr can sometimes be a little tricky. One designer takes a unique look on how this can be done using our solar system as a model.
Tag Galaxy is a Flickr tool that visualizes image browsing utilizing tags and planetary constellations to show their related tags. You just type in your keyword, for this example, I used Des Moines and that keyword becomes the sun and keywords associated with it spin around it like planets.
One of the fun parts is that a click on any other tag other than the main tag will combine the old tag with the new tag to include only pictures that have been tagged with all tags.
You keep drilling down until you find what combination you are looking for and the pictures are then presented on a globe. Clicking on the central “star” will close in on that star and fill it with exactly 235 picture thumbnails. The planet can be rotated with the left mouse button and zoomed with the mouse wheel. A click on a preview image will load that image in front, another click will load information about the picture like the name of the artist, a description and a link to the Flickr page.
As someone who has lived downtown for a little over a year now and being a transplant into the metro area for 6 years now from South Florida, I have often thought of missed business opportunities downtown, at least as I see it. With that in mind, I plan on writing a series of posts over the next several weeks or months that showcases what I believe are missed business opportunities that just need the right investors/capital to become a reality. With this being the first post in the series, I will focus on what I believe would be the best business opportunity for a downtown business.
Opportunity: The 24-Hour Diner
Business Case: Even just last weekend, I heard a skywalk cop tell a family with 3 small children that everything was closed after 5pm unless you they wanted an upscale place, where there children wouldn’t care to be, or a sports bar/pub. You don’t have a lot of other choices without traveling out to the burbs he said. I’ve also seen the late night/after bar closing crowd have to get in their cars and venture out on I-235 to either Euclid or 22nd/86th St to find a Perkins that is open 24/7 for late night breakfast or dinner.
In my opinion, either a mom-n-pop diner or a chain like Perkins or IHOP would do well downtown. Their food is inexpensive, quick and pretty good quality. The busiest times for the diner would be between midnight and 3am with the bar crowds, and Saturday/Sunday morning with the late breakfast brunch crowds, but if in the right location, they would be able to benefit from the 75,000+ work crowd during lunch Monday through Friday. Suggested menu would be 24-hour breakfast availability, and an assortment of standard restaurant fare such as burgers and sandwiches, with pricing in line with chains like Perkins or IHOP. For it to work, price, quality and service and location would all need to be serious considered.
Last year we ran a short piece about urban gardens and with this past weekends new garden planted by some of the 418 Liberty Condo residents, I thought we would run the story again with a couple of new photos courtesy of Perry Wehrle.
If you have a balcony or garden area downtown, here are some tips on planning for your urban garden:
Continuing with our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week, this week’s picture comes from Flickr user Carol VanHook, also known as vanhookc and is titled Light Dancing on the Bridge.
Carol says “Photography lets me think “outside the box”. As an educator in the SE Polk Schools, I teach students to do that. And thus, my self-assignment this year is to capture a special picture a day. Thus, a trip to the city…
Photography allows a person to enjoy the sunrises and the sunsets and to watch the marvels of life in slow motion! What better place to capture this beauty than in Des Moines! The nighttime offers lights, sparkle, softness, a mellow flavor, peace – so much for the camera to enjoy!”
Check out previous pictures in of our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week.
Yesterday I got to attend the opening weekend of the Farmer’s Market. I didn’t make it down there until about 10:30, and from what I hear the crowds were thinner then than around 9am. Here’s some photos I took.
