There was a great article in Sunday’s Des Moines Register by David Elbert that talked about the redevelopment efforts that have been going on downtown. You can find the full text of the article here. The sidebar to the article had the biggest meaning to me, here’s what was included in it:

Des Moines’ downtown still faces a number of challenges, including:

COMPLETING THE RIVERFRONT: The biggest piece missing from the riverfront plan today is the World Food Prize Headquarters. City officials expect next month to turn over the keys of the former riverfront library to the World Food Prize organization, which plans to spend nearly $30 million to convert the century-old building into a headquarters that will include elaborate riverfront landscaping. The group still needs to raise about $5 million, but construction is expected to begin before year’s end.

HOUSING AND RETAIL: Retail development traditionally follows housing, so the emphasis is on housing. In 2002, a goal was set to add 6,000 downtown housing units. So far, the total is fewer than 1,500. New developments are being planned for an area south of Court Avenue called the Lower East Village and another location called Gray’s Landing between Southwest Ninth and 16th streets south of the MLK bypass. With the current economy, it could be years before either development begins.

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Continuing with our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week, this week’s picture comes from Randy Wetmore aka DMIA JAYHAWK, and is titled “Dragon Boats Waiting for the Race”.

“Des Moines has so many things going on all the time that there are many opportunities to capture some nice pictures. The Dragon Boat Races at Gray’s Lake is an example. It was a beautiful Saturday morning and this picture does not show it there were many, many participants in the races. Keep your eyes open for the variety of events going on in Des Moines.”

Check out previous pictures in of our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week.

As an avid walker and biker downtown, over the last several weeks I’ve noticed these bird silhouettes appearing on buildings downtown. Last night I got my camera out for an evening photo walk and captured these. I kinda of like them, a little urban graffiti in a good way. Does anyone know the story behind them?

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

• Your post may be anywhere between 150 and 1500 words in length.
• Author bio should be no more than 50 words or 250 characters in length.
• Affiliate links to your own blog are encouraged.

Submission Process

1. Register for an account, if you don’t already have one or log in.
2. Write your post, you can write it in multiple sessions, saved as a draft.
3. Edit your post to your liking.
4. Submit your post for review when ready.
5. Your post is queued for review and for publishing.

We look forward to hearing from you and to sharing your experiences about Downtown Des Moines with our readers.

Not sure if you are aware or not, but Trulia provides a quick listing of downtown condos that have recently lowered their asking price. If you are in the market, it’s a great place to start. Some of these have been reduced as much as $40,000! Wow! It looks like nows a pretty good time to get in on downtown living. Just visit:
http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/50309_zip/365_pr/reduceddt;d_sort/.

Here are a few that caught my eye:

Also don’t forget you can check out our Downtown Housing page for the most recent updates.

Condo sales have continued at a slow pace when compared to 2008, there have been 27 units sold this year compared to 44 during the same first eight months last year.

The big winners for 2009 continue to be an old stand by, The Plaza, and the new contender, 4th & Court Condominiums.

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Continuing with our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week, this week’s picture comes from Jerry Ranch, aka jerrysEYES, and is titled “We Built This City..” (to quote a Jeff Starship tune).

Jerry says, “There is no doubt that downtown Des Moines is for living, working, and playing. You are lovingly greeted and enveloped in a photographers’ mosaic of architectural styles. The canyon of edifices reflects the psyche of Des Moines – comfortable and inviting, malleable and forward looking, yet rooted in tradition. From the bustle of the workday, to the entertaining Court Ave nightlife, to the family-oriented superb Farmer’s Market, I always find unique opportunities to document on my visits.”

Check out previous pictures in of our series, Des Moines Picture of the Week.

Yesterday evening, I had a chance to listen to Douglas Romig, Park and Recreation Services Manager for the City of Des Moines present the proposed master plan for West Riverside Drive. It sounds like a very exciting plan, that I would love to personally see happen for downtown.

For more details on what is being proposed, check out the official Park and Recreation Communication.

Sometimes I shake my head in disbelief. Des Moines puts on a face of such a progressive city with its awesome new sculpture park until you see what was selected for bike racks around the park. I invite you to play the game, of the 10 images of bike racks on the photo above, one type was selected for the Pappajohn Sculpture Park, and five other types can be found around downtown and three types are possibilities that could exist in downtown with had a few more creative minds that participated in the selection of bike racks.

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When I lived in the burbs, I of course depended on Mediacomm and Qwest but in most projects downtown, you have a much better option NexGen Communications. If you haven’t heard of them before, here’s the low down:

NexGen Communications was founded in 2000 providing Business Phone and Internet to customers in the Des Moines and surrounding areas. In 2004 they started a MDU division (Multi Dwelling Unit). NexGen teamed up with DIRECTV to provide Condos, Lofts, and Apartment complexes with DIRECTV, PHONE, and INTERNET solutions.

In speaking with Lance Allison with NexGen, he let me know about the following services that they provide:

• DIRECTV – We provide a One Dish DIRECTV solution that eliminates the need to have multiple dishes attached to the patio or sides of the buildings. This allows all residents in high rise lofts or apartments to receive the programming from DIRECTV.
• INTERNET – NexGen is an Internet Service Provider that has multiple paths to the Internet for Redundancy. We have 1Gbps Gig-E links to separate providers that ensure our Internet Service stays up. Currently NexGen supports DSL access ranges from 1.5Mpbs to 24Mbps via ADSL2+ DSL technology.
• PHONE – NexGen is Telephone Service Provider, we own and operate our on Class 5 Telephone switch. We also have multiple paths to separate providers that provide redundancy and ensure we keep our voice network up 99.999% of the time. NexGen provides many of the calling features offered Caller ID, Call Waiting, Call Waiting with Caller ID, Voice Mail, Call Forward, and a list of other features.

So what has been my experience with NexGen over the past year and half?

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