GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – In an online feature, Forbes Magazine named Grand Rapids as one of 15 cities that all have something in common: their downtowns are emerging and going through periods of revitalization.
Here is the Forbes write-up on Grand Rapids:
“Since the mid-1990s, the small Michigan city has drummed up billions in public-private funding. Investments have yielded the Van Andel Arena, the new $60 million home of the Grand Rapids Museum, a $220 million convention center, and $1 billion in new hospitals and new headquarters for Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine. Rockford Construction has converted more than a dozen abandoned warehouses and office buildings into 400,000 square feet of updated residential, retail and office space. This summer will welcome the $30 million Downtown Market (pictured above), a year-round culinary marketplace, spanning 130,000 square feet and the city plans to build a rapid transit bus line that will more easily cart people from the suburbs to Grand Rapids’ downtown.”
Other cities on the list include Detroit, Denver, and Birmingham, AL.
