Downtown projects aim to continue business, resident attraction in Hammond
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowThe city of Hammond is looking to completely overhaul its downtown with the goal of making it a go-to destination instead of another drive-through city in Lake County.
Hammond leaders have been working for years with East Coast urban planning design firm Speck Dempsey LLC on a plan that starts with redesigning its streets, starting with the city’s core by replacing the five-lane Hohman Avenue with two-lane road to make it more pedestrian friendly.
The $9 million project comes along several housing projects, including the $28 million renovation of the Bank Calumet building into a mixed-use development, which will primarily include apartments.
Mayor Tom McDermott told Inside INdiana Business said anytime a city tries to change and redefine a specific area, it doesn’t come without some pain.
“For the businesses that have been trying to operate in a construction zone for the past two years, I feel for them, but I’m excited about the opportunity that’s coming,” McDermott said. “I see a lot of excitement and investment taking place in downtown. And I think that has a lot to do with what the state of Indiana has done by investing in the South Shore expansion that’s going right through the heart of downtown.”
McDermott referred to the West Lake Corridor extension of the South Shore Line, which adds eight miles of rail line from Hammond south to Dyer. The $945 million project is slated for completion in May 2025.
The Bank Calumet renovation project is being developed by NWI Development Group, which is transforming the 100-year-old building into The Banc, a mix of apartments, retail and event space.
Developers are expecting to complete the project in May with the first residents moving in this summer.
“It’s been sitting there abandoned for the better part of a decade,” McDermott said. “It’s completely getting retrofitted by a development group out of Michigan City, also with the help of the state of Indiana. It’s that maintaining the character and the beauty of the building, which is the best part.”
The mayor said he hopes that the changes being made in downtown Hammond will help attract new residents, particularly from Chicago.
“As we all know, a lot of people are working from home, and a lot of young people want to live close to a city but not necessarily downtown with the downtown prices,” he said. “Hammond is the closest city to Chicago in the state of Indiana. We literally touch Chicago and with this easy access with the West Lake expansion taking place, it’s going to be realistic to think that we could get a lot of these young professionals from Chicago to relocate to northwest Indiana.”
McDermott acknowledged some of downtown Hammond’s problems with its roads that were detailed in an evaluation by Speck Dempsey. He noted the firm’s founding partner, Jeff Speck, helping with identifying solutions.
“Jeff mentioned that he thought [downtown Hammond] was dying. I’ve seen it dying a slow death, and now I see a lot of investment taking place and it’s rebirth,” he said. “But over the last 20 years I’ve really seen the shopping go to the edges of Hammond, and it seems like the middle part of our city has been the harder part to develop. But this West Lake expansion is helping with that.”
The mayor said Indiana’s low-tax environment has been crucial to attracting business that wants to be close to Chicago but not in Illinois.
“For cities like Hammond, right on the border, it’s been a boom, and we’re getting new residents and new businesses constantly and they’re coming from Illinois. So we’ve just got to tout all the great advantages Indiana offers, and they’re coming right through, believe me.”