Downtown Fresno restoration bringing new life and purpose to historic buildings

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Downtown Fresno is filled with historical buildings, galore of which person sat bare for years, adjacent decades.

Bringing businesses and creating caller surviving spaces is simply a extremity of metropolis leadership.

Leadership said radical travel to the metropolis and expect downtown to beryllium the spot to go. Right now, historical buildings similar the Helm Building connected Mariposa and Fulton Street and the Old Fresno Water Tower are undergoing renovations to springiness visitors and locals businesses to visit.

For merchantability signs and plywood boards people the fronts of historical buildings successful Downtown Fresno, waiting for caller life.

"Downtown is surely peculiar successful that respect. It's the oldest portion of Fresno, and it's the spot successful the vale wherever you spot the astir density of historical buildings," Elliot Balch, President of Downtown Fresno Partnership, says. So it's a peculiar portion of our downtown heritage, and we're excited to spot immoderate question with immoderate of our historical buildings."

The historical Helm Building is 1 specified gathering that could beryllium filled again soon. Three caller tenants are acceptable to determination successful wrong the adjacent six months.

A unsocial program is acceptable for 1 country of the building. La Boulangerie volition spell from having a model crossed the intersection to a greeting lease.

"They're gonna expand, we're gonna person indoor space," said Balch. "Their lease volition spell until similar 2 p.m. each day. So they're doing the meal and the coffee, and the luncheon business, but past if idiosyncratic other wants to travel successful and marque dinner, drinks."

There are different storefronts successful the building, and the upstairs is being converted from bureau abstraction to surviving space.

The aged JC Penney gathering connected Tulare and Fulton is besides being converted into 40 to 60 market-rate lodging units, which are expected to unfastened wrong the adjacent year.

Changing a building's usage from offices to lodging is simply a agelong process. But erstwhile it comes to greenish lighting projects, the metropolis is trying to velocity up the process.

"Addressing the issues successful the zoning codification and addressing the costs and the fees, which person been reduced, addressing the clip it takes to process caller proposals -- that's been reduced," said Balch. "Addressing the infrastructure, which comes into play."

Even with that help, different issues tin origin delays. One illustration is the Old Fresno Water Tower, wherever Frida Cafe has been moving to unfastened since 2021.

"We're conscionable simply waiting for the large electrical transformer to get from the manufacturer," said Miguel Arias, Fresno City Council. "So we tin electrify the building, which we expect successful the adjacent fewer months occurring."

"What's the holdup there," asked Action News Reporter Kate Nemarich.

"Manufacturing, there's an planetary proviso concatenation for transformers, electrical boxes extracurricular the power of PG and E," replied Arias.

Arias said Frida Cafe is already moving connected interior improvements, truthful hopefully, the cafe volition beryllium acceptable to unfastened erstwhile the powerfulness gets turned connected successful six months.

There is besides a propulsion to reopen the Raddison Hotel present that it's backmost up to code, but improvements are inactive needed, including the excavation and rooms.

Other historical buildings acceptable to reopen soon see Hardy's Theater. Arias said the exterior renovations are complete, and interior renovations are successful the last stages.

Within the adjacent year, we could spot a batch of ribbon cuttings happening astatine historical buildings downtown.

For quality updates, travel Kate Nemarich connected Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.