Once a vibrant shopping district, this section of Downtown Peoria needs reinvestment

PEORIA — The Warehouse District and Central Business District are paramount to the city's trajectory.

They represent opportunities for business investments and residential growth. But while they are adjacent to each other, there is a disconnect.

The revitalization of the Warehouse District is in full swing, a success story for the city. Meanwhile, parts of the Central Business District are much further behind in an attempt to return to the glory days.

In particular, Downtown Peoria between Washington, Jefferson, Liberty and State streets is one of those areas that could use more investment. The streets are near tourist attractions — the Peoria Civic Center, Dozer Park and the Peoria riverfront — but there is little in that section of downtown to entice a leisurely stroll.

The sidewalks are crumbling in places, and while there are trees along the sidewalks, the ground beneath them is bare and untended. People who come to Peoria for a show at the Civic Center may think twice about walking through the area to visit a restaurant in the Warehouse District.

The Warehouse District is the perfect example of how improved infrastructure can help inspire development. Michael Freilinger, president and CEO of the Downtown Development Corporation of Peoria, has seen how developers react when they tour different parts of the city.

“They were uninspired when in the Central Business District," he said. "Then I went down to the Warehouse District, I could see them almost salivating and their eyes popping out because they can envision their building being full of tenants who would love to be on that street, love to live in that neighborhood just because of the street improvements and the proximity to the river. You still have proximity to the river in the Central Business District, but it was the street improvements that really did it."

More: Peoria's Warehouse District is growing fast. Here's what to expect in 2024

Quiet, but not dead

This particular section of downtown is filled with office buildings, civic buildings, a bus depot and a good number of parking lots and garages. Once a thriving retail district, only a few stores remain — including Born Paint; A-Z Jewelry & Swap, a pawn shop; and Lovers Playground, an adult bookstore.

Although the area is not teeming with pedestrians during the workday, that doesn’t mean there's nothing going on there, said Kert Huber, who owns multiple downtown buildings, including 432 Main St. — the former Commerce Bank Building — 401 Water Street, and two buildings in the same block as A-Z Jewelry & Swap.

“I relate it to being in London years ago, when we went into the financial district. We considered it kind of a dead area, but when you did see someone, they were well dressed up," he said. “The financial district didn’t have a lot of restaurants and touristy things to do. You have that in any city. And if you get enough people in those areas, eventually a café or restaurant will open, which we are seeing happen. Our Mexican restaurant at 401 Water is packed, and they are coming from that area.”

Repurposing old buildings in Peoria

A few buildings in the area are vacant, including the grand old building that housed Cohen’s Furniture for many years.

“That was where our executive offices were,” said Les Cohen, president and CEO of Cohen Development Company. “It was our headquarters from 1925 to 1997. Cohen’s was in business from 1879 to 1997 and was an 11-store chain in its heyday.”

Since the closure of Cohen's Furniture, several ideas have been formulated on how to repurpose the building. One proposal got as far as negotiations with a major retailer, but the deal fell through when Caterpillar pulled its corporate headquarters out of Downtown Peoria.

Cohen has had discussions about repurposing the building to serve Peoria’s growing medical community. While a number of old buildings in the city are being repurposed into condos and apartments, Cohen doesn’t think that’s a viable idea for the Cohen building.

“There are plans to potentially build an additional residential tower behind the building. That’s another long-range goal we’ve been working on for a number of years,” he said.

Once used as a warehouse, a smaller structure behind the Cohen building could be razed to make room for a residential tower, Cohen said.

More: Deal could help transform Warehouse District property into retail and residential spaces

Historical perspective

The owners of Born Paint, 317 Walnut St., have also thought about converting their old building — a former bakery — into residential units. They've gotten no further than talking, however. For now, they are content to continue the long-standing family tradition of selling paint.

“My grandfather purchased Born Paint in the 1950s, and he ran it until he died. He passed away in 2004 at the age of 92,” said Pat Berres, who co-owns the store with his brother Paul Berres Jr.

The Berres men basically grew up in the family’s store, which was at the bottom of the Main Street hill until it was razed to make way for the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria.

“We’ve been in this location since about 1975,” said Paul Berres, the company's president. “When we moved in, it wasn’t a great neighborhood. But over the years it changed. Where the Caterpillar building (501 SW Jefferson Ave.) is now, that was all housing – First Street, Second Street, Third Street, all the way up to Moss Avenue. It was an old, old neighborhood. And across the street, we could see about six or seven taverns from our front door. It was a late-night bar area, it was a district similar to what that part of Main Street is now, where those bars are open until 4 in the morning.”

Paul Berres is happy with how the area has evolved and is hoping to see more growth in the future.

“There’s Caterpillar across the street, there’s a ballpark next door, all the guys down in the Warehouse District are remodeling those old buildings — it’s great,” he said. “We got restaurants, Kelleher's and Sugar and those places down here. ... But downtown needs more residential, and we need more restaurants and more retail storefronts. The Riverfront Association is working on that area, and the downtown business district, they’re working on Main Street and Adams Street. Everybody’s working on it. We’ve been working on it for a long, long time.”

More: New $27M residential development proposed for Peoria's Warehouse District

A once-vibrant shopping district

Just a few blocks away at 414 SW Adams St., Gary Davis, longtime manager of A-Z Jewelry & Swap Shop, has also seen many changes in the Central Business District.

The business has been in operation for about 40 years, originally opening at the corner of Franklin and Adams streets in a building that was razed to make way for the Bob Michel Bridge in 1993.

The business was the first swap shop to get a pawn license in Peoria, which allowed it to provide loans along with buying and trading merchandise. Today it's located in the former Stein Hardware Store, one of many shops that once filled the area.

The buildings in the block with A-Z Jewelry & Swap are occupied by various businesses — Hot Spot, a tattoo and piercings studio; Tada Cognitive Solutions; and CityBlue Technologies. But foot traffic is slow, except for customers coming and going from the pawn shop. It's filled with an assortment of items, from antiques to modern electronics, and unusual things, like a taxidermy ram nestled among tricycles and bicycles at the front of the store. Glass cases hold fine jewelry, while a wall is filled with guitars.

Davis said that business is not what it once was. All secondhand stores have seen a decline in business since the rise of online marketplaces such as Facebook and Craigslist, he said.

“Before, if you were looking for a lawn mower, you couldn’t just hop on Facebook and look for lawn mowers. You had to go out and find a place that dealt with used lawn mowers. I had bought a used lawn mower off somebody for decent, cheap money to where I can resell it and make a profit, but now they just find someone that has one for sale and they are getting the deal I used to get buying it from the seller, and not one iota of taxes are being paid," said Davis. “And here I am paying the rainwater runoff taxes and pension for the fire and police department and $2,000 CILCO bills a month, and insurance and wages.”

The building that houses A-Z Jewelry & Swap is old and in need of improvement. He'd like new windows, paint, furnaces and siding on the front of the building. He would also like to put better signage on the building.

“I wouldn’t mind having something neon that sets us high enough for everybody coming over the bridge to see, you know, a picture of a diamond or gold or something, to catch everybody's attention and make them stop in and spend their hard-earned money,” he said.

Incentives and homeless housing

Davis has a few ideas on how the city could attract new business to the area.

“There needs to be an incentive to get business down here. Some sort of tax cut or funding,” he said. “And they need to take one of these vacant lots to put up a metal building to put some of these homeless people in, so they are not sleeping in the street all night, or over here in the grass. And in the wintertime they huddle up inside the doorways."

Though a homeless shelter for men is located in the nearby Peoria Rescue Mission, a lot of people don’t use it because the rules there are strict, Davis said. There have always been homeless people living downtown, but the problem has gotten worse, he said.

“In the last eight years or so, it went from a few to double digits — 20, 30 homeless people around here. It’s definitely increased majorly in the last six to eight years.”

More: Main Street in Downtown Peoria is promising and problematic

Much-needed improvements

The city of Peoria is working to provide more housing for the homeless population, said City Council member Denise Jackson, whose district includes the area between Washington, Jefferson, Liberty and State streets.

Phoenix Community Development Services is working to turn the old Methodist College of Nursing dorm into an apartment complex for homeless people, Jackson said. The building will also include offices where case managers will work to address some of the issues that lead to homelessness.

While the Warehouse District has gotten more attention in recent years, the Central Business District has not been forgotten.

Jefferson and Adams streets will be undergoing a major conversion from one-way to two-way streets, which is seen as a way to increase business and make the area easier to navigate.

Freilinger says parts of Downtown Peoria need flowers, holiday decorations and improvements to make walking more welcoming. Sidewalks should be bumped out into the street at intersections, so pedestrians are crossing four lanes rather than six, he said.

“It just makes it feel more walkable. You are more inclined to feel good about walking a few more blocks because you’re not crossing six lanes of traffic every block,” Freilinger said. “The restoration of two-way traffic will help because it slows down the traffic. It doesn’t seem like you’re walking across the highway — which is how it feels when you cross Adams Street or Jefferson Street right now in the downtown area.”

The city is aware that infrastructure is important when it comes to attracting new business. It's also expensive.

"If you don’t take care of the infrastructure needs, that makes it impossible to attract new businesses," Jackson said. "What business would want to come down here if the roads were tore up all the time?”

More: What is the future of Downtown Peoria? Here's the vision

Leslie Renken can be reached at (309) 370-5087 or lrenken@pjstar.com. Follow her on Facebook.com/leslie.renken.

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Warehouse District overshadows lackluster parts of Downtown Peoria