Birmingham News production building

The Birmingham News production building is a 97,700 square-foot building at 417 22nd Street North, extending along 5th Avenue North to 23rd Street and occupying the full northern half of Block 57. It was constructed for $32 million in 1980 by the Birmingham News Company as a press and production facility for its Birmingham News, as well as the Birmingham Post-Herald, then published under a joint operating agreement.

Occupying a 1.6-acre site, the building's usable floor space wraps around the large printing area which stretches up from the 35,700 square-foot basement. The result was 19,900 square feet on the ground floor, 11,400 square feet on the second floor, and 30,700 square feet on the third floor.

The $32 million facility was planned and developed under the leadership of Victor Hanson II. When the paper's owner, Advance Publications, reorganized the state's newspapers under the Alabama Media Group banner in 2012, the production facility became the home of Advance Central Services Alabama. In 2017 printing of the newspaper was contracted to the Cox Media Group in Atlanta, Georgia. The former production building was put on the market for $2 million, and purchased months later by News Properties LLC, owned by Brent Fields, for redevelopment as a climate-controlled, self-storage facility, operated as Extra Space Storage. Fields sold the redeveloped building to Morningstar Properties of Charlotte, North Carolina in 2021.

Birchfield Penuel & Associates designed the renovations to the building, which were approved by the Birmingham Design Review Committee in August 2018.

References

• Godwin, Brent (July 13, 2017) "Former Bham News production building is for sale." Birmingham Business Journal
• West, Ty (May 30, 2018) "Former Birmingham News press building sells ahead of redevelopment." Birmingham Business Journal
• Edgemon, Erin (June 19, 2018) "Former Birmingham News production building sells for $1.5 million." The Birmingham News
• Van der Bijl, Hanno (February 17, 2021) "Morningstar entity acquires self-storage facility in downtown Birmingham." Birmingham Business Journal