It once was Motoramp Garage, then Spark Park. Now historic Tacoma building has sold again
Eli Moreno, the Tacoma developer who is renovating Old City Hall, recently closed on the purchase of a nearly century-old building nearby.
Known as the Spark Park building, the site at 745 Commerce St. was acquired in an off-market transaction by Moreno from Aspen Park LLC. Aspen Park is affiliated with Diamond Parking.
The sale price was just over $3 million. According to county records, the building dates to 1925.
Dorky’s Bar Arcade and Metro Retro are business tenants on the ground level of the site.
Harrison Laird, principal with Lee & Associates, told The News Tribune via email this week that the building has around 130 secure parking stalls in the garage portion.
Laird, Tom Brown and John Bauder represented both Moreno and Aspen Park.
“Eli owns Old City Hall, which makes this a strategic purchase because of the proximity. He plans to leave the retail tenants in place,” Laird told The News Tribune.
Moreno did not respond to a request for comment this week. The site last traded hands in 1999 for $1.48 million, and the 2023 assessed tax value for the property is listed with the county at more than $2.79 million.
The building appears in many images from the last century included in the Tacoma Public Library’s Northwest Room online archives. In 1929, it was presented as Motoramp Garage with a music shop on the ground level.
Another image notes it was the largest garage in Tacoma for many years, holding as many as 325 cars.
In another image, ordered by Standard Oil of California in 1953, the caption notes, “Besides covered parking, the Motoramp also offered car repairs, lubrication and the chance to purchase batteries and Prestone anti-freeze. No need to run to the gas station: the Motoramp also had at least two pumps for outgoing patrons.”
Another image shows Vern’s Sandwich Shop at the corner of Ninth Street and Pacific Avenue, in the ground floor of the parking garage, and a fixture in downtown Tacoma for over 30 years after it opened in the 1940s, according to the caption.
Moreno is CEO of Surge Co. and has developed co-working spaces across Tacoma. Old City Hall will be the newest Surge site after renovations and rehab are complete.
Surge was selected by the city in the fall of 2018 to enter purchase and redevelopment talks for the building after a competitive bid process. An agreement was approved by City Council the following year.
The building’s clock-tower bells were removed earlier this year as part of seismic upgrades for the 1890s-era building. The bells are in storage until a new home is found for them, the Surge team told The News Tribune in August.
A new sound system will replicate the chimes “on the hour,” Moreno said at the time.
Old City Hall’s Phase 1 will open next summer, including four floors for retail, office, restaurant and coworking space. The remaining areas “that include affordable apartments, retail/commercial space and event space will be completed a year later,” Moreno told The News Tribune in August.
The cost of bringing Old City Hall back to life was estimated at $14.5 million in 2021.
The recent Spark Park building sale recorded Sept. 8 with the county shows the purchase listed under Surge Parking Garage LLC representing Moreno. The LLC’s registration as an entity was filed with the state Aug. 22.
The sale was the most recent high profile property transaction in the Tacoma area with ties to Diamond Parking.
The former site of Tacoma Discount World, 11013 Pacific Highway SW, in Lakewood, was sold in May 2022 by another LLC with ties to Diamond Parking to a logistics property company managed by a Florida-based firm.
The Lakewood site is set to become a new fulfillment center.
The sale of the Tacoma Spark Park building was first reported by the Puget Sound Business Journal.
