Happy New Year! Are you ready for 2026? Well, here are some of the top local business stories that we will be watching closely this year, in no particular order:

Landmark Credit Union Live opening to shake up city’s live music scene

Landmark Credit Union Live, a new 4,500-capacity music venue, will open in February in the Deer District, just south of Fiserv Forum. The venue is sure to shake up the city’s live music scene. Hopefully it will attract more artists to perform here that have otherwise been bypassing Milwaukee. But it will also compete with existing venues in the city to attract artists and could cannibalize the marketplace. The developer for Landmark Credit Union Live is Madison-based FPC Live, a division of Frank Productions which is a joint venture partner with Beverly Hills, California-based Live Nation, the live music industry giant that has tremendous influence over much of the industry and could give the new venue a huge advantage in booking shows.

Downtown development

Development in downtown Milwaukee has slowed considerably, especially with the stoppage of construction for The Edison and the lack of progress for the Iron District project. However, construction is continuing for the new museum to replace the Milwaukee Public Museum, which will be called the Nature & Culture Museum of Wisconsin and will open in 2027. Otherwise, most of the downtown development activity will be in Deer District where Landmark Credit Union Live will open in February and construction could begin for a 156-room Moxy Hotel and the Field House Flats development, which will include apartments and a fitness, health and athletics facility for Milwaukee Area Technical College. Milwaukee-based J. Jeffers & Co. is the developer for the Field House Flat development, and also plans to convert the historic Mitchell Building from office space to apartments. That’s one of several office to residential conversion projects planned downtown, with the most significant being the planned $165 million redevelopment of the 35-story 100 East office tower building, at 100 E. Wisconsin Ave., into 375 apartments. That project is also expected to move forward in 2026. Another conversion that could move forward in 2026 is Jeffers’ plans to convert the upper floors of the Clark Building at 633 W. Wisconsin Ave. into apartments. The firm is seeking low-income housing tax credits from the state for the project. Meanwhile, work on the $500 million reconstruction of the North Office Building at Northwestern Mutual’s downtown headquarters campus will continue this year and be complete in 2027.

New air cargo facility at Mitchell International Airport

A new air cargo facility, being built at the former 440^th Airlift Wing site at Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport is expected to be operational this year. With capacity to accommodate up to five Boeing 747-400 planes simultaneously, the facility is expected to significantly increase the amount of air cargo shipped in and out of the airport, and could provide a boost to the region’s economy.

New South Shore Cruise Dock to help increase cruise ship activity in Milwaukee

Milwaukee officials are expecting a big increase in cruise ship traffic in 2026. The city expects 19,000 cruise ship passengers to visit Milwaukee this year, with 62 cruise ship visits already scheduled for Port Milwaukee. That would be a 72.7% increase in passenger traffic from 2025, and would smash cruise ship activity records at Port Milwaukee. The city’s busiest year for cruise ship activity was in 2022 with 13,611 passengers coming on 33 vessel port calls. The 2026 cruise ship season in Milwaukee is expected to have a $3.5 million economic impact, up from $2.5 million in 2025 according to Port Milwaukee. The increase in cruise ship activity is coming as the city is building a new South Shore Cruise Dock to handle the largest vessels on the Great Lakes. The $17 million project is expected to be completed by the middle of the 2026 cruise season.

Former Northridge site redevelopment efforts

Now that the city has completed demolition of the former Northridge Mall site, the hard part begins. Can the city attract development to the 58-acre site? Several ideas and concepts have been floated, but it remains to be seen what actually comes forward in the marketplace. A large site is challenging to develop, especially in a struggling area. What about this site is going to be attractive to a developer? If any development proposal does come forward, it is highly likely that it will need a significant subsidy from the city.

The future of the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena and Miller High Life Theatre

There are signs that a major controversy is brewing here. The Wisconsin Center District has hired consultants to study the cost of maintaining operations at the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena and the Miller High Life Theatre and to examine the highest and best use of those sites. The WCD owns and operates the facilities, located just north of the Baird Center, the downtown convention center that the WCD expanded last year. There has been speculation that the studies will report that the buildings need significant maintenance and that they could be demolished to make way for a large convention headquarters hotel. There are a number of issues that would complicate that idea. The Miller High Life Theatre is little-used but the WCD still has about $20 million in debt for the $42 million renovation of the facility in 2003. The UWM Panther Arena is the home for the UWM Men’s Basketball team, the Milwaukee Admirals and the Milwaukee Wave, which would have to find somewhere else to play if the building was demolished. The Common Council recently approved historic status for the buildings, which would make it harder to obtain approval for demolition. The WCD wants to see development of a headquarters hotel to help attract conventions, but it’s unlikely the downtown hotel market could support the addition of a huge hotel and the cost to build such a hotel would be prohibitive and would likely require city subsidy. Frankly, the best option to create a convention headquarters hotel for the Baird Center would be to expand the Hilton Milwaukee hotel.

Data center developments

The surge of massive data center development in southeastern Wisconsin has been a big story in recent years and will continue to be in 2026. The $15 billion project in Port Washington for OpenAI and Oracle is just getting started. In Mount Pleasant, the first phase of the $7.3 billion data center development for Microsoft is expected to become operational sometime this year. Meanwhile, Meta plans to build a $1 billion data center in Beaver Dam and Microsoft is looking for a site for a smaller backup data center in the Racine County area. Perhaps additional projects will emerge this year. One thing is for certain, the controversy about them is unlikely to abate as many residents remain concerned about the impact the data centers will have on energy prices, the environment and property values.

Uline continues to grow its headquarters

Pleasant Prairie-based Uline is adding another office building to its growing headquarters complex. The 365,000-square-foot building will be completed by the middle of the year and will house 1,000 Uline employees. The company has been on an extraordinary growth pace since it moved its headquarters to Kenosha County in 2010. Uline now has more than 2,500 employees in Pleasant Prairie and occupies 16 buildings in Kenosha County. It is a major economic force in the Kenosha area, and hopefully its growth there continues for years to come.

Andrew Weiland is the editor of BizTimes Milwaukee.