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It was last Wednesday when HSBC Bank announced plans to vacate One HSBC Center early next year -- leaving the building mostly empty.
Congressman Brian Higgins says he sees the development more as an opportunity than as a reason for concern, saying it could perhaps lead to several possibilities.
"I could see a Hotel Lafayette and Avant model work very well there," Higgins said.
Higgins says office space could even work -- along with apartments.
"If you were to convert ... top five to 10 floors to residential that would be some pretty interesting housing in downtown Buffalo," he added.
The move will leave the 38-floor HSBC tower without its anchor tenant and mostly empty. HSBC says it's occupied the tower for 40 years and currently fills 653,000 of its 842,000 square feet.
The building is owned by Seneca One Realty LLC.
HSBC spokesman Neil Brazil says all of the employees now working in the tower will move to a nearby Buffalo office building which HSBC owns and a facility it leases in Depew by the time the tower lease expires in October 2013.