From San Antonio Heron
Weston Urban has submitted plans to the city to build a 32-story apartment tower with ground-floor retail a block from Geekdom and the Frost Tower.
The $107 million tower, 305 Soledad St., would include 351 apartment units, 7,250 square feet of retail space and a six-level parking garage with 456 spaces, according to the Planning Commission agenda for Wednesday’s meeting.
“We absolutely have exciting plans on Soledad, but all still extremely premature to comment on,” Weston Urban president Randy Smith said in a text message last week, before the agenda was posted.
The commission will vote on whether to adjust the property line on Soledad Street and abandon the city’s right-of-way on aerial space above North Main Avenue so that Weston Urban can build a cantilevered parking garage, which is a “necessary component” of the development.
Construction is expected to begin in mid-2021 and last for two years, the agenda says. The 0.87-acre building site is currently a parking lot.
It’s unclear how tall the tower will be, but at 32 stories, it would likely rise higher than the 24- story Frost Tower that Weston Urban completed last year. The only downtown buildings with more than 32 stories are Convention Center hotels: the San Antonio Marriott Rivercenter, with 38, and the Grand Hyatt San Antonio, with 34.
Weston Urban’s Weston Centre office building, a block east of the proposed tower, also has 32 stories.
The company’s executives have long said they wanted to build housing in west downtown, where they have worked closely with the city to create a busy urban district with a tech flavor centered around their Geekdom co-working space in the Rand building.
The proposed tower would be across the street from the 21-story historic Milam Building, which the company owns and intends to renovate.
In 2015, Weston Urban reached a deal with the city that gave rise to the new Frost Tower and made the company owner of several properties in the area, ranging from the stately Municipal Plaza Building where City Council meets to several run-down parking lots. The agreement required the company to build at least 265 housing units.
Since then, the company has frequently bought up property in west downtown, where the construction of the San Pedro Creek Culture Park and the University of Texas at San Antonio’s (UTSA) plans to expand its downtown campus are expected to draw in even more businesses and residents. Last year, for example it bought two low-rise office buildings at 601 and 800 Dolorosa, occupying a total of 2.7 acres, deed records show.
Another notable development the planned restoration of the Continental Hotel on West Commerce Street into house meant to complement UTSA’s expansion.
https://saheron.com/weston-urban-apa...er-on-soledad/