A new five-story apartment building is under construction at 1833 Emerson Street in Denver’s Uptown district. The new development will provide 84 homes that are within easy walking distance of both Downtown Denver and the nearby hospitals and medical office buildings. The project site is outlined on the Google Earth image below:
Emerson Place is being developed by Allante Properties and features all studio apartments. The highly transparent ground floor includes the lobby and leasing office along with a clubhouse for residents. The next four floors contain the 84 residences with a rooftop deck offering a splendid view of the Denver skyline. Two levels of underground parking hold spaces for 85 vehicles. The video and two renderings below are courtesy of Sprocket Design-Build, the project architect, and Allante Properties.
Construction started a few months ago and the shoring walls for the underground parking are being installed. Here are three photos from this weekend, looking toward the southwest, northwest, and northeast:
Emerson Place should be finished in 2018.
This project has been added to our DenverInfill Project Map.
I always have mixed feelings about projects like these. Removing a nondescript SFH and infilling an empty lot in Uptown with a 5-story building is great, but I am bothered about tearing down the 3-story pre-1950 apartment building. It is the combining of those older apartments with newer ones like this development that makes a neighborhood more interesting and provides not only new housing, but older and therefore cheaper housing. Part of the problem with lack of mid-range affordability is that not a lot of apartment were built in the central city neighborhoods during the 80s, 90s, and 2000s.
Good point. No one should do anything ever. If something exists, that must mean it will always be the highest, best use.
honestly, the existing buildings on this site are pretty run down.
this project is a nice scale – it fits in nicely with the neighborhood.
The point I was trying to make was that, yes, the small apartment building that existed there was pretty run down and therefore cheap. If Denver had been building new apartments all throughout the 80s, 90s, and 2000s as well as now then there would be a good selection of market rate apartments at a variety of price points because the older ones would be cheaper than the brand new ones. Instead, there are a lot of new apartments and very few from those other time periods, relatively speaking. Yes, this building is bringing in 84 units, which is probably a lot more than in that smaller three story building, and that is a good thing. However, these apartments are all new and will therefore be priced at the higher end of the market rate range. Ideally, I would have preferred that one of those nondescript office buildings with the accompanying parking lots be replaced so that there would be apartments in both a new building (more expensive) and in the old building (cheap) to provide apartments at a variety of price points. Like I said, I have mixed feeling about projects like these.
I don’t disagree with that.
Speaking of the map, there is a multifamily condo project at 32nd and Blake that hasn’t been added to your map. It’s called Factory Flats. I know condos are rare in Denver, so it seems like something that should be included. Thanks and keep up the great work!
The owner of a property should have every right to develop land under the zoning code or to sell to someone who will.
I agree with your overall sentiment, but the vast majority of these pre-war apartments will probably survive. The most underutilized, functionally-obsolete ones on the choicest lots will not, and that is ok, and entirely within the natural evolution of a place.
While for the most part I agree with your assessment, I think developers first look at the “choicest lots”, i.e. is the lot in a hot or becoming hot neighborhood and is the current property owner willing to sell. Whether the current structures on the property are “underutilized or functionally-obsolete” is somewhat irrelevant at that point. As long as the developer can replace an existing structure profitably, they will do that. As is their right. Unfortunately, I think that a lot of the pre-war apartments that will survive are in neighborhoods that are currently not as walkable and/or not served by transit as well as they should be and can be. However, that is a city issue that has to be addressed by the city.
If the structure is still functional and not obsolete, I do not believe it is irrelevant, because the price will be significantly higher than if it is just “land” value.