City Council approved zoning changes on Thursday that will allow local developer Efraim Varga and investment partners to construct a multi-block, mixed-use complex in the Eastside’s Denver Heights neighborhood near the Alamodome. The neighborhood, plagued with crime and vagrancy, stands to undergo a revitalization similar to that which the Pearl brought to the crumbling brewery complex just north of downtown.
Specific plans for the site, currently an industrial park, are still in early stages, Varga said. The development itself is pending the closing date on his purchase of the 7.7-acre property in early May. Mike Horn and Edgar Lozano own the property that hosts several abandoned homes and buildings as well as small automotive, wood, and metalwork shops. He’s also looking to acquire about two to three acres of separate property nearby.
“We’re in negotiations … they know that we’re doing something big,” Varga said Thursday, motioning towards City Council chambers from the from the front steps in Main Plaza. But he was also referring to the neighbors. Varga has met with area neighborhood associations and he said they’ve been receptive to his plans.
“They’re looking forward to the change, it’s going to (revitalize) the neighborhood,” Varga said. While the project will surely have a residential component, he added, preliminary ideas for the commercial aspects include a wide range of uses including a microbrewery, hotel, office space, restaurant, and retail.
“We (have) the zoning for the maximum available that we could do,” he said. The new zoning would allow up to 100 residential units per acre and diverse commercial use. “We fit everything in there (for now) and now we’re going to go back and design it.”
Once the property is purchased, Varga estimates that the design phase will take until the end of 2016. If all goes as planned, the first of three phases would break ground in the first quarter of 2017.
“It’s hard to find an eight-acre piece of property so close to downtown,” Varga said, who has a few other housing projects in nearby Southtown, but none at this scale and complexity.
(Read More: Varga Breaks Ground on Two Southtown Developments, One of the Last Inner City Trailer Parks Going Condo)
Councilman Alan Warrick II (D2) welcomes the increased attention to Denver Heights. Most public and private investments in the Eastside have been focused further north, closer to the Dignowity Hill and St. Paul Square historic districts, where single- and multi- family residential projects are sprouting up almost monthly.
“Since the Alamodome, very little has happened with this area,” Warrick said during an interview with the Rivard Report prior to the Thursday vote. “That’s what makes this so exciting.”
The Alamodome was a highly-controversial project when it was built two decades ago on the lead-contaminated site of the former Alamo Iron Works. It was supposed to bring jobs and development that never came. Perhaps until now. A $43.5 million improvements package was approved in January 2015 that is slated to improve connectivity to the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center expansion and Hemisfair Park.
Though it’s physically and psychologically cut off by Interstate 37 from downtown and the flourishing neighborhoods of Southtown, it’s a short walk or bike ride to either. Urban blight and vagrancy stands in the way.
But not for long, Varga said, because projects like the one he has in mind will provide the connective tissue – with street and infrastructure improvements close behind – to bring these communities together. “It’s all going to be one big inner-city town” despite the highways.
“We definitely have plenty of room,” Warrick said of the surrounding area that is dotted with homes, warehouses and industrial complexes – some vacant, some in use.
“But we also don’t want to force people out too quickly before they can take advantage of (education and employment) programs,” the councilman added, speaking to the building fear of gentrification and displacement that the looming increased property values that many commercial and residential neighbors have.
“It’s not about making sure you can stay in the community,” he said, it’s about making sure that current residents have access to programs like Promise Zone to Work and job training opportunities so that the people in the community can rise with the neighborhood and choose to either stay or move elsewhere.
“Because does everyone want to stay?” he asked rhetorically of Eastsiders. “It’s not (or won’t be) the same neighborhood that you were in before.”
Top image: Properties along Cherry Street at the corner of Carolina Street are proposed to become possible mixed use by developer Efraim Varga. Photo by Scott Ball.
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It was touted as supporting Major League Baseball. Within seconds of the referendum passing, the first thing thrown out was baseball. Helen Dutmer said it best. The thing looks like a WWI hangar at Brooks. It’s been a boondoggle and white elephant from Day 1.
Curious to know how this will effect the current residents of the East Side.
“But we also don’t want to force people out too quickly”, “It’s not about making sure you can stay in the community”, “Because does everyone want to stay?”
These are callous and despicable comments from my council representative, and District 2 deserves someone who cares about the residents here.
Nobody’s going to tear up over the loss of these stacks of shipping containers and empty palettes, but the long game here is that Alan Warrick can’t even pretend to care about the displacement of long time eastside community members.
I am concerned about the residents and the community.
So am I. So are they. The city council and developers are not.
Maybe the project has legs, but comparing these dilapidated buildings of no significance that will likely be torn down to the Pearl…is doing the Pearl an injustice.
The layout of the pearl is claustrophobic… The intentions were good and the architecture was reveled but it’s so closed off that it feels like a gated community
I’ve heard about this in the news but not at our @denverheights neighborhood association meetings. Weird how Dignowity is Cc’d in the article but not Denver Heights.
Why didn’t the reporter include the name of the shop on the cut line? Seems a bit disrespectful, even if not intended. Why not call shop owners and ask their opinion?
I’m an active member of the Denver Heights neighborhood where this is going up. Contrary to what is stated in this article the developer has not met with the Denver Heights Neighborhood Association . Meeting with neighbors is not mandatory but it does make a newcomer as grand as this one a good neighbor. As of today, it is untrue that he met with neighbors and that it was “well received”. We’d love to hear about the plans Alan E. Warrick, II, City Councilman District 2
Tommy Moreno
When is the city going to do something about the blight and vagrancy in the the city council? Once a thriving place (but oh so long ago) where citizens met to address concerns of residents of San Antonio, it is now a place that has large abandoned the concerns (and intentions) of long term residents to pursue upscale development in the interests of monied newcomers and tourists.
I once worked on the East side for a period of three years. I did not see blight and vagrancy but a real place and real people who struggled with real issues and who welcomed me with the sincerity. I think we understood each other.
Ms. Dimmick…. you have much to learn about how “blight” and “vagrancy” come about….. Hint. Look downtown.
He certainly has not reached out to Alamodome Gardens Neighborhood Association, either, Martha Banda and Alan Neff.
Its important to welcome this development since most of us who own homes here. The price value will go up on homes as YOUR HOME IS A FUTURE INVESTMENT FOR YOUR KIDS TO HAVE A BETTER NEIGHBORHOOD AND MORE VALUE TO HOMES!!!!