39-Story Condo Tower Proposed
Another major high-rise tower has been proposed for downtown San Diego, this one a 490-foot-tall, $110-million, 39-story condominium across the street from the Convention Center, a bayfront area rapidly becoming the focal point of several other high-rise projects.
As proposed by the San Diego division of Shea Homes, one of the nation’s largest privately owned builders, the tower--dubbed Harbour Court--would hold 230 condominiums ranging in size from 800 square feet to more than 2,500 square feet. Prices have not been set but are expected to range from about $250,000 to more than $700,000.
Top-floor penthouses could cost as much as $2 million.
Although some design elements of the building are being refined, the basic structure would make it one of the tallest residential structures downtown. It consists of a slender tower with 390,000 gross square feet topped by a dome.
The building would be set back from the street and would have an interior courtyard consisting of open space and two stories of shops and restaurants. The structure is divided into 35 stories of condos on top of the two stories of retail and commercial uses. Parking for 360 cars would be underground.
At the tower’s upper levels, the building would have several steps, giving it a variety of shape and design near the top as opposed to the older, unyielding office high-rise monoliths commonly seen downtown.
The one-square-block, bounded by 1st, 2nd, Island and J streets, was bought by Shea last November. As proposed, the project would be entirely privately financed and without government redevelopment subsidies. Shea says it expects to have the building financed early next year, with construction tentatively set to begin next August or September. Completion is scheduled for late 1993.
Because the site lies within the Marina Redevelopment area, the building needs an exemption to the area’s height limits.
Centre City Development Corp., the agency in charge of downtown redevelopment, considers exemptions if buildings are built back from the street in slender towers, as Shea has proposed. The exemption criterion is written to avoid having entire blocks filled with short, squatty buildings more apt to block views corridors.
Harbour Court’s design has already begun to receive some initial approvals. CCDC’s resident advisory committee unanimously recommended Thursday the project’s approval, as has a subcommittee of CCDC board of directors. Both also recommended some modifications to the design, as has the CCDC staff.
The full CCDC board will review the project Friday, with the City Council tentatively scheduled to review it next month.
“Overall, we liked it a lot,” said Cecilia Contini, chairwoman of the residents advisory committee.
Thomas Noon, president of Shea’s San Diego division, said his company felt the revitalization of downtown and the focus of CCDC and the City Council on it were critical factors in deciding to build Harbour Court.
“Downtown just seems to be a success waiting to happen, though it’s not quite there yet,” Noon said. “We believe it’s going to work.”
The building’s designers are Toronto-based Page & Steele Architects, who worked with the Austin Hansen Group of San Diego, the landscape architects. Austin Hansen is the designer of the linear park that will run next to Harbour Court and is incorporated into its design.
