San Diego Planning Commission Approves 70-Unit Condo Project in DTLA

On September 24th, the San Diego Planning Commission approved a Tentative Map and Coastal Development Permit amendment for a 70-residential unit condominium building under construction in Downtown San Diego’s Little Italy neighborhood.

The eight-story mixed-use building, located at 915 West Grape Street, would include six affordable dwelling units, about 1,500 square feet (SF) of ground-floor commercial space, and 79 parking spaces. The project’s residential unit mix is 17 studios, 40 one-bedroom units, and 13 two-bedroom units. The six restricted affordable dwelling units would be dedicated for rent to low-income households between 30% and 80% of the Area Median Income (AMI) for no fewer than 55 years.

The original permits for the project were granted by Civic San Diego on September 30, 2015, and the project was unanimously approved without conditions by the Downtown Community Planning Council on December 13, 2017.

The project, owned by Cyrus Pacific LLC, is located one block east of Downtown’s Waterfront Park, two blocks west of Little Italy’s neighborhood center, and directly adjacent to the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System (MTS) railroad and trolley tracks.

The project, designed by DBRDS, is a Type-III wood-framed structure over a two-level concrete podium structure at grade. Board-formed architectural concrete with storefront glazing make up the required street walls along Grape Street and California streets. The upper portions of the street walls are divided into several components clad in smaller scale materials of brick and metal panels or exterior plaster/architectural concrete and wood panels that extend to the ground-floor residential apartments along California Street.