Downtown San Pedro’s construction plans for a mid-rise development on the cleared former courthouse property have run into financing delays, prompting discussions about interim uses at a downtown development panel meeting on Wednesday, Aug. 7.
In the planning stages for several years, the 8-story mixed-use building — Acqua Via at San Pedro — was set to begin construction “soon,” officials announced in June 2023, and would take about 28 months to complete.
The development, 505 S. Centre St., would feature a ground floor public food hall named Union Hall and 300 apartments, with 20% of those set aside as affordable units.
The tentative completion would be sometime in 2025.
But there’s been something of a “long COVID” effect on the financial market, which stalled the development and “effectively, the market shut down,” said Bill Cockrum, senior managing partner and president of Genton Cockrum Partners.
The $200 million project was ready to launch when instability hit the wider real estate market.
Wild swings in those markets combined with rising interest rates caused a massive pause in building and transactions, a decrease in valuations, vacancies in office and apartment buildings, and rattled investors who literally “put their pencils down” to see how things would shake out, Cockrum said.
The worst appears to be over, though, Cockrum said, and “we are ready to go,” with building permits possibly at the beginning of 2025.
But the past fallout has left the large plot of vacant land where San Pedro’s courthouse once stood still empty, which prompted discussions among San Pedro’s downtown managers this week.
A discussion about the stalled development at Wednesday’s San Pedro Property Owners’ Alliance meeting included speculation on finding an interim use for the property in the meantime.
“Boots on the ground for construction might take a couple more years,” Executive Director Ryan Blaney said in a telephone interview…
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