New Apartment Building Planned For Beverley Road

Over the last couple months, we’ve noticed some changes at 1608 Beverley Road–the little house that’s sandwiched between the newish condos on the corner of E 16th and the older apartment building on the corner of E 17th–and as it turns out, a new 6-story, 12-unit apartment building is planned for the lot after said little house is leveled.

The house, which is estimated to have been built in 1899, has been completely gutted at this point, and it finally looks like demolition is underway for its shell. The building has been sold five times since early 2004, hitting its peak price at $1.3 million in 2007 before dropping to $975,000 in December of last year, and finally going to the current owner for only $330,000 in September of this year. It had been boarded up for months leading up to the current construction.

According to the permit application, the “Development Challenge Process is pending Zoning Approval,” but at 2,300 square feet and 23 feet wide, the lot seems like a bit of an odd size and shape for the project planned.

It’s so narrow that we imagine tenants either being able to arm wrestle their neighbors to the east through abutting windows or hang their wet towel on the brick wall of the condo next door, and we can only hope (if the building even comes to fruition) that units will have oversized windows facing Beverley and the back of the lot, because it’s hard to believe they’ll be getting much light from the east or west sides.

A sign at the site says construction is expected to be completed in Winter 2014. So what do you think of a new development in the neighborhood, and the loss of an old, if long-neglected, house?

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