Private projects will house PSU students
http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2009/12/public-private_project_to_hous.html
Faced with what its leaders say is a critical shortage of student housing, Portland State University is turning to the private sector for help.
The university is working with American Campus Communities, a private student housing development and management company, on what could become a 16-story building with 238 apartments at 1950 S.W. Sixth Ave. The units in the College Station building could hold as many as 980 student beds.
Just across the street, Portland developer Jerry Eekhoff is working on final designs for a smaller high-rise to be called the Beacon, which would contain roughly 158 units on a smaller site at 1951 S.W. Sixth. Coupled with an existing PSU apartment complex on the same block as the Beacon, the two blocks at the south end of the campus could become the most densely populated blocks downtown.
PSU's involvement with Campus Communities is the university's first attempt to partner with a private developer.
"We can reach housing goals without consuming state dollars," says Mark Gregory, a PSU associate vice president. "We need to spend our institutional dollars on classrooms. Nobody will build those but us."
Gregory says the campus has identified an on-campus housing shortage of about 4,200 beds. As PSU enrollment approaches 28,000, he says more housing is essential to retain students.
PSU currently has 10 buildings offering campus housing, adding up to about 1,325 units, including single rooms and studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments.
View full sizeUnder a deal negotiated with Campus Communities, PSU will own the land and the company will develop, own and manage the building. The first level will contain a lecture hall, retail space and a public walkway between Southwest Fifth and Sixth avenues, with apartments on the floors above.
The U-shaped structure will be unique in another way. Its south-facing courtyard will contain a two-story, wood-framed 1894 Victorian house facing Southwest Jackson Street, now used as an office by lawyer Randal Acker, who refused to sell it.
Kurt Schultz, a principal in SERA Architecture, the firm designing the complex, sees the old house as an asset. "This is like a little jewel box sitting in the courtyard," he says. "It's really a lovely building."
Schultz says talks are underway with Acker to determine what kind of screening, if any, works best in accommodating the house and the landscaped courtyard. When the building is finished, TriMet expects to add light-rail stops on the east and west sides, a block short of the turnaround for the Green and Yellow MAX lines.
Plans for the College Station building will not be completed until early 2010. Eekhoff, who is developing the Beacon on a quarter-block site, hopes to win approval in December for his project, which would replace a vacant deli/convenience store.
His current plan, which tops out at 13 stories, has drawn opposition from some PSU students who live in the Broadway apartments bordering the Beacon site on two sides. Many of those residents will lose views of downtown and Mount Hood as life on the state's largest urban campus grows more urban itself.
