A large site in the heart of Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood may soon be home to a large mixed-use construction with hundreds of apartments and a grocery store.
Plans call for a seven-story, 335,700-square-foot building at 359 Halket St. near UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital and the fork of Boulevard of the Allies and Zulema Street on land owned by the University of Pittsburgh.
That would require the razing of a decades-old eight-story hotel, which has sat vacant for years, according to Tim Gigliotti, managing director at Villanova-based Radnor Property Group.
Radnor and Pitt have entered a public-private partnership that will see Pitt maintain its ownership of the land, while Radnor owns and operates the building — which will be called “Zulema.”
“Beyond providing the university with revenue, Radnor Property Group’s project will transform a key gateway site in Oakland to address housing and grocery needs of the community,” Pitt spokesman Jared Stonesifer said in a statement.
Despite the building’s proximity to Pitt and Carlow University, however, Gigliotti said the company does not imagine undergraduates as its primary renters.
He said Radnor would market the building more toward graduate students and professionals.
Floor plans for the building displayed at a meeting with Oakland neighborhood groups this week call for 265 apartments, about half of which would be one-bedroom units. Roughly another third would be studio units.
Developers are also planning 236 parking spaces, most of which would be located at an on-site garage accessed via Halket Street.
Though small neighborhood markets like Groceria Merante exist nearby, a planned 22,500-square-foot grocery store on the building’s ground level would offer the neighborhood its first supermarket.
The closest other large grocers are across the Mon in the South Side or farther east in Shadyside, Squirrel Hill or Greenfield.
Gigliotti said Radnor was in negotiations with several grocers to fill the space but declined to name them.
Zulema will mark Radnor’s first partnership with Pitt, but the company has worked extensively with nearby Duquesne University, where it renovated Brottier and St. Martin halls and built the new McGinley Hall. The company also served as development manager and formerly owned the Alcoa Business Center on Pittsburgh’s North Side.
Strip District-based Indovina Associates Architects — who are handling the design of the building — have worked on around 20 projects with Pitt, including renovations at Ruskin Hall and the Barco Law Library, according to principal architect Ryan Indovina.
“We’re thrilled to be part of the southern gateway to Oakland,” he said.
The project will next proceed to an as-of-yet unscheduled Pittsburgh Planning Commission meeting. Gigliotti said he doesn’t expect the building to require any zoning variances.