Riverfront, first of three big housing developments along San Lorenzo River, is underway

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The fencing is up, the buildings are coming down, and suddenly the city of Santa Cruz’s massive plans to develop along the San Lorenzo River are moving from the conceptual to the concrete.

Demolition has begun along Front Street in downtown Santa Cruz for the new apartment complex to be known as the Riverfront Apartments, which is to include 175 rental apartments with 20 set aside for low-income residents.

The Riverfront project also represents a big leap forward in the city’s long-in-gestation efforts to develop along the San Lorenzo River levee. It is the first of three projects planned for the Front Street corridor along the river between Soquel Avenue and Laurel Street. If all goes to plan, the seven-story, three-building Riverfront complex will eventually be flanked to its north by the Five 30 Front apartment building and the proposed Cruz Hotel to its south within the next three years. All three projects have ambitious plans to develop along the riverwalk with public access plazas, cafes and retail shops. Lookout has described the changes going on downtown in our continuing series “Changing Santa Cruz.”

More Santa Cruz housing coverage

• Six Blocks: A Lookout series at development happening around Front Street in downtown Santa Cruz
• A field guide to downtown Santa Cruz’s many in-progress housing developments
• Santa Cruz City Council advances plan for more than 3,700 housing units — a fourfold increase — by 2031
• Is Santa Cruz’s housing plan too dependent on UCSC’s new development?
• OPINION: New housing is coming to our communities — be part of the process

The Riverfront Apartments will take roughly two years in the construction phase, and the target date for move-in for the complex’s first residents is summer of 2025. The buildings coming down along Front Street include the former 418 Project site, India Joze restaurant and the Yoga Center Santa Cruz.

“There will be three separate buildings, separated by a plaza,” said Brandon Wang, the executive vice president for the Northern California region for the Lincoln Property Company, the project’s developer. “Along the riverfront, it’ll be great, because we’ll have picnic tables, soft seating and retail — I think there’s about 11,000 square feet of retail [in the whole complex]. It’ll be more restaurant- and cafe-focused on the riverfront, and more casual retail along Front Street.”

Architecturally, the plan to construct three buildings, said Wang, was to discourage the idea of a one giant block building, and to invite locals and visitors downtown toward the river.

The view of the Riverfront Apartments from the Laurel Street bridge. The complex will likely be in between two other major developments along the river, the Cruz Hotel and the Five 30 Front apartment complex.

“The real goal for having those three buildings was to open up the view corridors to the river,” Wang, “so it’s not just one large wall. And so it kind of gives that relief from the additional height and getting those views to the water.”

The “additional height” is a reference to what’s known as the “density bonus,” a waiver that developers can request to build vertically beyond downtown height limits if they also offer a percentage of units as affordable housing. In the case of the Riverfront project, it exists in a zone with a basic height limit of 50 feet that can be increased to 70 feet if it meets certain criteria. On top of that, the state’s density bonus allowed another 7 feet and 9 inches to the building.

A rendering of how the river levee at the Riverfront Apartments might look.

As the only one of the three Front Street projects with a building permit and with construction underway, the Riverfront project will be the first to “engage” the riverwalk. The neighboring projects each have their own plans to face the riverwalk with cafes, restaurants and other areas for recreation and relaxing for both locals and residents/guests of the new complexes. Connecting Front Street to the river will be a paseo — the Cathcart Paseo, will be one of three such entryways to the river to be located between Soquel and Laurel. The paseo will feature steps up to the riverwalk as well as design elements to entice passersby.

A rendering of the Cathcart Paseo at the Riverfront Apartments, connecting Front Street to the San Lorenzo River at Cathcart Street.

“We’re anticipating engaging with the local artist community to put murals on the walls there, and we’re still working out exactly what that art will ultimately be,” said Wang. “It’s somewhat of a canvas, if you will, to engage local artists on multiple sides of the building.”

As for residents of the new complex, Wang said that the Riverfront will offer some amenities unique to Santa Cruz and its setting near the river and the beach. Among those amenities could be surfboard storage, a surfboard repair service, wetsuit wash stations, even a pet wash station.

Lincoln Property Co. is a 58-year-old company that says it is the second-largest apartment manager in the United States. Its portfolio includes dozens of residential apartment buildings and office spaces on the West Coast, including buildings in Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco and at the Wilshire Beverly Center in Los Angeles.

FOR THE RECORD: This story has been updated with details on the density bonus and height of the Riverfront Apartments.