Quick Take
Downtown Santa Cruz is set for big changes in the coming years with a new, expanded downtown envisioned south of Laurel Street. A Texas-based developer wants to be the first one in the new neighborhood.
For years, local leaders and the city government have been working toward a generational change in Santa Cruz’s built environment by expanding the city’s downtown footprint into the area south of Laurel Street, known as SoLa. Now, a Texas developer wants to be one of the first in the new neighborhood.
Dallas-based Lincoln Property Company has submitted a pre-application for what it’s calling SOLA 201, an eight-story, 245-unit mixed-use development at 201 Front St., replacing the existing Ace Hardware. Early plans for the project show a building reaching 85 feet tall, a four-level parking garage with 256 spaces and 10,000 square feet of ground-floor commercial space.
The development would fill the entire block bounded by Front Street and Pacific Avenue to the east and west, respectively, and Laurel and Spruce streets to the north and south.
Santa Cruz Planning Director Lee Butler teased the project during Thursday’s planning commission meeting, where the city’s panel of land-use experts approved the regulatory changes needed to create the SoLa neighborhood. The city council, which holds the final say, could vote on the changes as soon as May. Butler used the project as a proof of concept for the city’s proposed downtown density bonus program.
The program is in response to the widespread community concerns about recent state laws — known as a density bonus — that allow developers to ignore local height limits if they include affordable housing in their projects.
The city’s downtown density bonus program aims to incentivize future developers to cap their building heights at 12 stories by allowing wider structures and softening affordable housing requirements. Developers who use the city’s program would need to provide slightly more affordable units than the state requires, but they wouldn’t need to be as deeply subsidized.
During Thursday’s meeting, Butler said the project, designed by California-based architecture firm AO, was “expected to result in more than 30% of total units being affordable and perhaps much more.” However, early project plans make no mention of affordability, only that the project seeks a mix of studios and one-to-three-bedroom units. Lookout was unable to reach the developer ahead of publication.
According to Lincoln Property Company’s website, SOLA 201 will be the developer’s first in Santa Cruz. In 2024, the company, which has offices and developments in several major U.S., made a $5,000 campaign donation to the No on Measure M campaign, which sought to defeat a 2024 ballot measure that wanted to restrict tall buildings in Santa Cruz.
“With its important location, this project is poised to become a unique landmark and a visual statement to the Santa Cruz urban context,” the developer’s project application reads. “The design seamlessly integrates into the urban setting, offering a bold contemporary metropolitan aesthetic, while maintaining a harmonious relationship with the heritage, charactor [sic] and urban vibe of Santa Cruz.”
If the project makes it out of the pre-application phase, the developer will submit a formal application, after which the public will have multiple opportunities to weigh in.
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