Pearl gets room to grow
By Richard Webner
Downtown’s landmark development project has plenty of room to grow after the city voted Tuesday to rezone several acres around the Pearl to allow for high-density development.
Silver Ventures, the development firm that billionaire Christopher “Kit” Goldsbury formed to build the Pearl, asked the city to rezone 7.9 acres of its land to “infill development zone,” a designation which allows for a variety of commercial and residential uses like high-rise offices, apartment buildings, bars and hotels.
The rezoned acreage includes the vacant Samuels Glass Co. warehouse and roughly 3 acres touching the Museum Reach stretch of the River Walk, which has sparked a development bonanza in north downtown since it was built about a decade ago.
The vote, on the Zoning Commission’s consent agenda, cleared the way for Silver Ventures to continue the ambitious expansion of the Pearl it has undertaken over the last decade. The firm has in recent years opened Hotel Emma, one of San Antonio’s most luxurious hotels, and Cellars at Pearl, the city’s most expensive apartment complex.
Cody Doege, president of the Tobin Hill Community Association, said Silver Ventures briefed him on plans to turn the Samuels Glass property into an open-air market and to put a restaurant on the former site of the Fox Motel at 302 Newell Avenue.
Elizabeth Fauerso, a spokeswoman for Silver Ventures, said the company’s initial site plan for the Samuels Glass site is “preliminary” and “indicates an intention for mixed use and public access to the space.”
She declined to comment on possible plans for the restaurant and open-air market.
The Pearl, formerly a blighted brewery complex, has become downtown San Antonio’s greatest success story since Silver Ventures purchased it in 2001 and moved in its first tenant in 2006, thanks in large part to millions of dollars of incentives from the city and county. The community has received accolades from the Urban Land Institute and the American Planning Association.
Within the last couple years, a food hall, a jazz bar and the Hotel Emma luxury hotel have opened there, as well as the tony Cellars at Pearl apartment complex.
Another apartment complex is under construction at the Pearl across Newell from the Samuels Glass warehouse. Local credit union Credit Human is building a 10-story, $112.5 million new headquarters on Broadway with the help of an $8.8 million incentive package from the city and county. The company plans to move 435 employees there from its current headquarters on the North Side and to hire another 50 workers.
Other developers are also flocking to lower Broadway, which the city plans to turn into a landscaped boulevard with $42 million from the most recent bond package. Jefferson Bank recently purchased an entire block on the thoroughfare with plans to move its headquarters there. Downtown developer GrayStreet Partners wants to build a hotel and office tower at the crossing of Broadway and Newell.
Silver Ventures is also working on plans for a small-scale residential development on 4.74 acres of land across the street from Hemisfair, at the corner of Lavaca and Matagorda streets. The firm bought the land from San Antonio Independent School District earlier this year in a $14.5 million deal.