Via City of Phoenix
By Corina Vanek | Arizona Republic
A redevelopment project in downtown Phoenix aiming to make better use of the transit depot at Central Avenue and Van Buren Street is on track to begin opening for student housing in the fall 2024 semester.
Central Station, which will include two towers, one for student-oriented housing and one that will be traditional apartments, recently reached a construction milestone the developer called “bottoming out,” meaning the underground excavation work to clear a pit for the underground parking lot has been completed.
The milestone is significant, designers of the project said, because the below-grade parking structure will allow the project to be urban and walkable on the ground floor, without visible parking.
“It’s not easy to build below-grade parking, but it is important to create a vibrant, urban environment that is not full of parking,” Krista Shepherd, principal at Multistudio, the designer of the project, said.
What will be built at Central Station?
The finished development will require incorporating the bus station, which was temporarily relocated during construction, and the existing light rail lines that border either side of the site. The development will also include 70,000 square feet of office space and ground-floor retail space.
The student housing portion, which will be a 22-story tower with about 240 units, is planned to be open ahead of the 2024 school year, Gary Holloway Jr., CEO of GMH Communities, the developer and operator of the project, said. The student housing tower will be called Anova, a brand that GMH has begun building in several markets around the country.
