We have quite frankly been amazed at how quickly things have been changing along Ridge Avenue in West Poplar, between Spring Garden and North Broad Street. Back in April 2020, we mentioned how a long-underutilized lot just north of the intersection of Ridge Avenue and 13th Street was finally getting some love, with a number of smaller projects just getting started. When you stop by the area today, you can see just how much progress has occurred.

Quite the change, right? While things are moving on most of the rest of the lot, the northwest corner at 1315 Ridge Ave. has remained basically untouched. We had preliminary ideas that a six-story building with 20 units would be going up here when we first reported, but things have remained as in the past, in spite of the construction boom surrounding the property.

So why did we bring you back to this busy development triangle, you may ask? Because we have a better picture now of what will rise on the northwest corner of the property. Thanks to a recent zoning permit, we know that we should see a now seven-story building rising here. The new building will rise seven stories and consist of 24 units, with a commercial space on the ground floor. A drive aisle off of Ridge will allow access to 11 total car spots, though only six of them are in this new structure. In an interesting maneuver, the total number of spots is spread out across the other buildings, which also happen to be part of this same address. This HDO Architecture-designed building will include multiple balconies and some sort of indented area on the Ridge-facing facade. While we don’t have renderings yet, we’re happy to share the zoning plans to give you an idea of what’s in store.

While light on details, we conceptually think this is a great use of the space. These tricky lots call for some major thinking around how units will be divided across property lines and trying to maximize density at the corner of this CMX-3 zoned lot. We can imagine that the look and feel will mirror what’s already up along the eastern side of the site, which comes from the same developer/architect team. It is exciting seeing this area approach its full potential, not so long after much of the immediate area consisted of neglected buildings and vacant lots. Just across Wallace Street, the Residences at Park Avenue, which we checked in with back in February, are adding more homes to the former empty parcel. We can’t wait to see how this new building fits in with what’s already in progress.