Apartment construction near Gonzaga set for spring

Southern California developers plan to build a 60-unit student apartment complex on the west edge of Gonzaga University.

David Schneider, director of a development group based in San Clemente, said he and his partners plan to build a second student housing complex in the Spokane University District after the GU project is finished in summer 2016.

Schneider said his company has done several off-campus projects, including construction near Michigan State University and near a California State University campus.

Their project, called the Ruby Apartments, will go into an acre of land on the east side of Ruby Street northeast of the former CompUSA building. It adjoins one of Gonzaga’s parking lots and is a stone’s throw from the school’s Dussault Apartments.

Construction costs are estimated at $10 million for the five-floor building with about 102,000 square feet.

The 60 units will be furnished with flat-screen TVs, wireless service and keycard security systems. He anticipates rents will be the $700-per-month range, with all utilities included.

“All the students will need is their bedsheets, their plates and their artwork. Everything else will be provided,” Schneider said.

The complex will be made up of two- and three-bedroom units, with a capacity for 200 beds, he added.

It took a significant amount of money to hire crews to blast away the basalt rock that had made previous developers shy away from the land. Schneider said crews from Baker Construction used explosives to take out the rock.

“It was more work than we thought at first. There was so much rock; it was almost like one large mountain of basalt,” he said.

The groundwork is done and foundations will go in next spring.

Schneider said his firm’s research found Gonzaga would rather assist or support private developers for off-campus housing at a time of tight budgets and instead focus on academic buildings. It’s the same situation at WSU Spokane.

Dennis Colestock, Gonzaga’s director of housing and residence life, said most undergraduates find a sufficient number of apartments and rental homes. It’s the graduate students and law school students who seem to want more choices for near-campus apartment choices.

Schneider said the development company hasn’t settled on a site for the University District complex. It will have 120 units – twice as large as the Ruby Street project. Among the options is possible conversion of the historic Jensen-Byrd Building, which one Texas company intended to tear down and replace with student apartments. That plan failed as historic preservationists rallied in opposition, saying the six-story building should be saved rather than razed.

WSU officials are looking at a variety of options for the 105-year-old commercial warehouse building that sits on the east side of the University District. It expects to present a plan for the building at the December WSU regents meeting.

“That building presents historical issues and some massive design problems” because of low ceilings and other structural concerns, Schneider said. “It has pluses and minuses,” he said, leaving it a possible option but probably not his firm’s top priority.