This project should never have been permitted due to their intrusion of the river perimeter, lack of openness to/interactions with the river walk and poor architectural design (gotta love those three dominating windowless wall sections climbing up on the river side - so much for taking advantage of river views for the apartments. Better to look out at the railroad or One Call building walls!). Where was DDRB when this came up?
Not sure what you mean with 'intrusion of the river perimeter'. This was literally a (privately-owned) parking lot with no public waterfront access for decades. The developer is actually building out the public access to the river by 'extending' the Riverwalk through this property. There was a broken sidewalk thing along the waterfront before, but it did not conform to the design standards of the rest of the Southbank Riverwalk... and more importantly, the developer deeded that portion of the waterfront over to the City so now there is an actual public easement going through the property. This easement is no different that how the Northbank Riverwalk was extended from the Acosta Bridge through what is now RAM. Haskell, St Joe, Fidelity, etc all provided public easements (and in some cases paid for a portion of the Riverwalk construction) through their private properties to allow the Riverwalk to be extended.
That sort of incremental development of the Riverwalk, paid for by private developers as they develop riverfront property, is DIA's explicit strategy for continuing to extend the Riverwalk. Its no different that the old TCEA requirements to repair/enhance sidewalks/public realm under the old Downtown zoning laws (Downtown property was exempt from Mobility Fee contributions).
As to the windowless sections.... that's the parking garage. The parking garage that faces the bridge obstruction you note here:
noisy, ugly and vibrating railroad to one side, a skinny entry way through the hospital traffic (if a train isn't keeping you blocked)
Seems like the perfect location for a parking garage, considering the rail bridge in its immediate vicinity.
squeezed in with little surrounding perimeter spaces
Its an oddly shaped site. The alternative would be to simply let is sit empty as a parking lot for a few more decades. I guess I'm just too 'pro-development'.. but 'allowing' private property owners to buy/sell properties and bringing sites to a higher and better use seems logical to me. Keep in mind that the infill development to include retail and enhance the public realm leading into this apartment development seems to finally be moving forward after being stalled out for the past decade. Within a few blocks, you'll have residential, office, retail and institutional users. I don't see how that is a negative.
https://www.thejaxsonmag.com/article/retail-spaces-proposed-for-southbank-parking-garage/Where was DDRB when this came up?
The DDRB has reviewed this project extensively since 2016
https://www.thejaxsonmag.com/article/first-new-high-rise-proposed-downtown-since-2008-page-4/about as ugly as the apartments planned for Friendship Park
Architectural opinions are all subjective... but I don't think the two are remotely comparable. This development is basically coherent with the adjacent buildings... whereas the currently proposed facade treatment at the RCBC site is about as incompatible with the surrounding buildings as can be.
