Type: Multifamily housing

Units: 264

Developer: Sherman Associates

Architect: Kaas Wilson Architects

Details: Long-simmering plans for a third phase to Sherman Associates' West Side Flats apartments across from downtown St. Paul remain alive after officials extended the developer's window to finance the project.

The plans envision two buildings on a vacant, city-owned site along the Mississippi riverfront. One is a 182-unit market-rate building that would include a 5,000-square-foot restaurant on the ground floor. The other is an 82-unit building with most of the units at rents affordable to those earning between 50 percent and 60 percent of the area's median income.

City officials see the project as important because of the possible addition of affordable housing near downtown and the potential to "activate" a barren stretch of riverfront with an esplanade. Sherman indicated it has a letter-of-intent from an unnamed restaurateur who has "owned and operated a large restaurant in downtown Minneapolis for 10 years" and has proposed "a modern eclectic pub and restaurant."

The project remains contingent, however, on securing funding from the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency for the affordable portion. The developer last year didn't make the cut in its bid for a $10 million first mortgage and $1.6 million deferred loan from the state agency. It has again applied for funding for the current year, with awards expected to be announced in October.

Don Jacobson