It could get crowded in Miami’s Arts and Entertainment District.
Developer J. Milton and Associates wants to build a residential project with a maximum of 550 units and ground floor commercial space on a 1.7-acre site sandwiched between the Filling Station Lofts apartment building and the Canvas condo tower, both of which are being developed by NR Investments.
Art Luxury Rentals LLC, which is owned by the principals of family-run J. Milton & Associates, is seeking approvals to rezone 14 lots that make up the 1.7-acre site. The change would allow the developer to increase the proposed project’s square footage by 1.2 million square feet. By right, Art Luxury Rentals can build a 36-story tower with 852 residential units totaling 674,920 square feet.
Miami-Dade property records show Art Luxury Rentals bought the 14 lots for $7.3 million in 2015. The site is located between Northeast 16th and 17th streets and Northeast Miami Court and Northeast Miami Place.
According to its application, Art Luxury Rentals would only build 525 to 550 units, but needs the rezoning in order to build larger units in the 750-square-foot to 1,300-square-foot range. Under the current zoning, J. Milton would only be able to build micro-units. J. Milton president and CEO Joseph Milton was out of town and could not be reached for comment.
The Miami City Commission is scheduled to vote on the rezoning application at its meeting next week. In exchange for the rezoning, J. Milton has offered to set aside 10 percent of the units for workforce housing if the company decides to do condos. If the project ends up being apartments, the workforce housing would jump to 14 percent.
The Arts and Entertainment District is one of Miami’s hottest neighborhoods for development. In addition to Filling Station Lofts and Canvas, NR Investments is proposing a 45-story tower with 457 condos, an 11-story, 150-room hotel and 30,000 square feet of office space on a 1.14-acre site on Northeast 14th Street between North Miami Avenue and Northeast Miami Court.
The company also wants to build a 30-story, 225-unit residential tower with 8,000 square feet of retail and some office space on two lots at 70 and 90 Northeast 17th Street and a third property at 1642 Northeast First Avenue.
Another developer, The Melo Group, is building Art Plaza, a 667-unit apartment building with 11,800 square feet of retail and restaurant space. The company recently opened Square Station, a two-tower, 710-unit apartment building at 1424 Northeast Miami Place.