Landmark Eyes 110-Unit Tower Across From UC Berkeley

Landmark Properties wants to build 110 student apartments across the street from UC Berkeley.

The Georgia-based developer has filed plans to build a 12-story tower at 2530 Bancroft Way, the San Jose Mercury News reported.

It would replace a Main Street-style storefront between Telegraph Avenue and Bowditch Street, leased by the Bancroft Clothing Company, known for its large selection of licensed Cal merch.

Plans call for a building with 11 studios, 11 one-bedroom, 35 two-bedroom, 12 three-bedroom and 41 four-bedroom apartments. Of those, 11 units would be set aside as affordable for very low-income households.

The highrise would have 2,200 square feet of ground-level shops and restaurants.

The beige building, designed by Trachtenberg Architects, would feature banks of vertical windows, with large eaves and balconies outside floor-to-ceiling doors and windows.

Landmark has already made its mark on the East Bay college town.

Next to the proposed development site, the Athens-based developer built The Standard at Berkeley, a 318-unit complex at 2580 Bancroft, now billed as “luxury student housing off-campus near UC Berkeley.”

At 210 Milvia Street west of campus, Landmark built the 98-unit Stonefire, another luxury student housing complex in a city short of student housing.

In November, Landmark paid $27.7 million for a commercial building at 2190 Shattuck Avenue, where it filed plans to build a 25-story, 326-unit apartment tower. Slated to be completed in 2026, it would be the company’s third student housing complex in Berkeley.

Plans by Landmark to welcome incoming students haven’t fared well in Florida.

Landmark was forced to turn students away last month from an unfinished housing complex near the University of Miami. It has put students up at a Miami Beach hotel until their flats are finished.

— Dana Bartholomew