A young Milwaukee developer has a $60 million plan to revitalize the city’s 30th Street Industrial Corridor by replacing vacant industrial space with 190 apartments and a business incubator.
Que El-Amin, a 2016 graduate of Milwaukee’s ACRE program, and principal with Scott Crawford Inc., is working on the multi-year, three phase project at West Center and North 33rd Streets, a site that straddles the city’s Sherman Park and Metcalfe Park neighborhoods.
El-Amin said he has site control over the buildings between Center and West Hadley streets, east of 33rd Street. He plans on purchasing the properties as he develops them.
El-Amin is working with a larger, unnamed developer on the project.
The first phase will cost approximately $15 million and include 50 affordable and market rate apartments along 33rd Street and a community service facility with a business incubator, El-Amin said.
El-Amin is envisioning about six nonprofits in the incubator that will support the residents in his development and the surrounding community.
Phase two will cost approximately $25 million and include 80 affordable and market rate apartments. It will also include a recreational facility and health club for the community.
Phase three will be $20 million and will include the remaining 60 apartments.
The majority of the apartments will be large – about 1,700 square feet with four bedrooms to attract families, El-Amin said. Affordable units will be priced $350 a month for studios up to $1,000 a month for the four bedrooms. Market rate units will range from $650 a month to $1,200.
El-Amin is planning to finance the project with state and federal historic tax credits, low income housing tax credits and debt.
El-Amin is modeling the project after the Stacks Lofts in Atlanta and the Marquis Lofts on Sabine in Houston, which were both projects on linear parks.
“My goal and intention is to create similar nodes of activity along the 30th Street Industrial Corridor,” El-Amin said.
El-Amin’s first project was earlier this year with Alex Walker. The two are working on 3600@Villard, a $9.6 million, four-story mixed-use building on five lots at the corner of North 37th Street and Villard Avenue, which they are hoping to get approval for from the city by the end of the year.
