A new 45-unit apartment complex is planned for the South Broad District by a Chattanooga development group in what could be the first such housing to go up in the area in decades.

The $5 million complex is slated for West 25th and 26th streets in two buildings, said developer Bo Oglesby.

He said the apartment buildings, probably three stories each, would be located within a couple of hundred yards of a new Tennessee Riverwalk trailhead at the U.S. Pipe/Wheland Foundry site.

This aerial view of the South Broad District shows the large Wheland/U.S. Pipe site in the foreground and is looking east toward The Howard School.

"People could easily get downtown," said Oglesby, who's developing the project with builder Mike Berry.

Plans call for the units to be mostly studio efficiencies and one-bedroom apartments, Olgesby said. He said work is to start this summer with completion in early 2019.

Planners in the South Broad District have envisioned a potential array of new housing and other projects for the 10-square-block area just south of Interstate-24.

A preliminary blueprint of the district's future unveiled last September after an intensive community planning effort included a multi-use minor league baseball park anchoring the area.

The early vision for the district also called for new housing, retail and better connections between Howard School with the rest of the area and potentially adding a new middle school.

Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke said recently that areas just outside of downtown, such as Cherokee Boulevard, Highland Park and South Broad Street, are seeing more development.

"The market is pushing these areas," he said.

Randall Taylor of Neuhoff Taylor Architects said the apartment project may be the first in the area south of Interstate 24 in years.

"That area is changing," he said.

Oglesby said he and Berry have been looking at doing something on the vacant tract such as apartments for the last three or four years.

While there have been new apartment projects coming out of the ground off South Broad Street in and closer to downtown, Oglesby said they believe there's room for more.

"We feel like there's still plenty of absorption," he said.

Oglesby said the developers have closely followed last year's South Broad District planning process. He noted that West 26th was seen as a major east-west corridor connecting a potential ballpark with Howard School.

The district is roughly bounded by the foundry property, I-24, Howard School and Chattanooga Creek.

In 2016, South Broad LLC and DEW LLC sought rezoning changes to a 7.5-acre parcel taking up parts of a three-square-block tract between South Broad and Long streets and West 26th and 27th streets.

Apartments, single-family homes, townhouses and new retail were envisioned, though nothing has been built so far.

Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6318.