The project, to be known as Pearl City Lofts, is being done by building owner Jonathan Dubinski and architect Don Harrington. The pair presented the site plan for approval during last week’s Planning Commission meeting.

“You know the location, 16 Scott, is pretty sturdy, well worn but pretty sturdy, strong, good exterior masonry walls, really, really heavy timber interior structure of columns, vertices and beams, and a very thick, three and a half inch solid wood floor,” Harrington said.

On the interior Harrington said they will be creating lofts, with the first floor being four three-bedroom apartments that includes one- to two-bedroom handicapped accessible units on the first floor, with the second floor including some potential extra living or sleeping spaces in the loft with the whole floor having five apartments including the loft, and another five on the third floor, for a total of 14 units.

The building already has a sprinkler system and is set to be all electric. Electric energy for the building and whether or not that would go back into the grid, along with another possibility of using water to capture extra energy being made, and as to when it will be determined if it will be water or battery storage was discussed. There is a mechanical room for battery storage set in the back of the first floor, away from any living spaces if anything catastrophic should happen. It was noted that this is also expensive so if another idea is found to work better that will be done instead.

Pictured is 16 Scott Street, future home of Pearl City Lofts. P-J photo by Sara Holthouse

Heating and cooling was then discussed with the planning commission, along with any environmental impacts, remediation, parking, landscaping, and drainage.

The pair also discussed how the building will look, including that the plan is to make it look less like a warehouse, while also keeping the industrial feeling and keeping a little bit of the bricks of the outside walls.

The idea for the apartments to be three bedrooms also came because Dubinski said he received multiple calls about them.

“What turned me onto doing it this way was that I kept getting calls from people about doing three bedrooms, three bedrooms, three bedrooms,” Dubinski said. “We have tons of weird ones and twos but we don’t have any nice twos and threes. So, that was like, my phone never stops ringing with people inquiring about it, we should build it like that.”

Dubinski then briefly discussed trying to buy adjoining properties to add more greenspace, and being unsuccessful, though he said he is still bothering some of the people to get some more. There will be landscaping and sidewalks, and he said they will try to make it look “as pretty as possible”, including a low fence to try and make sure people feel secure.

After some more discussion about parking, drainage and storm drains around the property, the commission approved the site plan for the Pearl City Lofts project, with the contingency that they will continue to work with the Department of Public Works on landscaping, drainage and parking plans.