$90 million housing project with parking garage proposed for downtown Columbia

A $90 million housing project is being proposed along an important gateway into downtown Columbia, at the former SCANA bus storage site on Huger Street.

Details on the project are sparse, but they include a parking garage and infrastructure improvements.

Richland County Council will consider the project during a meeting Tuesday. The council may approve tax credits in exchange for the $90 million investment from the project developer. The developer is not named in county documents shared for the meeting Tuesday.

As part of the prospective deal, the developer would build a “conventional multi-housing development,” as well as a 643-space parking garage, a pocket park, new sidewalks and other infrastructure enhancements in the area.

The project site at 1409 Huger St. is one of the most prominent undeveloped properties in the core of the city, sitting at a major gateway to downtown across from The Nine student apartments on one side and the South Carolina State Museum on another.

In 2008, SCANA Corp. demolished the bus barn at the site, and the public began speculating about what would fill the prime piece of Columbia real estate.

Other proposals to redevelop the site in the past have fallen through. A supermarket and apartments were pitched in 2016 but never came to fruition.

County Council will also consider Tuesday a separate $66 million market-rate housing project at an unspecified location.

Both housing projects are requesting infrastructure credits from the county. The infrastructure credit deals require three rounds of council votes to receive final approval from the county, the first of which are expected to be taken Tuesday.