Student Apartments at Playhouse Square

 A 237-unit apartment project at the intersection of Cleveland State University and Playhouse Square won final approval from a city commission, setting the stage for construction after more than a year of talks.

The Cleveland City Planning Commission gave its unanimous OK on Friday to Clayco Realty Group's student-housing plan at East 18th Street and Euclid Avenue. An 11-story building, containing roughly 535 beds in furnished apartments, will replace a pair of vacant buildings owned by the Jewish Federation of Cleveland. The proposed student-apartment building will be at East 18th Street and Euclid Avenue. Clayco gained an initial round of city approvals inearly 2014, but spent most of a year tweaking designs and trying to sort through financing challenges.

Revised plans show a taller building, with more apartments, than Clayco originally envisioned. Instead of weaving a four-level garage into the building, the developer essentially will erect a parking platform just south of the apartments - a much less costly way to add 76 spaces to an existing, 100-car lot. Members of a city design-review committee gave the revisions a thumbs-up Thursday, after the developer made aesthetic adjustments to the apartment building's facade. On Friday, Planning Commission Chairman Anthony Coyne commended Clayco for reworking the building's design, with input from the city's planning staff.

But Coyne and Lillian Kuri, another commission member, reiterated that they wished Clayco had incorporated retail - a coffee shop, for example - into the project. The building's Euclid side will house a cafe and a fitness center, but those spaces will be accessible only to residents and their guests.

Rob Lochner, a Clayco vice president of development, told the planning commission that the company hopes to start clearing out the existing buildings and preparing them for demolition in March or April. The apartments would open in time for the fall 2016 semester. The Jewish Federation moved to Beachwood in 2010, emptying out its longtime headquarters building and the Rogers Building at 1720 and 1750 Euclid Ave. Clayco has not disclosed what it will pay for that real estate, which the Cuyahoga County Fiscal Office values at nearly $3 million.

By Michelle Jarboe McFee, The Plain Dealer