Parking Lot No Longer?

Will the much-disputed mixed use apartment development at E. Pine St. and Belmont Ave. E., the one that displaced a block of divey nightlife favorites, finally come to fruition? At Crosscut, Peggy Sturdivant reports that citizen activist Dennis Saxman has lost his appeal that the project violates Pike/Pine design review guidelines. (UrbnLivn first reported this rumor last week.) Saxman's appeal is the reason the block is currently a parking lot; the developer Murray Franklyn didn't want to start the project with it in legal limbo. They claim to have the financing (hard to come by these days), and the project will be apartments ( thus not competing in the softening condo market) so it'll be interesting to see if it goes forward now.