Second Tower Plan Withdrawn for 446 Fourth Street South in St. Petersburg

A second high-rise plan for the 0.7-acre parcel at 446 Fourth Street South in downtown St. Petersburg has fallen away. The Beach Company, a Charleston, South Carolina, developer, withdrew its application for a 16-story, 165-unit apartment tower across from the USF St. Petersburg campus before it reached the city's Development Review Commission, St Pete Catalyst reported on October 21. An earlier, larger tower from Stadler Development won city approval in February 2025 but was never built (St Pete Catalyst).

What Happened

According to records reviewed by St Pete Catalyst, Beach Company development manager Morgan Bentivegna emailed city zoning official Corey Malyszka on September 21 asking to pull the application from the commission's October 7 agenda. The email gave no reason (St Pete Catalyst). The hearing had already been pushed from September to October before the withdrawal (St Pete Catalyst). City spokesperson Samantha Bequer confirmed that no replacement application has been filed, and the property currently has no approved project moving toward construction (St Pete Catalyst).

During departmental review in August and September, most city departments raised no objections. The Engineering and Capital Improvements Department, however, flagged that foundations and structural elements could not extend into state rights-of-way or over a sewer line, and warned that the restriction could force changes to the building footprint (St Pete Catalyst). St Pete Catalyst noted that the documents do not show whether those engineering conditions influenced the decision to withdraw (St Pete Catalyst).

The Site and Its Constraints

The parcel sits at the northeast corner of Fourth Street South and Fifth Avenue South, across from USF St. Petersburg (St Pete Rising). It holds a roughly 105-year-old commercial building, formerly a Fresenius Kidney Care dialysis center, and a surface parking lot (St Pete Rising). The Florida Department of Transportation controls both Fourth Street South and Fifth Avenue South, and an alley called Delmar Terrace runs along the northern edge with an eight-inch sanitary sewer line beneath it (St Pete Catalyst). On a lot this small, a building that cannot push foundations into the adjacent rights-of-way or over the alley sewer has very little room to fit a parking podium, ground-floor retail and an efficient residential floor plate.

Two Plans, Side by Side

• Stadler Development (approved February 2025): A 21-story, 245-foot tower with 213 apartments, about 2,250 square feet of commercial space and 230 parking spaces (St Pete Rising). St Pete Catalyst reported the project's cost at $67 million when it was first reported in January 2025 (St Pete Catalyst). Stadler later said it had not finished its feasibility analysis before seeking approval because its due diligence period was short, and that the parcel was too small to meet city requirements and its ground-floor needs in a financially workable way (St Pete Catalyst).
• The Beach Company (withdrawn 2026): A 16-story, roughly 195-foot building with 165 apartments, about 3,200 square feet of ground-floor retail, a 176-space garage and 178 bicycle spaces, designed by Charlotte-based Housing Studio (St Pete Rising; Florida YIMBY). The application listed a construction value of about $54 million and a floor area ratio of 6.0, below the 7.0 allowed under the site's DC-2 zoning (St Pete Rising). The design drew on Art Moderne and historic warehouse architecture, with a masonry base, stucco upper floors and metal-panel accents (St Pete Rising).

The second plan was a deliberate step down. It was 50 feet shorter than the Stadler tower, with 48 fewer apartments and 54 fewer parking spaces (St Pete Rising), which Florida YIMBY described as roughly a 22 percent cut in unit count (Florida YIMBY). Even the smaller program did not make it to a hearing.

Where Things Stand in the Downtown Market

The withdrawal comes as downtown St. Petersburg's construction pipeline has thinned. St Pete Catalyst reported that downtown had roughly a dozen active tower cranes a year ago and has one today, at The Cade Residences, a seven-story condo project overlooking Mirror Lake (St Pete Catalyst). The outlet also cited a Marcus & Millichap report finding that apartments under construction in the Tampa-St. Petersburg market fell in the first quarter of 2026 to their lowest level since early 2021 (St Pete Catalyst).

St. Petersburg commercial real estate broker Jon Wittner, whose firm worked with prospective buyers of the site but never represented the owner, pointed to high interest rates, rising insurance and construction costs, and oil price volatility that affects fuel, transport and materials (St Pete Catalyst). He also noted a possible offset: with fewer projects bidding, contractors are more competitive and some construction prices are falling (St Pete Catalyst).

The picture is not uniform. Larger, better capitalized projects are still moving, such as the 330-unit tower that secured a $125 million construction loan earlier this month and the twin condo towers Kolter plans for the Hilton Bayfront site. Smaller infill rental sites with tight footprints appear to be the ones struggling to pencil, a theme that also runs through the regional refinancing gap facing Tampa Bay apartment owners.

Implications for Owners, Developers, Contractors and Subs

• Developers: Both plans on this site ran into the same basic problem: a 0.7-acre parcel bounded by state roads and a sewer alley. Early structural and civil feasibility, including right-of-way and utility constraints, needs to happen before entitlement, not after.
• Owners and land sellers: An approval alone does not make a site buildable. Prices that assume the maximum zoning envelope can outrun what a parking podium and foundation system can actually deliver.
• General contractors: A slower pipeline means more competition for the residential towers that do move forward. Preconstruction input on podium layouts, foundation systems near rights-of-way and utility relocation can be the difference between a project that pencils and one that is withdrawn.
• Subcontractors: With fewer cranes in the air downtown, structural concrete, curtain wall and podium trades in St. Petersburg face a thinner near term backlog, though the competitive bidding Wittner described may help marginal projects restart.

What to Watch

• Whether a new application is filed for 446 Fourth Street South, and whether it addresses the right-of-way and sewer conditions engineers identified (St Pete Catalyst).
• Any change in the downtown crane count as projects such as the Hilton Bayfront towers and other financed rental buildings move toward construction.
• Construction pricing in Tampa Bay, and whether softer bids bring stalled infill projects back to the table.

Bottom Line

Two developers, two different tower designs and one approval have produced no construction at 446 Fourth Street South. The site's size and its state road and sewer constraints are a recurring obstacle, and the broader slowdown in downtown St. Petersburg's rental pipeline has made it harder to absorb that kind of complexity.

Related Coverage

• Kolter Plans Twin 44-Story Condo Towers on St. Pete's Hilton Bayfront Site
• Tampa Bay Apartment Owners Face Refinancing Gap as Boom-Era Loans Mature
• PTM Partners Lands $125M Construction Loan for 330-Unit St. Petersburg Tower
• 363-Unit ClearView Tower Completed at Echelon City Center in St. Petersburg

Image credit: The Beach Company, via St Pete Catalyst. Image from the source article.

Sources

• St Pete Catalyst, "Two developers, two failed plans for one St. Pete site": https://stpetecatalyst.com/two-developers-two-failed-plans-for-one-st-pete-site/
• Florida YIMBY, "Developer Proposes 16-Story Mixed-Use Tower for 446 4th Street South, St. Petersburg, Florida": https://floridayimby.com/2026/08/developer-proposes-16-story-mixed-use-tower-for-446-4th-street-south-st-petersburg-florida.html
• St Pete Rising, "16-story apartment tower proposed to replace larger approved project near USF St. Pete": https://stpeterising.com/home/16-story-apartment-tower-proposed-to-replace-larger-approved-project-near-usf-st-pete