The new apartment complex IDA on McKinley will bring a new style of apartment living to downtown Phoenix while meeting almost all of the City of Phoenix’s Climate Action Plan goals.
When walking down the streets of boarding Roosevelt Row and the restaurants, bars and apartments that encompass the area, it’s hard to miss the six-story storage container building that sits on the Northwest corner of McKinley Street and Third Street. IDA on McKinley opened its doors last month and the tallest shipping container building in the nation is ready to make its impact felt throughout downtown Phoenix.
Local Studio, the team that was behind the design of IDA on McKinley, built the apartment complex with sustainability as a priority. According to Local Studio, their team emphasized the importance of meeting almost every City of Phoenix Climate Action Plan goals. The building includes two shaded solar canopy walkways, a rainwater collection system, an E-bike charging station and other measures to promote walking and biking around the city.
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Anna De La Cruz, a downtown Phoenix resident, explained how the location of the building is a perfect fit for Roosevelt Row and said that it matches the artistic style that is also seen in the area. She also explained how the addition of IDA on Mckinley may help bring more residents to downtown Phoenix.
“That being built up and giving people more options downtown is going to be really nice,” Cruz said. “It’s crowded but why is it crowded if there’s not many apartment complexes downtown.”
She hopes that the addition of the building will promote future downtown Phoenix developments to “piggyback” off of IDA on McKinley by focusing more attention on building with sustainability.
Judah Moya, another downtown Phoenix resident and student at Arizona State University’s Downtown Campus, said when construction started on IDA on McKinley, she wasn’t quite sure what the project was going to end up being, but as the project progressed, she had high hope and thought it was a great fit for the area and added a unique twist to the area surrounding Roosevelt Row.
“At first I thought it was some type of storage unit,” Moya said. “I didn’t realize people would be living in that building but now that it’s finally all coming together it’s starting to look more like an apartment.”
While she finds the building unique and even unappealing in some aspects, Moya said that she could see the construction of IDA on McKinley will be the first of many projects that attempt to become more sustainable in the downtown area.
“It can make a large impact throughout all of downtown Phoenix and the whole city hopefully,” Moya said. “Once somebody starts doing it then more people will start doing it.”
Even though there is no business currently slated to rent out the ground floor commercial area, Moya hopes that the commercial space will host a quick and healthy food option similar to ones seen on Arizona State’s Downtown Campus.
IDA on McKinley will be joining the Churchill, another building designed by Local Studio and built out of storage containers, in the Roosevelt Row district.
