New Senior Housing for Northway Business Park
A rendering of the first phase, a twenty-four-unit, three-story building with a mix of studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments.
Photo Credit: Cook Inlet Housing Authority
Cook Inlet Housing Authority (CIHA) can proceed with a seventy-two-unit senior housing development in the Airport Heights neighborhood. The 4.3-acre wedge at the corner of DeBarr Road and Northway Drive, an area known as Northway Business Park, required rezoning, which the Anchorage Assembly approved last month.
Toward a Summer Groundbreaking
The rezone eliminated a “special limitation” in place since 1982 that required a site plan review for development. CIHA President and CEO Gabe Layman says, “We are grateful to our partners in the mayor’s office and the Assembly for considering new tools, resources, and local partnerships to create more affordable housing opportunities in Anchorage.”
The senior housing campus is the first project to successfully utilize rezoning policy reform as part of Mayor Suzanne LaFrance’s goal to add 10,000 dwellings in Anchorage by 2035.
“When we launched the ‘10,000 Homes in Ten Years’ strategy, we promised to cut the red tape that stalls projects,” LaFrance says. “[The Assembly’s] approval is proof our reforms are working, allowing Cook Inlet Housing Authority to move toward a summer groundbreaking that otherwise would have been delayed.”
Both the policy reform and the Assembly’s approval of the zoning change were a long time coming, says CIHA spokesperson Sezy Gerow-Hanson.
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“For years, CIHA, along with other developers, has been working with local officials to review and revise zoning and building codes that create barriers to housing development,” she explains. “Mayor LaFrance has taken the position that we should not make it more challenging to develop housing than other uses in our code, especially at a time when we need housing units of all types.”
The campus would be adjacent to an apartment complex, the Penland Park trailer court, and light commercial properties near Bragaw Street, including the headquarters of CIHA’s sister nonprofit Cook Inlet Tribal Council. The site selection was very deliberate.
“We liked the access to public transportation, proximity to healthcare, and proximity to other supportive services for our residents,” Gerow-Hanson says. “With 4.3 acres, we feel there will be an opportunity to create a campus-like feel over the three phases of development. This will allow us to provide on-site, shared amenities for the seniors who live there.”
Those amenities include a large multipurpose room with kitchen space to facilitate potlucks, classes, holiday celebrations, and resident-led activities, as well as shared, furnished common space on each floor for socializing, Gerow-Hanson says. A second multipurpose room with space for exercise programs and other activities is expected in the Phase II development. Outdoor garden spaces will include “active and contemplative programmatic elements reflective of our Alaska Native heritage and Dena’ina land,” she adds. Residents will have access to all complex amenities regardless of which building they live in.
Phasing plan through 2028 for the vacant lot at DeBarr Road and Northway Drive.
Photo Credit: Cook Inlet Housing Authority
The complex will be built in three phases over several years. Phase I includes a twenty-four-unit, three-story building with a mix of studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments, Gerow-Hanson says. Phase II will have a similar footprint. Phase III is currently planned as six fourplexes, but changes in market conditions over the next three years could lead to design modifications, she adds.
Apartments at the mixed-income property will be open to residents 55 and older, with some set aside for income-eligible households and others available at market rate. As with all CIHA’s senior-specific housing, the layout and design of the complex were intentional.
“We are addressing the ability to age in place and live independently longer through intentional design choices and amenities,” Gerow-Hanson says. These include secure buildings with elevators and accessible floor plans that can be modified to meet residents’ changing needs.
Despite being available only to seniors, Gerow-Hanson says the complex is an important component in helping to ease Anchorage’s overall housing crunch.
“In a healthy continuum of housing, you have households moving from rental apartments to starter homes to longer-term, larger homes and then downsizing as their household size decreases to smaller condos or rental housing,” she explains. “If we don’t have enough of any one of these types of housing, we will see a bottleneck—or worse, complete gridlock.”
CIHA plans to break ground on the development this summer, with construction expected to be completed in fall 2027.
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