Today, the spread of green to the immediate north of Parkway Center Mall is an unused driving range. But a Florida-based contractor and a local developer want to turn those 26 acres into a 10-building, 418-unit "high-end residential village" of town homes, lofts and condos.

DeLorenzo & Co. LLC, based in Moon, began scouting the location two years ago and was the local fixer for Coral Gables' SouthStar Development Partners, which bought the property in spring 2007 for $1.1 million.

They've been touting the proposed development as "transit oriented" -- a high-density, close-to-the-bus line complex that would allow residents to get Downtown in a jiffy or walk to work at the Parkway Center offices nearby. Cities across the country are promoting high-density housing near transportation hubs to cut down on urban sprawl and to make better use of mass transit, taking cars off the highways.

The project, to be called City Vista at Parkway, began to take shape this week, with renderings that were unveiled before the city's planning commission. Lynn R. DeLorenzo, principal with DeLorenzo & Co., said the units would start at $150,000, with most of them between 800 and 2,100 square feet.

Many upper units would have a view of the city skyline. A gatehouse at the entrance would give the complex a private feel, as would the swimming pool and clubhouse that would sit at the middle of the property. The renderings call for a lot of brick and glass.

Originally, the developers had considered a mixed-use plan with some retail below the residential units. But Parkway Center -- both the 10-building office park, and the nearby mall of the same name -- suffer from high vacancy rates. Irving Firman, attorney for the development, said SouthStar and DeLorenzo & Co. hope that adding several hundred residential units to the mix could inject some life into a lifeless business corridor.

Parkway Center Mall, which has closed its bottom floor and whose biggest tenants are K-Mart and Giant Eagle, is owned by Kossman Development Co. of Pittsburgh, as is a nearby hotel. The office buildings also once were owned by Kossman, which sold the buildings to a Philadelphia company.

Now, the buildings have various owners, including Greentree Parkway Associates, which is the company that dealt the vacant driving range to SouthStar last year.

Because the development is bisected by the boundary separating Green Tree and Pittsburgh, the developers will have to seek planning approval from both municipalities; 240 of the units will be in the Green Tree high-rises, and 178 of the units will be in the shorter buildings on the Pittsburgh side of the property. If the project keeps to its preferred schedule, digging could begin next year, with the first units ready by 2010.

It would be one of the larger recent owner-occupied residential developments within the city limits (even though it straddles the city line). For example, 151 First Side, the first new condo tower to be built Downtown in years, has 82 units. Summerset at Frick Park covers more than 100 acres, and eventually will have more than 700 townhomes, apartments and single-family units. DOC-Economou is planning for 150 condos and townhomes at the intersection of Baum Boulevard and Liberty Avenue, while the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust's $460 million, 700-unit residential complex was put on hold indefinitely.