The rising cost of land in city centers, an increased interest in walkable neighborhoods and growth in online car shopping have made urban dealerships tempting targets for redevelopment.

Standing on the outdoor terrace of an office tower being built on the west side of Los Angeles, one can easily see why the location is such a selling point. The Santa Monica Mountains lie to the north, the Expo Line light rail has a stop one block south, and the Pacific Ocean stretches westward.

But Dan Martin sees history: His family’s car dealership, Martin Cadillac, once the busiest on the West Coast, previously sat on the five-acre construction site; he was born in 1974, the same year it opened.

A massive bank of garages and maintenance bays where Mr. Martin used to fetch parts as a summer job will be replaced by 600 apartments. New office space, leased by Riot Games, and storefronts will stand where rows of flashy Eldorados and Coupe DeVilles once impressed commuters at the busy corner of Bundy Drive and Olympic Boulevard.

“This is an ocean of opportunity,” said Douglas H. Metzler, West Coast chief executive of Hines, the developer collaborating with the Martins to redevelop the site, called West Edge. “To do a pre-eminent project in Southern California, you need scale, you need quality, and you need density.”

The idea of finding new uses for car lots has existed for decades, but the transformation of Martin Cadillac illustrates how trends in real estate and the auto industry are rapidly converging. The rising cost of land in downtown areas and a premium on walkable commercial districts have recently made urban car lots tempting targets for developers. And with the move toward online car shopping, dealerships no longer need large sales spaces.

“The car dealership is not going away, but it may look a lot differently in urban centers in the next 10 to 15 years,” said Brady Schmidt, president and co-chief executive of National Business Brokers, a firm that helps owners buy and sell dealerships. “What dealers are hoping for, at least the dealers that I’m talking to, is to be able to get the best of both worlds: They want to redevelop these sites to include high-density housing and not have to sell or give up their dealership to do it.”

Strategically situated on busy intersections, dealerships offer some of the last — and largest — parcels of relatively easy infill development. Most consist of a few single-story buildings and large asphalt lots, and they require relatively minor environmental cleanup. Converting dealerships into dense developments is a sort of urban upgrade; car-centric space can become something more walkable, transit-connected and ideally more sustainable.

The redevelopment projects are popping up across the nation.

In Durham, N.C., Hines plans to break ground on the former University Ford lot this year, looking to expand the American Tobacco Campus, a redeveloped factory complex with retail, restaurants and events spaces.