Old West Tampa Rising
The City Council has now approved the required zoning changes for the renovation of the Ft. Homer Hesterly Armory as Heritage Square. For over a year, the efforts to put all the pieces of the puzzle together to make this happen have been moving along. The slowness of government to act is notorious, but having to deal with a City Administration, City Council, National Guard leaders, and more has been a daunting task for everyone involved. The unanimous vote of the City Council affirmed the excitement, energy, and challenge of the Heritage Square project. Tampa was fortunate to have a number of attractive bidders for the over 10 acre site, but after much discussion and public input, the overwhelming depth of purpose of Intelident’s Heritage Square clearly prevailed.
With predictions of creating over 2,000 jobs and providing an economic impact of over $250 million a year are gigantic, that impact will not be significantly felt until late 2009 at the earliest. But there is a lot more to the story of Old West Tampa than that.
Intown Homes and Castillo Homes have built over 200 new homes in the immediate area. More than 300 townhomes and condo units are underway in the section between Howard and the University of Tampa, north of Kennedy and South of the Interstate. WalMart has announced plans to build a new store at the former Save Rite location in the same area. The Tampa Museum of Art will be temporarily locating to North Howard Avenue, just a few blocks north of the Interstate.
At the same meeting as the Armory redevelopment was approved, two additional zoning requests were presented from the immediate area, one for an organic tea and coffee location and one for a renovated office space.
With over 96,000 square feet of retail space, over 300 hotel rooms, and 850 parking spaces, Heritage Square will definitely impact the North Howard, North Hyde Park, and Old West Tampa areas, but the change is already well underway to this very central part of Tampa. And all of this in an unmotivating business climate, imagine what it will be like when the economy improves.
We have been crying from the roof tops about the Armory project for over a year and the changes in this area that are coming. If you haven’t noticed the changes in the past, just wait because the best is yet to come.
Almost all of Old West Tampa’s key business leaders attended the meeting to speak in support of Heritage Square.
We recently talked with Intelident/Heritage Square CEO, Tom Marler on TimeOutTampa. You can hear that here.
www.sohotampa.com/sohoexpands.html
www.tampagold.com/armoryheritage.html |
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