Wonder what this may mean for stores/malls along the First Coast and the shoppers they attract. However, we'll see if this ever comes to fruition.
http://jacksonville.com/2010-03-30/story/giant-retail-destination-near-i-95-aims-draw-jacksonville-shoppers-georgia
The developers of a giant shopping center designed to draw Jacksonville shoppers to Kingsland, Ga., say they’ve figured out a formula for pulling in visitors from surrounding states.
The development, described by the company as a “retail destination,” could have as many as 6,000 employees. It would include a mix of department stores and specialty shops, according to Dave Claflin, vice president of marketing for RED Development of Kansas City, Mo.
Sounds like an outlet mall on steroids to me..
They already get this Jacksonville shopper (pointing at myself with two thumbs) -- they tempted me with Fat Tire
I'll believe it when i see it. of course if i do see it, ill be there
Why do I get the feeling this will be filed under "Proposed" for a while?
Will it have a Macy's?
Sorry, couldnt resist.
Reminds me of a St JOE scheme and dream I heard about five years ago. That would be wonderfull with ten years of work. It shut down after two years.
I know an architect/developer that had tried to do some outlet malls in that south GA area. They could never get the performa could never get to be quite right.
They quote 6,000 jobs. You know there is only 13,000 people in Kingsland. I suspect many of them are Navy from Kings Bay. Not enough to support that monster with employees or customers. They are depending heavily on the I-95 travelors. The northside folks might drive up there, but they'd likely pass by the center at the Duval Road/Airport to get there and stop after the first couple of times.
Phase one would be good to get 600 jobs.
Why not just put it in Jax?? I mean Kingsbay?? people have to DRIVE all the way there? more sprawl?? Put it IN Jax not Near Jax.
Kingsland/St. Mary's is technically it's own micropolitan area, and could support "some" retail, but not just them alone.
It would draw from the overall SE GA market including the St. Mary's MSA, Brunswick, and Waycross. All of those listed have to drive to either Savannah or down here to get your traditional mall shops like what is found at The Avenues, SJTC, and Regency Square.
At the same time though, that area is not very wealthy overall, say outside of the Sea Islands and some scattered areas. Heavily relying on travelers is not a very good plan, look at the outlet mall in Darien in McIntosh County, just north of Brunswick.
Quote from: St. Auggie on March 30, 2010, 04:37:57 PM
Will it have a Macy's?
Sorry, couldnt resist.
Glad someone got to it before me
Seems like a fantasy plan to me.
Kings Bay is about the same distance from downtown as the St Augustine Outlets - about 35 miles either way on I-95. So the distance isn't really an issue.
What's confusing to me is that Camden County has the same 6% sales tax rate as St. Johns County. Either way, the different between Duval's 7% rate is going to be negligible for a consumer's decision to go there. It seems like there's just no competitive advantage ... so why build it? Couple that with the fact that Jax is still a relatively small metro which basically already has two outlet malls. I'm not sure Jax's demographics could support a 3rd one, let alone a mega-one.
Well the development company has a track record of major successes, but the line that says they're, "not sure yet about the Georgia Location," rather puts it in question. Personally now that we have the River City Marketplace I wish someone would locate a center like this at the Shipyards site, LaVilla, or out on the Westside. Our Westside and urban core are about the most overlooked locations in the sunbelt.
If they DO go into Kingsland, they almost guarantee our North Commuter Rail will someday terminate there. In fact if the developers, Kingsland, Georgia, Development Authority's and JTA would just be a bit vocal about our rail plan, we might find a ready partner to fast track the whole project. 1.3 Million people with a direct rail link right to the door of the mall couldn't be bad for business.
OCKLAWAHA
I think I will wait and see what takes place............I have reservations about a super mall so close yet so far away! As was pointed out, the difference between sales tax in Jax and sales tax there is not worth the trip to get to there!
Quote from: Coolyfett on March 30, 2010, 05:03:43 PM
Why not just put it in Jax?? I mean Kingsbay?? people have to DRIVE all the way there? more sprawl?? Put it IN Jax not Near Jax.
uh...because the state of GEORGIA is the one offering the tax breaks!
The T-U scooped British Shoe's (BS) birdie?
Quote from: tufsu1 on March 30, 2010, 09:41:00 PM
Quote from: Coolyfett on March 30, 2010, 05:03:43 PM
Why not just put it in Jax?? I mean Kingsbay?? people have to DRIVE all the way there? more sprawl?? Put it IN Jax not Near Jax.
uh...because the state of GEORGIA is the one offering the tax breaks!
Exactly. Sembler is proposing to build the biggest shopping mall/center in SC in one of the poorest counties (Jasper). Albeit it is next to the wealthiest county (Beaufort), home of Hilton Head. Still, Beaufort has only 130,000 residents and it will be miles from I-95. The local government is providing over $100 mm in tax breaks, though. It sounds crazy to me, and so does this Kingsland project.
They talked about this tonight on the local news and they said the company was also considering locations in Chicago and Houston. I'm not so sure a mega-center of this size, according to the news it's a $500,000,000.00 project, would make sense in Kingsland. I don't think most northsiders will drive there.
Y'all are just too young to remember in the day's before Disney, we'd spend all summer skinning alligators and all winter skinning Yankee's... This project has NOTHING to do with Jacksonville, Kingsland, Kings Bay, St. Marys etc. except as a place to hire more $8 dollar an hour slaves. This whole project goes back to my first line, I-95, ABOVE the St. Augustine Outlets. As vacationers pour south on the superslab, they are looking to spend, play, and indulge every whim, and their pockets are loaded. Catch those southbound birds and you'll discover El Dorado (If however the time-travel article turns out to be truth, one of us should go and explain how we created El Dorado to one
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, I'm sure he'd like to know). I'll even bet money it goes on the WEST SIDE of I-95, IE: SOUTHBOUND. Same game formula they used in the Gainesville Mall in North Texas, just below the Red River and Oklahoma Border, and I bet this same company is using on the new Razor Mall in Denton.
OCKLAWAHA