The Jacksonville Daily Record has a great rendering attached to this article:
(http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/~jaxdaily/articles/09_22_10/3a.jpg)
QuoteFinance defers Adams ordinance: Budget vote looms
09/22/2010
by David Chapman
Staff Writer
With a full City Council budget vote looming next week, the final Council Finance Committee meeting Tuesday was anchors aweigh for Chair Daniel Davis, while one Downtown project was left unanchored for the time being.
An ordinance that would provide formal City support for the Jacksonville Historic Naval Ship Association to bring the retired naval vessel USS Charles F. Adams Downtown as a floating museum was deferred, to the dismay of Council member Bill Bishop, who sponsored the ordinance.
The ship association is raising funds to berth the vessel as a floating museum on the River City Brewing Company side of the Acosta Bridge, but needs City support to remove a dock in the area where the ship would be moored. The privately raised funds would go toward the dock’s removal.
While Bishop said there is no financial obligation to the City, and no incentives nor tax deferrals, other Council members decided to defer the matter until language concerns were resolved.
Full Article:
http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/showstory.php?Story_id=531928
That is a great shot right there
That looks really nice!
It appears the group has or will about to be granted the necessary easement, pending successful private donation goals.
Would this mean the public boat ramp at RCBC be closed?
This is an interesting comment... would like to know more:
Quote“Ron Barton doesn’t like this project,†said Bishop, referring to the JEDC executive director.
Quote from: fieldafm on September 22, 2010, 12:44:21 PM
This is an interesting comment... would like to know more:
Quote“Ron Barton doesn’t like this project,” said Bishop, referring to the JEDC executive director.
Ditto from my end also............why doesn't Ron like this idea? Maybe he has grandiose plans for the Ship Yards we are not privy to?
Quote from: fieldafm on September 22, 2010, 12:17:55 PM
That looks really nice!
It appears the group has or will about to be granted the necessary easement, pending successful private donation goals.
Would this mean the public boat ramp at RCBC be closed?
Not necessarily, it might just mean one hell of a long boarding dock alongside. OCKLAWAHA
Looks good to me!
Love the rendering and the project. I'm not too disappointed that council members want to review the language to make sure the taxpayer is protected, but my two worries are that
A) the Council Members are not exactly the most intelligent people in the room and will probably take a very long time to put the contract documents in front of an attorney
B) the current there is sooooo strong, I mean really strong. Couldn't that pose a challenge for any major vessel to be moored there?
I don't think the current would have any effect on a large mooring. Boats moored in Frisco are subject to harsher conditions. RCBC Marina is tricky for small boats, but not devastatingly so.
I am PERFECTLY fine that the Council wants language that no City funds will be used for this project. I like the idea, as long as no tax dollars are used.
To those concerned about "Mooring" something the size of the Adams and maybe having a problem...........simple answer is "NO"! Lines amidship X'd (middle for those not conversent in ship speak) and fore and aft (front & rear) and doubled up (two of everything) should be just fine! Thats not the only way to do it, but the cheapest! USS Alabama is in a special dock and it went through Katrina...........it has not moved! Something similar could be done for the Adams also.........just a matter of the dollars!
Dan Bean, an excutive at Holland & Knight, and retired Navy captain is at the helm concerning bringing in the USS Adams to the Shipyards.
www.actionnewsjax.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoId=4713791&navCatId=20896
www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2013/11/20/uss-adams-project-sails-closer-to.html
http://wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Charles_F._Adams_%28DDG-2%29
Very nice!!!
I wonder why they felt the need to make the hulls ship a graphic of the Jaguars? I have been a strong supporter of this, and believe it will eventually come. However it has taken almost 5 years to secure less than half of the $3M so I'm not sure a target date for mooring in DT next year is really accurate.
Quote from: JayBird on November 21, 2013, 08:53:21 AM
I wonder why they felt the need to make the hulls ship a graphic of the Jaguars? I have been a strong supporter of this, and believe it will eventually come. However it has taken almost 5 years to secure less than half of the $3M so I'm not sure a target date for mooring in DT next year is really accurate.
I understand that there is a long way to go in regard to fundraising. I would also want to make sure that enough money is raised to maintain the ship and dock in perpetuity. This sounds like the type of thing where the city gets stuck with the maintenance 15 years down the road.
^You're looking at the glass being half empty. In the event something like that happens, we could place a rusty crane on an abandoned pier, next to a rusty hulking ship and call the entire thing the Haydon Burns Jacksonville Shipyards Memorial Wharf.
Quote from: JayBird on November 21, 2013, 08:53:21 AM
I wonder why they felt the need to make the hulls ship a graphic of the Jaguars? I have been a strong supporter of this, and believe it will eventually come. However it has taken almost 5 years to secure less than half of the $3M so I'm not sure a target date for mooring in DT next year is really accurate.
With regard to Jaguar graphics. I am sure it is a hey Jags see what we can do if you donate a cool $1.5 million to our efforts.
I would assume they would charge visitors to tour the ship and that would fund the upkeep.
Fares won't cover the cost of upkeep. You'll need them, donations, lots of special events, grants, etc.
Quote from: MEGATRON on November 21, 2013, 09:02:36 AM
I understand that there is a long way to go in regard to fundraising. I would also want to make sure that enough money is raised to maintain the ship and dock in perpetuity. This sounds like the type of thing where the city gets stuck with the maintenance 15 years down the road.
Something to be concerned about, however their business plan appears to be sound and shows how within 3 years of operation they can be a financially self sufficient operation. Obviously a lot of unforeseen factors could change that. I wonder if this will be the chicken or the egg for the Shipyards.
Quote from: edjax on November 21, 2013, 09:38:54 AM
Quote from: JayBird on November 21, 2013, 08:53:21 AM
I wonder why they felt the need to make the hulls ship a graphic of the Jaguars? I have been a strong supporter of this, and believe it will eventually come. However it has taken almost 5 years to secure less than half of the $3M so I'm not sure a target date for mooring in DT next year is really accurate.
With regard to Jaguar graphics. I am sure it is a hey Jags see what we can do if you donate a cool $1.5 million to our efforts.
LoL good point!
QuoteI understand that there is a long way to go in regard to fundraising. I would also want to make sure that enough money is raised to maintain the ship and dock in perpetuity. This sounds like the type of thing where the city gets stuck with the maintenance 15 years down the road.
100% agree.
Not knowing too much about public tourism projects such as this, this is their projected plan. Seem feasible? I think a big benefit is that nothing like this exists in Florida or even the region. Mobile, AL and Charleston, SC are closest. So it could benefit tourism from the entire state as well as Georgia.
(http://i.imgur.com/P09a73D.jpg)
The business plan: http://www.adamsclassmuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/JHNSA-Business-Financial-Plan-June-2013-Edit-_2_.pdf (http://www.adamsclassmuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/JHNSA-Business-Financial-Plan-June-2013-Edit-_2_.pdf)
The site for the proposed museum: http://www.adamsclassmuseum.org (http://www.adamsclassmuseum.org)
QuoteI think a big benefit is that nothing like this exists in Florida or even the region.
Tampa does.
^ see, learn something new every day. I was basing it on the reports from JNHSA and was not aware of the S.S. American Victory. Thanks.
The Yorktown needs roughly $40-$80 million worth of work now. $13 million in USS Laffey restoration work was just completed. The Patriots Point Development Authority is looking at leasing 50 acres for infill development to help keep these floating ship museums afloat in Charleston.
QuoteThe authority has struggled to fund the enormous costs of maintaining the naval and maritime museum's ships, which sit in water near the base of the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge. Salt water has been slowly eating away at their steel exteriors for years.
The USS Laffey destroyer recently underwent a $13 million restoration. The aircraft carrier USS Yorktown needs an estimated $40 million to $80 million in repairs.
The Coast Guard cutter Ingham was given to a Key West, Fla., museum in 2009. The USS Clamagore submarine will eventually be sent to the ocean floor off the coast of Florida to be an artificial reef.
Financial issues resulted in a lack of grant support at the federal level a few years back, according to state leaders. The authority is a state agency, but it receives no state funding.
full article: http://www.charlestonbusiness.com/news/49111-development-of-remaining-land-could-buoy-patriots-point-rsquo-s-maintenance-funds
Also, fieldafm is right. The SS American Victory has been in Tampa since 1999.
http://www.americanvictory.org/
It has the benefit of being adjacent to Channelside, the Florida Aquarium and Tampa's cruise ship terminal. There's also a streetcar line that connects these venues to DT Tampa and Ybor City. I'm not sure how successful it is because you never hear anything about it.
Quote from: fieldafm on November 21, 2013, 11:22:31 AM
QuoteI think a big benefit is that nothing like this exists in Florida or even the region.
Tampa does.
the same claims have been made as to why we need an aquarium here...one guy stood up at the DIA CRA meeting and said he had to drive 6 hours to show his daughter fish....guess he ignored Marineland (owned by the GA Aquarium) or the Florida Aquarium in Tampa, which is only 3 hours away
^Or Charleston's aquarium which is 3.5 hours north.
I love aquariums, but my recollection is that a lot of them experience significant financial struggles.
^ You could even say many are currently under water.
Quote from: urban_Savvy on November 21, 2013, 02:33:34 PM
^ You could even say many are currently under water.
I'm not sure I agree. This is the dawning of the age of aquariums.
I thought that age was about a decade ago?
Quote from: thelakelander on November 21, 2013, 03:04:03 PM
I thought that age was about a decade ago?
It was, but that wouldn't fit the bad song lyric joke I wanted to make.
Turning the Shipyards property into a parking lot... awesome!
(http://members.jacksonville.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/lead_photo_wide/USSadamsRendering660x295_0.jpg)
Please no! The ship being moored there is fine but we've got to get some better utilization out of that property than just paving it.
I like the ship being there, but not a parking lot. I mean there are thousands of spaces just a few blocks away that go unused most of the time.
I like the idea of the ship too, but on no condition should that highly visible riverfront property worth millions of dollars be yet another surface parking lot.
I agree 110%, there should NOT be a parking lot there. Maybe if JTA can connect the area better people can use a shuttle bus or better yet, a Skyway extention or streetcar.
And just a piece of advice for the towing crew for the USS Adams, please wait for low-tide and maybe weigh the ship down with some weight before towing under the bridges, please!
If this ship were to hit any of the bridges, I could see it killing the whole museum idea!
With the exception of that one photo on their web site, no where is there any mention/plan/idea of building a parking lot for the museum. Access will be from Bay Street and the RiverWalk so public parking will be connected by them. That rendering was just made to fill in the picture because the rest of the area is still unknown. As Chris Flagg, the artist of rendering, said months ago "it may be a roller coaster, a carousel, a Ferris wheel, a petting zoo, or a 50 story tower on the pier and empty lot. Right now it's anyone's guess and all those and more are still on the table".
The original olans were to construct a small welcome center with gift shop on the pier alongside, however the current plan consists of locating all operations on the ship itself in hopes of spurring some sort of development immediately pier side. Now, those plans can and probably will change over the next 3-5 years that I see this project taking. I actually anticipate a solid shipyards plan and maybe even beginning constructing before this ship gets towed into town.
Something like the London Eye I hope.
^ hahaha there we go, but I think it should be called Alvin's Eye because after all it will save downtown and turn Jacksonville into the next Vegas!
Only if it has a new downtown Winn-Dixie in it....
***How in the world does this fit in with what has already been decided for the Shipyards?***
Personally, I think it's ugly.
A great celebration of the Military Industrial Complex.Yea! Jacksonville!!!This will put us on the map and draw us to Downtown as if on a military march.Forward!.....March!
My dad served aboard USN LSM 82. He loved the Jacksonville downtown waterfront and "the potential". If he were still alive I am quite certain he would agree to my outlook.
Ultimately,it is not about a naval ship but more about what the downtown riverfront is,and could be.
By the way,kayak runs alongside and underneath the Pier reveals what appears to be looming repair needs.
WOW! You guys are tough. I still think its a great idea. All aboard!
AH American History
AH Adams to Hogan
Will post more.
I'm All In
As Lake is fond of saying, 'A trick pony won't remake downtown Jacksonville.' I hold to the theory that a compact herd of complimentary trick pony's will.
The Adam's is a good start, so is the aquarium, southern music hall of fame, expansion of the Landing, a quay, art market, transportation center, another mixed use high rise or two and a streetcar/skyway link to thread them all together.
I've always liked the old shipyards site for something like this but considering the value of the real estate there is no room to expand. Perhaps Metropolitan Park or JEA site is better, the JEA site will have better access to I-95 in the near future as well, so would an Acosta Bridge site.
The trouble I see isn't that it's another 'awful military museum' as at least one has indicated, but that there isn't enough of a military museum to draw people in. The Adams was at the Bay of Pigs, and supported 'Police Actions' in Vietnam and the Mid-East and while the valor of the crew may well be the same, this is hardly the USS Alabama at Leyte Gulf in WWII. So toss in the USS Jacksonville, a very cool attack submarine which will soon be retired. Add in the crew from the 'Wings of Dreams Museum,' in Keystone Heights along with their various historic aircraft. Haul the North Florida Military Museum up from Green Cove Springs and their untouchable collection of vehicles, photos and Militariana, lastly the Museum of Southern History and the Maple Leaf Collection and you'd have a winner.
Dreaming has never been our problem. If we find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, we can do a herd of complimentary trick ponies. Until then, we're stuck in this time warp known as reality.
I can't imagine why Jacksonville needs a behemoth like a 400+ foot-long destroyer on our riverfront. Or that this single ship with a meager battle record (a few weeks at the Bay of Pigs) would draw people downtown. As mentioned already, this isn't a ship with an oversized historical profile or a recognizable name.
I've read through the executive summary of the business plan and destroyer advocates claim they will triple their revenue from the first year to the second year. But I didn't read in the plan how this extraordinary feat is accomplished.
While pride of one's service to the country is a positive attribute, burdening the cityscape of Jacksonville to satisfy that sense of pride is not. We all value the Navy's contribution to the nation and Jacksonville but I personally am not interested in looking at the Navy's mothballed relics every time I come downtown.
As a scholar of Latin, I can absolutely assure you that an accurate translation of "pro forma" is "wish list," or, loosely, "SWAG."
I'm kinda with rbirds on this but maybe at the opposite end of the spectrum. A destroyer is at the small end of the warship scale. If we want to attract visitors, we need something bigger. If we can have the world's biggest jumbotron, it seems to me that we ought to have a battleship or at least a cruiser on the waterfront, and I'll bet we can have one for less than $43 million. The bed tax statute probably allows for such an expenditure.
Though I can agree with the points brought up by rbirds and WM, I think this is a good idea solely because something is better than nothing. This is causing people to look at downtown. To look at the Shipyards. Personally, I would rather see the city lobby for CV-67 JFK because that has a local, more personal connection. And though I understand it is really too big for downtown, JTA or JaxPort does own some nice property in Mayport that they apparently no longer want to use for a cruise port. And even with something being better than nothing, I would not want to see the city have to take on costs of it because it isn't the great tourist magnet that it's founders think it will become. I do know a portion of the operating income is planning to come from Duval County Public Schools, in the form of class trips but am not sure what percentage of total income that is. Either way, better than looking at empty fields and piers while people talk of amusement larks, aquariums and sky scraping residential towers.
Some are questioning the USS Adams's history by saying it isn't that it doesn't have a significant historical profile. I'm not trying to say that it's the most war tested floating fortress ever by no means, by it was the lead ship in the Cuban Missile Crisis, and it's the only Adams Class ship that's still around; Not exactly the history of an unused lifeboat. IMO it's smaller size is okay; I don't think that we need some gargantuan thousand foot long aircraft carrier to prove our Naval might. I guess that I'm in the minority, but I actually prefer a smaller ship like this one, opposed to some hulking maritime monstrosity.
www.firstcoastnews.com/topstories/article/336440/483/Plans-for-USS-ADAMS-Naval-warship-museum-moving-forward
www.news4jax.com/news/nonprofit-works-to-bring-uss-adams-to-jacksonville/-/475880/23117168/-/4dkkdt/-/index.html
This is about the largest that can be docked downtown, I think everyone understands that. It's also worth mentioning that out of the 23 Adams class Destroyers made and put into service, all are retired and the Charles Adams is the only one to be preserved. In 20 years, this will be one of the few ways for people to "see" a piece of the Cold War.
I'm in the minority. While I don't mind the ship being docked downtown, I seriously doubt it's sustainable without clustering a variety of other complementing activities nearby.
^Agreed, but like I said earlier by the time this becomes reality there will be other stuff there (or at least I hope so, because it is easily 3-5 years down the road)
I doubt anything is built on the Shipyards in 3 years. We don't even have a proposal or solid idea of what we want there at this point. If things were good, you'd be looking at, at least a year or two to go from concept to permitting and another 18-36 months of construction.
Quote from: JayBird on November 23, 2013, 09:10:20 PM
This is about the largest that can be docked downtown, I think everyone understands that.
Well the USS Saratoga (a past failed plan to bring in it during the 'Save Our Sara' effort) was more than twice as long than the USS Adams. Some preferred a larger ship than the USS Adams.
And what does this say about guys thinking about Bigger Ships? ;)
How exactly were they planning to get the Sara in? Remove bridges? Drop it from Chinooks? And were they planning to dredge the river downtown? The ships that made Green Cove home look like bath toys compared to what we have had in service lately. Anything larger than 700' or so and needing more than 25'-30' feet of water is going somewhere other than Jacksonville.
And I'm assuming the group that wanted the Sara downtown is probably similar to the group that wants Tebow QBing for the Jaguars. Sometimes the loudest or most annoying aren't always right.
Quote from: JayBird on November 23, 2013, 09:47:19 PM
How exactly were they planning to get the Sara in? Remove bridges? Drop it from Chinooks? And were they planning to dredge the river downtown? The ships that made Green Cove home look like bath toys compared to what we have had in service lately. Anything larger than 700' or so and needing more than 25'-30' feet of water is going somewhere other than Jacksonville.
And I'm assuming the group that wanted the Sara downtown is probably similar to the group that wants Tebow QBing for the Jaguars. Sometimes the loudest or most annoying aren't always right.
Well said. I wasn't positive about the Sara's dimensions etc. LOL, the Tebow comparison was right on. When I was younger, all I heard was 'Save our Sara' like it was actually possible to dock it DT.
I-10 East suggests this ship was the "lead ship in the Cuban Missile Crisis".
Certainly it was near Cuba for about 6 weeks or so. But a Navy-produced ship history of the Charles F. Adams describes its participation in the crisis as "one of the ships actively involved in the quarantine and
surveillance operations." It was there but no mention is made of a "lead ship" status.
Acknowledging the ship's and its crew members' service to the country is important and should be remembered by all of us. However, our obligation to acknowledge its service hardly justifies parking a 1.5 city block-long ship downtown.
That Navy report on the ship's history is at http://www.history.navy.mil/decomship/c/DDG2/1986.pdf
Support the USS Charles F. Adams