Landing bill moves forward without preservation funds, but mayor may veto

[tufsu1]

Unless they can tie this money to actual Landing improvements that benefit downtown as well as the Landing, I hope the Mayor vetoes it. 

I'm with Kay on this

[fsujax]

I dont know about you guys, but this is purely a power struggle between Sleiman and Peyton. It is getting really old. I do not support taking the money from historic preservation, but I do support taking the money out of Metro Park improvements. The Landing could be a major source of revenue for the City. It could also have major spill over effects for the "core". On the one hand you have DVI talking about investing in the "core" and quit speading what little money there is too thin, on the other hand the City is going to invest $8.2 million in Metro Park which will do nothing for the "core".  What direction are we going?

[thelakelander]

In circles with only a dead core to show after continuing to waste millions of tax dollars in the process.  It is a power struggle and unfortunately, downtown's health is being affected by it.

[MusicMan]

Who owns the surface lot directly across the street from The Landing? That is the solution to this problem.
Build a 3 or 4 floor garage there and you have ample parking for current users and enough overflow for The Landing, less than one block away.

[fieldafm]

Sprucing up this existing lot, not only solves the Landing parking issue but also creates a new foot traffic pattern along Hogan Street and helps expose the restaurants and retail in the base of the Omni.

Exactly!  Anyone questioning this, I'd be happy to stand next to you at the base of the Andrew Jackson statue and point out this very same thing.  It's easy to see if you're staring right at it(especially if you know what's hiding behind all those walls).  Maybe the mayor needs to take this very same tour.  

Sleiman is very serious about getting two national chains.  Very serious!  He also understands that frontage to Hogan once the Andrew Jackson statue is moved is critical to this corner as well.  Track him down next time you're at the Landing(he's there frequently).  Spend 5 minutes with him and you'll understand that he gets it.  He is a businessman that understands commercial development.  The same can't be said for many of the downtown puppet master 'public servants' that are too busy hanging on to their personal grudges like spoiled children.

Also, how does that ROI compare to spending the money a mile away from downtown in Metropolitan Park?

Well, spending 8 million dollars on a space where about 190-200k people visit a year equates to spending about $40 per person in taxpayer money.  The Landing gets somewhere over 4 million in attendance annually(the football stadium gets around 740k in comparison).  It doesn't take a financial analyst to figure that out.

You really dont have wonder now if you had in the past. I mean the Landing is the one place your going to take a visitor on their first visit here. Its gotta start there and then branch out. Peyton has been a nightmare for this city, a city already decades behind.

Amen.  Why in the world would you spend money on Laura Street, only to turn your back on the very thing that anchors Laura Street.  And the very thing that is the only signficant draw to the core of the city?

[hanjin1]

Who owns the surface lot directly across the street from The Landing? That is the solution to this problem.
Build a 3 or 4 floor garage there and you have ample parking for current users and enough overflow for The Landing, less than one block away.

If they do build a garage on the empty lot across from the landing, i sure hope they make the first floor into retail space.

[JeffreyS]

The basic deal was negotiated 23 years ago.  Good, Bad or Ugly it is time for the city to live up to it's own bargain.  That said the city should collect rent and Sleiman hopefully will make more money and improve DT at the same time.

[Miss Fixit]

The basic deal was negotiated 23 years ago.  Good, Bad or Ugly it is time for the city to live up to it's own bargain.  That said the city should collect rent and Sleiman hopefully will make more money and improve DT at the same time.

Refresh our memories - what, exactly, WAS the "basic deal"?  Is the agreement posted somewhere online?

The City needs to live up to its obligation, whatever it is.  Tony Sleiman knows what he's doing; scary that he's apparently dealing with a group (City Council) that, as a whole, is clueless.

[JeffreyS]

The basic deal was negotiated 23 years ago.  Good, Bad or Ugly it is time for the city to live up to it's own bargain.  That said the city should collect rent and Sleiman hopefully will make more money and improve DT at the same time.

Refresh our memories - what, exactly, WAS the "basic deal"?  Is the agreement posted somewhere online?

The City needs to live up to its obligation, whatever it is.  Tony Sleiman knows what he's doing; scary that he's apparently dealing with a group (City Council) that, as a whole, is clueless.

The only disagreement about the obligation is the city claims it needs to be new garage the Landing claims it should be used for an existing one.
3.5 mil city obligation about 1 mil rent Landing obligation.

The current agreement between the city and the Landing says the city will provide $3.5 million if a parking garage is built that provides 300 daytime spaces for the Landing and 375 nighttime spaces. Barton's letter said that after Orlando developer Cameron Kuhn defaulted on that agreement, the city's financial obligation shifted to pay the $3.5 million to The Landing only after The Landing built its own parking garage.

http://jacksonville.com/business/2010-04-20/story/jedc-chief-proposes-solution-jacksonville-landings-parking-needs

[thelakelander]

Parking garages are expensive to build.  A couple of years ago it cost around $20k per space to construct a garage.  Assuming the city is to provide 300 spaces that comes out to an investment of $6 million.  Who is supposed to pay the extra $2.5 million (in addition to the cost of land...$5 million in this case) for a new parking garage?  Again, no new garage is needed.  Due to bad blood and politics, this has turned into a game of semantics with DT being held as the hostage.  What is needed is dedicated parking, which was the city's obligation in getting Rouse to come to town in the first place.

[duvaldude08]

HAHAHA this city is a joke. I knew this was going to happen. Anything that has to do with downtown is always a "debate." Screw metro park and that back the 3.5 million and use it for its intended purposes. The mayor and the city council are IDIOTS. I pray long and hard for this city. ATLEAST the historic preservation fund will not be tocuhed and JEDC can get the laura street trio deal done. This city is a disaster. Spwral will continue in Jacksonville because nobody was to deal with the circus we call downtown.

[thelakelander]

Looks like the council made the right decision in this case.  The historic money remains untouched and the project with the least impact on DT is where the money comes from.  Nevertheless, things like this show why downtown continues to struggle despite a national trend of people moving back to cities.

[blizz01]

Has the Laura Street developer been identified?

[Steve]

Call me a cynic.  Sleiman gets the City to buy him a parking lot already being used.  Then the City also has to give him $2.5 million to validate Landing patron's parking tickets!  Give me a break.  This is a way for Sleiman to make more money not improve the Landing.  Again, this is not a suburbia mall or strip center.  The extra $2.5 million is ridiculous.  I thought the problem was that people weren't coming because there is no parking.  Now people won't come unless they don't have to pay for parking. 

Unless they can tie this money to actual Landing improvements that benefit downtown as well as the Landing, I hope the Mayor vetoes it. 

Keep in mind a few things:

1 - In 1987, the city agreed to provide The Landing parking.  Like it or not, they ageed to.  Personally, I would have just sold the land to the landing owner, and not done a parking agreement, but that's me.

2 - Parking Validation is VERY common among large scale developments in downtowns.  Horton Plaza, which is a mall in San Diego and has been a huge contributor to the revitalization of the Gaslamp District, has done validated parking for a LONG time.

3 - The problem has VERY little to do with "people aren't coming to the landing".  The problem is that large-scale tenants will not come to the landing without dedicated parking.  I am in the came that downtown does not have an issue with number of parking spaces.  It has an issue with the public and private policies that govern these spaces.  If Sleiman has these spaces, he can then market this (and BTW, absolve the city of a 23 year old problem, and he also starts paying rent at that time)

Furthermore, and this is a vibe held by many people that we seem to be against Toney Sleiman making money.  Who cares?  If he is successful, then Downtown is successful.  What's so bad about that.  This discussion of "giving him a parking lot without a guarantee of revitalization" is nonsense, IMO.  First and foremost, it absolves a city of a 23 year old obligation, and assuming they take the funds from Met Park, it scales back a project that will do VERY little for downtown.

[Doctor_K]

Where is the dedicated parking to be located? 

The surface lot behind the Omni/under the Skyway track?  Part of the existing Omni garage?  The surface lot in front of said garage/adjacent to the Omni facing Water St.?

Or would someone really try to squeeze in yet another garage on the parcel that holds the Landing's current surface lot?