Red Robin Chaos

[spuwho]

Red Robin at SJTC is open now.

Parking is chaos at best. There just isnt enough spaces between them, Newks and Aspen Dental. People are parking in the construction dirt.

When Starbucks opens it will get worse. Newks isnt even a quarter full.

Action News is here to cover the opening...must be a slow news day...our first Red Robin!!

[thelakelander]

LOL! Sounds like fun. I can't wait to see what type of chaos on Town Center Parkway takes place when all of the new development is completed and open.

[remc86007]

Went to the Newks a couple days ago. Very well run...we'll see if that lasts. Parking and access in general to stores and restaurants seems less than ideal. I'm wondering if the new shops will increase total traffic to the town center or just spread the masses out a bit.

[thelakelander]

I suspect an increase. You're getting several chain restaurants that are new to Jax and as many new apartment units as Brooklyn, with the two developments across the street from SJTC.

[spuwho]

COJ is currently reconfiguring the Gate Parkway - Town Center Boulevard intersection.

They are adding an additional lane on both to support left turns into where the new PDQ is and also into the new Cheddars.

Of the people I have spoken to in the past 2 weeks, they all say the samething. They dont go to Town Center anymore! If traffic and ingress/egress is an issue now, just wait until this November when the holiday shopping season starts.

This maybe the final golden egg this goose lays.

[pierre]

If I go to the Town Center, it is usually weekday afternoon when it is not as crowded.

You could not pay me to go on the weekend, especially during the holidays. When I do go, I try to go from the UNF side.

[thelakelander]

COJ is currently reconfiguring the Gate Parkway - Town Center Boulevard intersection.

They are adding an additional lane on both to support left turns into where the new PDQ is and also into the new Cheddars.

Of the people I have spoken to in the past 2 weeks, they all say the samething. They dont go to Town Center anymore! If traffic and ingress/egress is an issue now, just wait until this November when the holiday shopping season starts.

This maybe the final golden egg this goose lays.

The developers of the retail projects under construction are funding these improvements. I suspect, things will still back up.

[Captain Zissou]

Damn.  I was really hoping Glenn started this thread.  Stay lit, FAM!

[Jim]

Can we get a series of peripheral parking lots and an elevated mass transit loop with street level feeder trolley cars?

Kidding but not entirely.

[spuwho]

Can we get a series of peripheral parking lots and an elevated mass transit loop with street level feeder trolley cars?

Kidding but not entirely.

I suggested it as well as some others.

I was thinking a basic feeder system like what Las Vegas uses with their elevated cable driven cars like the one between the Monte Carlo and the Bellagio.  (Not the Vegas Monorail) They are cheaper to build and operate.

The problem is who pays for it.  If it is free to use, then it would have to come out of the retail rents paid by the tenants through their CAM.

If they charge a fare, how much will work as long as the parking stays free.

Also, the entire set of properties along Town Center Parkway is no longer owned by the same set of entities.  They would all have to agree on how to partition the costs between them.

For example, that little corner where BurgerFi, Visionworks and couple of others, isn't owned by the same company that owns the land under Coopers Hawk and Black Finn. (owned by Hines today)

They would all have to agree how the CAM part of the lease would be partitioned out.

[thelakelander]

I don't recall there being a single land owner along Town Center Parkway since the road was built back before SJTC opened. Even Markets at TC was developed by a different ownership group than SJTC. I worked on some preliminary concepts for that site when I first moved to Jax to work at a firm involved in retail land development. The client was not the same as SJTC developers.

I can't imagine a scenario of fixed transit connecting strip malls, where probably +95% of shoppers arrive via car, being remotely successful. If built into tenant leases, it would make all of those shopping centers fail. There's not enough density or gridlock. You'd generate more transit ridership tying housing projects together.

At the end of the day, it's a congested collection of strip malls adjacent to a regional shopping mall. However, it's no more congested or unique than similar environments in the suburbs of every large and mid-sized city across the country. I agree with everyone else that it's a mess. However, people will learn to live with the congestion, in the same manner they do with Blanding between Orange Park Mall and I-295.

[Dapperdan]

Is this really any different than the cluster that is Mall of Millenia in Orlando? Talk about a sprawling mess. That is where the Town Center is heading. At least there isn't an IKEA in the middle of Town Center.

[Jim]

Is this really any different than the cluster that is Mall of Millenia in Orlando? Talk about a sprawling mess. That is where the Town Center is heading. At least there isn't an IKEA in the middle of Town Center.

Middle?  No, but it's being built on the fringes of what is becoming the expanded SJTC region. 

[TimmyB]

We were in town three weeks ago, picking out our apartment for our move (October 1st!!!) and made the mistake of going there from the Tapestry Park area, straight up Gate Parkway.  BIG mistake.   This was the middle of the day on a weekday, mind you.  As someone above inferred, the place will soon be off limits to a lot of people, simply because it will take such a long time getting in and out.   We will be fortunate as we will be coming in from the north, which means an easy exit and re-entrance from/to 295 (at least, easy until they screw that up, as well) but if I had to go there off of JTB or Gate, I don't think so.

[ProjectMaximus]

We were in town three weeks ago, picking out our apartment for our move (October 1st!!!) and made the mistake of going there from the Tapestry Park area, straight up Gate Parkway. 

Exciting! Which apt?