It’s 4:30 p.m. in early November, and developer Lissette Calderon
of Neo has already been at work for 12 hours. That’s because
at 4:30 a.m. Calderon’s latest condo property on the Miami riverfront
at South Miami Avenue and Third Street, WIND, officially announced
units for sale and scheduled for occupancy in Summer 2007. And
now, half a day later, Calderon is exultant. Her building is
already 75 percent sold.
Calderon was the first developer to see
gold in the community, and she got the idea, ironically, from
visiting and living in the other waterfront cities including
New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. “When I moved home, I
couldn’t
believe we had this opportunity with the river and it wasn’t
being used,” says the South Florida native. “With the Riverwalk
and the dredging of the river, the timing was right for the
private sector to come in.” she adds.
In fact, the dredging
of the river, which began on October 27 and should be finished
by spring 2007, serves as a kind of official announcement in
and of itself. The River area has arrived. Once 15 feet deep,
the river hasn’t been dredged since 1935. It’s now so full
of sediment that its average depth is about 12 feet, according
to
Brett Bibeau, managing director of the Miami River Commission.
And dredging the river is far more than an embellishment or
an environmental concession-it’s also good business sense.
This is, after all, a working river, important because it makes
trade
with the Caribbean (including, once relations have been reestablished,
the lucrative possibility of Cuba), most of whose smaller vessels
would be swallowed up in a port like the Port of Miami, possible.
And while the Miami River is, according to a 1999 survey, the
fourth largest port in Florida in terms of trade dollars generated,
it’s currently only able to accommodate vessels that are filled
to about three-quarters capacity.
Long before the dredging got
underway, developers had already begun to salivate over the
riverfront possibilities, especially given that Calderon’s
first two river projects, Neo Lofts and Neo Vertika, sold out
completely. But the river’s been there for ages, chugging along
as an industrial center but otherwise essentially a wasteland.
Why didn’t anyone think to develop this area during previous
building booms?
PUBLICLY PRIVATE. What makes the current
building boom around the Miami River interesting-and with 7,000
condo
units under construction or
in final permitting stages, make no mistake, it is a boom-is
that it’s the result of a fortuitous confluence of events.
The aforementioned dredging schedule, for one, making the area
more
attractive to prospective buyers; the national trend toward “urban
infill,” or well-heeled families and working singles, tired
of tedious commutes from the suburbs, moving back into the
city,
especially the “real” city as embodied in the nationwide rage
for industrial or, where needed, even pseudo-industrial “lofts”;
the low interest rates that have kicked the overall real estate
market into high gear and, perhaps most importantly, the availability
of government funding($7.5 million for the Riverwalk was just
approved as a bond issue in the last election). And when the
state legislature created the Miami River Commission in 1998
and charged them with the task of finding ways to perk up the
area, the commission came up with the Miami River Corridor
Urban Infill Plan, which divides the 5.5 mile river into three
sections:
the lower river from Biscayne Bay to the Fifth Street Bridge,
where many of the condos are now in development, with 50-foot
setbacks from the river and first floor mixed-use spaces connecting
to the Riverwalk; the middle river from Fifth Street to the
22nd Avenue Bridge, a mixed-use area with far fewer developments
and
more local neighborhoods (a section that also serves the Civic
Center and Jackson Memorial Hospital; and the upper river,
west of the 22nd Avenue Bridge, which is primarily devoted
to the
marine industry.
CONDO CRAZE. Many of the 7,000 planned units
will be taken up by giant projects, the largest of which will
be the 13.5-acre parcel once earmarked
for the Florida Marlins Stadium and now simply referred to
as Riverfront. It will be a secure community of six condos,
including
Calderon’s ‘Wind’ and developer Inigo Ardid’s ‘The Ivy’, a
400 Unit, 45 Story building designed by Luis Revuelta, with
interiors
by Alison Spear with prices starting a $180,000 for a one-bedroom
and soaring to $1.4 million for a sky loft. The four other
condos are still in their formative stages, but when completed,
Riverfront
is expected to include 2,000 units; 60,000 square feet of retail
space; and 200,000 square feet of office space in a planned
21-story office tower, all nestled among the Metrorail line
to the west,
the south Miami Avenue Bridge to the east, Southwest Third
Street to the North and, of course, the Miami River to the
south.
Eleven of the condo buildings going up have been permitted
for more than 200 units, including Calderon’s Neo Vertika,
Balbino Investments’ 1,100
unit Hurricane Cove, divided among two 28-story and one 26-story
buildings, the Related Group’s One Miami, with two 45-story
towers; Michael Bedzow’s Brickell on the River; Arquitectonica’s
42-story Latitude on the River; Ugo Colombo’s Dupont Towers,
once the site of Henry Flagler’s first luxury hotel; Royal
Atlantic in the former Miami News building; Terrazas River
Park Village;
and Tuscan Place.
THE NEIGHBORHOOD. Like all of downtown, the
river area is conceived as a walk/bike zone; unlike other parts
of downtown, however, residents won’t
need to wait for the infrastructure to kick in. Once the Riverwalk
is fully completed – residents really will be able to walk
to restaurants and attractions. According to Bibeau, 16 new
restaurants
(including Finnegan’s River) that will lead directly onto the
Riverwalk have already been permitted, taking their place alongside
long-time favorites like Big Fish and Perricone’s.
Both the
Miami River Commission (for school groups) and Dr. Paul George
of the Historical Museum of South Florida will continue to
give barge
tours of the Miami River, where eventually historical markers
will be constructed to point out spots of interest, including
the Miami Circle, the ancient Tequesta Indian site at the mouth
of the river that was, ironically, discovered when condo developers
broke ground around it in 1998. In Bibeau’s words, ‘the river
is both the birthplace and the future of the city,” and the
future includes the eventuality of water taxi service from
the Miami
Intermodal Center at the airport directly to the riverfront.
The
17 bridges along the river will also be transformed from eyesores
into brightly colored works of art. Artist Xavier Cortada’s
manatee mural, for example, already graces the East Little
Havana Riverside
Garden beneath the western side of the Flagler Bridge.
RIVERWALK.
Although Bibeau understands and hails the importance of condo
development to the overall plan of rehabilitating the river.
The developers
are, after all, kicking in to provide public access from their
properties to the planned 5.5-mile “Riverwalk” (or as it’s
formally known, the Miami River Greenway). There will be pedestrian
and
bike paths adorned with art works that will weave alon both
side of the river or, where necessary, through neighborhood
parks
and streets for an uninterrupted 11 miles. When asked about
his thoughts on the long-term feasibility of so many condos,
Bibeau
gives a verbal shrug. “Our job,” he points out, “is to rehabilitate
the river area.” In
other words, whatever eventually happens in the condo market, the new Miami
River will be alive and well.
