The Ford on Bay

[fieldafm]

If so, that will spark a bidding war.  Unless the rules cap the bids, which they often do.  If that happens, what an enormous waste of time foisted upon the city by Hyatt.

The City would have actually wasted everyone's time in that scenario. The RFP that Spandrel 'won', specifically excluded convention space as a use. The Hyatt is in the business of booking hotel rooms and conventions, and their right of first refusal centers around the expansion of those services. We've known this since COJ entered into an economic development agreement with a developer two decades and four mayors ago, to build what is now the Hyatt. This isn't rocket science.

If that were true, that Hyatt's Right of First Refusal applies only to Hotel/convention space, then there would be no impediment to Spandrel proceeding with both phases of their project. Obviously the RoFR is broader than that, or there is some sort of hitch.   

I didn't say that their right of first refusal only applies to hotel space.

Why would the Hyatt want to build low density apartments on that site?  How does that complement their business?  That's the hitch.  The proposed use doesn't benefit them one bit, and they have legal rights in regards to that site that they want to protect.  I don't blame them.

[Charles Hunter]

Added convention space would benefit their business of booking hotel rooms and conventions. Having cheap stick frame apartments on the site would hurt their hotel and convention business. Who knows, with a Public-Private Partnership, it may need less of a subsidy than the Spandrel apartments.

[thelakelander]

Now nothing (except maybe COVID) is stopping an agreement with Spandrel on the courthouse site. Nevertheless, for whatever reason, that's still not done either. Other than that, I can't blame Hyatt's owner either. It's literally a death sentence for that property if expanded convention facilities are 100% eliminated from its future.

[simms3]

The city is so stupid!  Reading people's comments and both the Daily Record and JBJ articles makes me a bit upset.  In the JBJ articles DIA board member David Ward is quoted as being very upset that Jacobs/Hyatt would continue to submit unsolicited bids and to make such bids known via a small media blitz.  Joe Ayers of CBRE who helped run the latest RFP concludes that in his expertise as a multifamily broker, multifamily is still the current highest and best use.  Well, quite frankly, for a host of reasons one could say that for just about any site in any city.  At some point the city needs to quit pretending it's desperate for this bullshit 10,000 unit mark downtown in order to start being "self-sufficient" and it needs to designate spaces for certain civic uses.

Ok, so Jacksonville is reportedly not ready for such a convention center "now", but as we grow and approach 2 million people with ever increasing tourism coming our way, at some point sooner rather than later we probably will be ready for such a convention center.  Where are we going to put it?  Of course we can only think about one thing at a time here and right now that seems to be hitting the magical 10,000 unit mark, and we are doing all we can to hit it - including expanding the geographic definition of downtown and bulldozing over previous agreements with existing non-residential users in the city (not to mention bulldozing over other historic buildings not likely to become apartments) to do so.

I question the relative genius of some of the board members and some of the DIA staff.  If this is all about appeasing Lenny Curry and Shad Khan, I do hope some back door discussions are being had so that such a valid convention center proposal for this site sticks around for the next administration.

[heights unknown]

The city is so stupid!  Reading people's comments and both the Daily Record and JBJ articles makes me a bit upset.  In the JBJ articles DIA board member David Ward is quoted as being very upset that Jacobs/Hyatt would continue to submit unsolicited bids and to make such bids known via a small media blitz.  Joe Ayers of CBRE who helped run the latest RFP concludes that in his expertise as a multifamily broker, multifamily is still the current highest and best use.  Well, quite frankly, for a host of reasons one could say that for just about any site in any city.  At some point the city needs to quit pretending it's desperate for this bullshit 10,000 unit mark downtown in order to start being "self-sufficient" and it needs to designate spaces for certain civic uses.

Ok, so Jacksonville is reportedly not ready for such a convention center "now", but as we grow and approach 2 million people with ever increasing tourism coming our way, at some point sooner rather than later we probably will be ready for such a convention center.  Where are we going to put it?  Of course we can only think about one thing at a time here and right now that seems to be hitting the magical 10,000 unit mark, and we are doing all we can to hit it - including expanding the geographic definition of downtown and bulldozing over previous agreements with existing non-residential users in the city (not to mention bulldozing over other historic buildings not likely to become apartments) to do so.

I question the relative genius of some of the board members and some of the DIA staff.  If this is all about appeasing Lenny Curry and Shad Khan, I do hope some back door discussions are being had so that such a valid convention center proposal for this site sticks around for the next administration.

Amen and amen.

[Florida Power And Light]

Names I like better than The Ford on Bay:

Lenny's Lawn
The Former Courthouse and City Hall Annex Site
The two blocks south of Bay and West of the Plaza at Berkman and one submerged property which used to be the site of the courthouse parking lot
The Grass Patch
The Bro-town Chill Zone
Downtown Bro-Down
The Place that will undoubtedly house the homeless for the next two years
A Great Place to Play Ultimate Frisbee that Only Cost $35M to Make
The Clusterf*ck
220 East Bay Street
The Suck
sadjknbsadxjkb

“Potential Square “

Anything “ Potential”

Potential Loop
Potential Strip
Potential Commons
Potential Endless Potential  Loop