Miami Takes up Proposed Development That Would Transform Coconut Grove - November 18, 2011

A massive mixed-use redevelopment seeks to remake the deteriorated face of Miami’s historically black West Coconut Grove, but longtime residents fear they will be pushed out.

BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI
aviglucci@MiamiHerald.com

The city of Miami appears poised to approve a massive redevelopment project in historically black West Coconut Grove that promises to radically transform its down-at-the-heels main street, by replacing six blocks of vacant lots and rundown apartments on Grand Avenue with multi-story shops, offices, new homes and a major supermarket — the first in the heart of the Grove in decades.

The Grove Village proposal, which will be reviewed Thursday by the City Commission, has sharply divided the West Grove, where some say it will resuscitate a dying neighborhood, while others fear it could gentrify it out of existence.

Developer Peter Gardner, who grew up and lives in Coconut Grove, says the project is as much labor of love as business proposition, noting that the West Grove has long been starved for new investment.

“I was born in the Grove and I live on the same street I grew up on, and some day my grandkids will walk down Grand Avenue, so it’s incredibly meaningful to me to make this the best possible project," Gardner said.

“I’ve watched other areas of Miami get a shot in the arm: Miami Beach got a rebirth, and downtown Miami and Brickell got the same, and most recently South Miami, and I think it’s now time for the Grove."

In four years of planning, Gardner says he has met scores of times with Grove residents, neighborhood groups, pastors and activists. That, city planners say, has led to significant redesigns to ensure the massive project better blends into the surrounding duplex and single-family neighborhoods.

West Grove, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city, is a long-established working- and middle-class enclave that is home to many descendants of the Grove’s original Bahamian settlers, though it has lost significant population in recent years amid cratering property values, extensive vacancies and a persistent street drug traffic in some areas.

Gardner has also promised to set aside 40 of the project’s planned 257 homes and apartments as affordable housing, and to train and hire local residents for construction jobs as well as the permanent jobs he expects to be generated by the new businesses the project will draw.

Gardner said he is in a position to make good on those promises because his company, Pointe Group Advisors, will manage as well as build the development.

But some activists and residents are skeptical, noting Gardner has spurned requests to guarantee those promises in writing. They also contend that the project won’t come close to replacing the dilapidated but low-cost apartments that have been or would be razed along the six blocks, which take up both sides of Grand from Margaret Street west to Plaza Street.

In effect, the critics contend, the project would extend the reach of the more-affluent, mostly white Coconut Grove into the poorer, black neighborhood.

“It excludes rather than includes the historic residents," Jihad Rashid, director of the Coconut Grove Collaborative, recently complained to members of the city planning and zoning board.

The result, Rashid and others fear, is that long-time residents will be priced out of the neighborhood, erasing the Bahamian heritage that the project’s architecture attempts to echo.

“They’re going to keep the architecture but not the people," said Pierre Sands, president of the main West Grove resident group.

The planning board recommended approval 7-0 after two hours of often-contentious debate and sharp questioning by some members concerned about the impact of new five-story buildings on the single-family homes behind them. Though the developer has purchased and demolished homes on the back sides of the six blocks, some “holdouts" have declined to sell.

City planners say they have ensured those remaining homes are separated from the project by park-like landscaping and that no building entrances will impinge on them. The backs of the new buildings will also sit back from neighboring homes.

“The question is, can this be done sensitively," asked planning board member Patrick Goggings, before concluding the plan represents “a good compromise."

If the commission approves the project and a related package of zoning changes necessary for Grove Village’s extensive mix of uses, Gardner said, the first two blocks to be erected would be the two easternmost.

One, a vacant lot on the south side of Grand where an organic farmer’s market is held regularly, would be anchored by a grocery store and contain some affordable homes at the rear. Across Grand would rise a rental apartment building.

The rest of the six blocks would be built in phases and would include retail and restaurant space, offices, homes and more apartments, as well as a possible hotel.

The project would be approved under an unusual scheme that would effectively lock in the current plan, preventing the developers from seeking major changes in the future.

Because the project was initially submitted before approval of the city’s new Miami 21 code, it was designed under the old code while incorporating many of the new rulebook’s pedestrian and neighborhood-friendly features, including concealed parking garages, with entrances on side streets only, and active storefronts at ground level on Grand.



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