The Tampa Palms Professional Center will begin to take form this spring just north of USAA.
By RODNEY THRASH
Published January 14, 2005
TAMPA PALMS - All that sits here, along this strip of Commerce Park Boulevard and Primrose Lake Circle, are man-made ponds, tall trees and weeds.
Soon it will be transformed into a business mecca for doctors, Realtors and other professionals.
In late spring, developer Tampa Palms Professional Center LTD will begin construction on a $50-million, 38-acre complex in Tampa Technology Park West, just north of USAA in Tampa Palms Area 8.
It will offer more than 350,000 square feet of professional office space, said Michael Urette, partner in the development firm.
"You've got a incomparably beautiful location," he said. "I don't know of any place that is more desirable.
"Would you rather go to the dentist or doctor on Bruce B. Downs or Primrose Lake?"
Developers of Tampa Palms always envisioned this area as a commercial hub. But in October 2000, the Tampa City Council revamped the original development plan, approving homes and apartments on land originally set aside for businesses.
That move gave Lennar Homes the authority to build a 288-room hotel, 89,000 square feet of office space, a 40-acre city park, a high school and middle school complex, and houses, including a 78-home gated subdivision.
Still, property north of USAA was to be set aside for hotel and office space, the City Council said.
That's where the Tampa Palms Professional Center will be. The center will be built in two phases, but Urette said he doesn't know when construction will be completed.
The first phase is set to begin this spring with 17 office buildings as small as 2,000 square feet and as large as 20,000. The medical, dental, legal, financial and real estate offices that will occupy this space will overlook conservation areas and the man-made ponds in Area 8.
Phase II will include storage space for business owners. It's not clear when that will begin.
The Tampa Palms Professional Center is just the latest coup for New Tampa, which last year signed deals with a Wall Street firm and one of the nation's largest wireless providers.
In June, Depository Trust & Clearing Corp., a Manhattan financial services organization, bought 176,000 square feet of space in the former Intermedia Communications office park. The 816,000-square-foot complex had been vacant when WorldCom, the last tenant, filed for bankruptcy protection and left the park in December 2002. Last year, DTCC paid $19.7-million for the building and 3 acres across from it. By 2007, 500 employees are expected to move in.
VoiceStream PCS Holding LLC, which operates as T-Mobile, signed a 10-year lease that went into effect Dec. 1. Highwoods senior vice president Steve Meyers said T-Mobile will occupy 85,000 square feet.
About 570 employees are expected to move from the company's current home, a 120,000-square-foot complex on Martin Luther King Boulevard, to New Tampa, T-Mobile spokesman Bryan Zidar said last year.
"There are so many lovely places to live" in New Tampa, Urette said. "Why not have a lovely place to work?"
Information from Times files was used in this report. Rodney Thrash can be reached at 813 269-5313 or rthrash@sptimes.com[Last modified January 13, 2005, 10:13:09]
