Polishing up the Redneck Riviera
Known for spring break rowdiness, Panama City Beach has gone upscale, with high-end condos luring a wealthier clientele.
By TAMARA LUSH
Published March 13, 2005
PANAMA CITY BEACH - When Alain Beauchamp first came here three years ago, the town rocked.
There was so much for a college student to do - miniature golf in the mornings, beach parties in the afternoons, everyone doing shots and dancing like crazy in sprawling clubs at night.
Now Beauchamp, 22, trudges along Front Beach Road and wonders what happened.
"It was more alive three years ago," he said. .
He had planned to play some miniature golf, but the place was closed and sported a "FOR SALE" sign out front. Across the street, construction crews paused for lunch outside a half-finished high-rise condominium where the Miracle Strip amusement park once stood.
The real miracle of Panama City Beach these days is how a town once known as part of the Redneck Riviera and a spring break hotspot is transforming itself into an upscale beach resort.
Some staggering facts:
More than 35 new condo complexes are in one phase of construction or another along the beach, with some 14,000 new units planned in the next three years.
Property value at the beach has risen from $500-million to $2-billion in five years.
The number of hotel rooms fell from 7,500 to 5,000 in the past year as motels gave way to condos.
Many of the area's landmarks are going, or already are gone.
The Miracle Strip closed last year. Club LaVela, which bills itself as the largest beach nightclub in the country, closes later this year to make room for more condos. Same for the Ocean Opry, which brought country stars George Jones, Randy Travis and Loretta Lynn to the beach.
Mom-and-pop motels, T-shirt shops and daiquiri shacks have sold out to developers and are awaiting transformation into places with marble tubs, concierge services and health spas.
"The Redneck Riviera is sinking into the sunset," said Jack Oakes, whose family has owned hotels on the beach since 1970. "It's a culture shock. Hopefully it will work."
Betty Jensen lives in the shadow of the new Panama City Beach.
On a recent day, Jensen pushed a broom around the porch of the Florida Palms motel, a weathered, one-story building on the Miracle Strip. It's Jensen's home for now, and she works around the motel doing odd jobs in exchange for rent.
A 22-story condominium across the street blocks the view of the Gulf of Mexico. Construction crews, cranes and PVC pipe are all Jensen sees out her front door.
Like the rest of Florida Palms residents - laborers, seasonal hotel workers, people displaced by Hurricane Ivan - Jensen is trying to eke out a living in Panama City Beach.
It's not easy.
Rental housing is expensive and scarce. Buying a condo is out of the question: prices start at $300,000.
She says she's not sure what the future holds. The motel has a "For Sale" sign outside the main office, though the owners say nothing will happen for at least a year.
"Everything here is up for sale," Jensen said with a sigh. "This used to be a very sleepy little Panhandle town."
Jensen, 57, has been coming to the beach since she was a child. She remembers when the mom-and-pop motels were filled with families just like hers. They could vacation for days for next to nothing.
Jensen said she knows those days are gone forever.
"This will be for the rich people," she said, pointing at the condo across the street. "And all the other people who are serving them will live across the bridge in Panama City."
Tim Hollis' memories of the old Panama City led to his book, Florida's Miracle Strip: From Redneck Riviera to Emerald Coast.
While attractions such as the Miracle Strip, Castle Dracula and Tombstone Territory were kitschy, Hollis says they were unique - unlike the new, fortress-like condos with names like "Aquatica," "En Soleil" and "Ceyladon."
To him, Panama City Beach is starting to look like everywhere else.
"There's no individuality anymore," he said. "Every city wants to look like every other city."
Officials insist they will try to keep a bit of the old style. They mention a new condo complex, called "Miracles Resort Park," which will include some of the Miracle Strip Amusement Park rides on the property.
That old-fashioned flavor comes with a price: condos at Miracles start around $650,000.
Panama City Beach Mayor Lee Sullivan wears ostrich skin cowboy boots and a big Stetson hat to City Hall. A worn Bible sits on his cluttered desk.
He's a lifelong resident of the beach and was police chief for 20 years. He, too, says he has warm memories of the family-owned cottages that used to dot the shoreline in the 1950s, when folks arrived by the carload.
"There wasn't a lot of anything here," Sullivan said. "It was unique, a place where you could relax and enjoy the beach."
The cottages gave way to hotels, and the family visits became shorter and shorter.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale were the hotspots for college students. Eventually, the students migrated to Panama City Beach.
Maybe it was the 27 miles of sugar sand beaches. Or the cheap and plentiful hotel rooms. Or the squeeze Fort Lauderdale and Daytona put on students because of wild parties.
But spring break brought underage drinking and fighting. What really angered Sullivan, though, were the infamous Girls Gone Wild videos, shot on the beach during spring break.
"We saw the worst of what we had become," he said, shaking his head.
Then developers started buying up waterfront property. County and city officials accommodated by easing zoning laws to allow for taller buildings along the beachfront, up to 25 stories.
Spring Break accounts for about 30 percent of some beach businesses' annual revenue, said Bob Warren, president and chief executive of the Panama City Beach Convention and Visitors Bureau. But college kids are increasingly looking to Mexico and Jamaica for their spring parties. The drinking age is lower in those countries, and the rules are a lot more lax.
This year, Warren's group spent $400,000 promoting spring break, the same as in previous years. But that will likely decrease in future years.
Warren is banking on the expanded condo market to make up for the erosion of spring break, but says the college rite of passage will likely survive in one form or another.
Sullivan said he is excited about the future, and said he hopes his city can return to the family vacations of the past - only this time, the families will stay in 25-story condominiums and shop at a 1-million-square-foot mall planned on Front Beach Road across from the Gulf of Mexico.
Condo buyers - many from Atlanta - might not be drawn to the humble little fish shacks, so city planners are trying to lure national chains to the area.
"I think where we are going is exciting and different," Sullivan said. "There will be a place for people to enjoy themselves, but maybe with a little less abandon than they have displayed in the past."
Times researcher Carolyn Edds contributed to this report. Tamara Lush can be reached at 727 893-8150 or at lush@sptimes.com