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Big changes coming in 2006

By DIANE STEINLE
Published January 1, 2006

You don't have to be psychic to predict that parts of North Pinellas County will look quite different on Jan. 1, 2007, than they do today. The machinery of change was primed in 2005 by local government decisions and escalating land values. People who visit North Pinellas a year from now will be shocked by the differences. Everyone will have their own opinion about whether the changes are losses or gains.

There may be nothing - except a direct hit by a hurricane - that has the power to transform the North Pinellas landscape like redevelopment.

As the last large pieces of open land disappeared in 2005, developers scurried to acquire the land under existing buildings, parking lots and mobile home parks. So great is the hunger for land that they will consider anything - land that is polluted, or near an airport, or under a beloved historic structure, or close to landfills or recycling facilities or even, unbelievably, a Superfund site.

This year we will see lots of land that was previously developed and still in use cleared for new construction.

Clearwater Beach has a head start, so it probably will be the most quickly and visibly transformed in the year ahead. The Clearwater Beach Hotel was leveled in 2005 and work already is under way on the four-star resort Sandpearl that will stand in its place. The high-rise Adam's Mark hotel saw its last guests in 2005 and is now gone, with developers poised to erect a new condo-hotel where it stood. All along the east side of S Gulfview Boulevard, the land that overlooks Clearwater Beach has been reserved for new resort hotel development, with construction of a 250-room Hyatt resort scheduled to begin in the spring. Elsewhere on the island, small motels have been razed or are shuttered in preparation for the arrival of bulldozers that will clear the land for condominiums.

However, Clearwater Beach is not the only place that will see much new development in 2006.

Moribund downtown Clearwater is finally on the radar screen of developers. The congregation of Calvary Baptist Church has departed for its new suburban campus and developer Opus South will clear the corner for construction of its high-rise condo and retail complex overlooking Clearwater Harbor. In February, on Cleveland Street next to downtown's historic post office, construction will begin on the 15-story Station Square condominium project. Other residential projects are under way along the waterfront just north of downtown.

In 2006 we will learn whether a movie theater for downtown Clearwater is reality or a pipe dream, and we'll hear more details about a possible public marina off Coachman Park.

We probably will find out whether a legal challenge filed to stop construction of a Wal-Mart Supercenter on Tarpon's Anclote River will succeed or fail, and what will replace the former Pappas restaurant at the entrance to the Sponge Docks.

Also this year, the future of the Belleview Biltmore Resort & Spa in Belleair and Schiller University in Dunedin, both large historic structures that have seen better days, surely will become clearer.

Construction of a new mixed-use "town center," including a movie theater, should get under way on the site of the former Bay Area Outlet Mall at U.S. 19 and Roosevelt Boulevard. New buildings that are a little taller are planned in downtown Dunedin, which just keeps thriving. In Safety Harbor, residents will be able to decide for themselves if the six-story Harbour Pointe development across the street from the marina ruins the quaint downtown, as some have predicted, or brings it new life.

Time will tell whether the recent arrival of a few new businesses on the stretch of Gulf-to-Bay Boulevard between Belcher Road and Highland Avenue in Clearwater will spark a long-needed commercial renaissance. This year also will bring news that downtown Largo property owners finally have linked arms with city officials to find solutions to end a redevelopment stall there - or that they are still arguing or ignoring each other.

Nowhere will the changes of 2006 touch people more than in the area's mobile home parks. The sale of mobile home parks throughout Pinellas County accelerated in 2005. Mobile home owners began organizing a few months ago to fight the loss of their homes, but it is not clear how successful their effort will be in the long run. State law acknowledges that owners of mobile homes parked on rented lots have some property rights, but the law seems to place the value of that right at a few thousand bucks at most. Litigating this issue will be expensive and time consuming for mobile home residents, but a mere bump in the road for developers.

Meanwhile, expect an increasing number of announcements this year that rental apartment complexes are converting to condominiums. Those renters, lacking any property rights, will be displaced if they can't afford to buy in.

North Pinellas County will lose some people because of the rampant changes expected in 2006 - people who don't like living here anymore or can't afford it. Their places will be taken by new arrivals, continuing to stream into Florida, who are undeterred by either the threat of hurricanes or the lack of elbow room.

Diane Steinle can be reached through e-mail at steinle@sptimes.com

[Last modified January 1, 2006, 00:28:15]