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Work to beautify road finally starts

Streetscaping on Clearwater-Largo Road has been a decade in the making. At last, it's here.

By LORRI HELFAND
Published November 1, 2006

LARGO - Clearwater-Largo Road merchant Jacob Wurtz spent about $1,000 on landscaping near his shoe store several months ago after giving up on the city's plan to plant native trees and bushes to beautify the road.

It turns out that maybe he could have saved his money after all.

Now, a decade after city leaders decided to revitalize the road, crews have started work on the streetscaping project, which will extend from West Bay Drive to Ponce de Leon Boulevard.

"It was a long time coming," said Wurtz, who co-owns Happy Feet Plus and purchased the building on Clearwater-Largo Road in 1997. "It took years and years."

Soon, Clearwater-Largo Road will be lined with old-fashioned streetlights and benches with a smattering of palms, crape myrtles and assorted shrubs.

Happy Feet was one of the first major businesses to move to the corridor. It built a two-story aqua and yellow building near Fifth Avenue NW and relocated its corporate offices and shoe store there.

A handful of other shops and restaurants followed suit, several incorporating a similar Key West theme. But several traditional shops, such as convenience stores and coin laundries, remained. With a hodgepodge of businesses along the corridor, Wurtz said, the landscaping and other features will help create a more consistent look.

With a goal of making the corridor safer, the city's $1.97-million project also calls for sidewalk improvements and pedestrian crossings. It will also provide irrigation for landscaped areas.

A few weeks ago, crews began staking out project boundaries and marking utilities, and this week they got out in the field, said community development director Mike Staffopoulos. The project should be complete in a little more than five months, he said.

The project has a tortured history.

For years, the city lacked the money to make the streetscaping project happen.

Then a redevelopment effort on West Bay Drive took priority.

Finally, when city leaders decided to proceed, they ran into a few snags again.

In 2003, the commission authorized a consultant to design a plan for the project, which was showcased to merchants, residents and community leaders in August 2004. Last year, city officials planned to move forward, but they learned that they had to apply for a permit to work on the road, which until recently was controlled by the Florida Department of Transportation.

Earlier this year, officials tweaked the plan to conform to state requirements and prevent further delays.

Then in June, just as the city was poised to begin again, the plan hit another roadblock. The lowest bid on the streetscaping project came in $1-million over budget.

The city shaved $400,000 off the project by removing brick banding from proposed sidewalk improvements, and city leaders approved the plan in August.

The aesthetic improvements are beginning as the city awaits passage of the newest redevelopment plan for the corridor.

Some rundown areas - mostly mobile home parks - along the road have attracted drug activity, prostitution and other crime. About a decade ago, the area was classified as "blighted." And Largo developed a plan to rejuvenate 77 acres of the district, partially by attracting businesses and developers.

In spring 2005, the city submitted a plan for an expanded 288-acre redevelopment district. Pinellas County commissioners rejected that plan last year, but three weeks ago, they approved the new plan, which is scheduled to come before the City Commission by the end of the year.

Lorri Helfand can be reached at 727 445-4155 or lorri@sptimes.com.

[Last modified October 31, 2006, 22:54:26]