It’s a place to sit and think, to catch live music or theater, get some cardio or fish with the kids. Some people even work along St. Pete’s downtown waterfront, a seven-mile stretch that runs from Coffee Pot Bayou to Lassing Park.
Yet while it has in recent years been heralded as an attraction integral to the city’s identity, city officials think the area could stand a sprucing-up.
A plan that’s poised to pass the St. Pete City Council on Thursday, May 21, reimagines the waterfront in ways that leverage the area’s best assets while linking portions of the waterfront that were previously not connected. City voters passed a measure in November 2011 requiring the city to pass such a plan in order to control future development of the area. So the city hired the nonprofit Urban Land Institute to do a $125,000 study to determine the target areas, then paid the firm AECOM $500,000 to develop the sweeping plan itself.
The council tentatively passed the plan May 7th — provided the firm modifies some aspects.
The overhaul is expected to cost, over multiple decades, up to $600 million, most of which consultants believe will be covered by private investment (an assumption which is already making some observers wary, envisioning a private takeover of a public asset). The plan notes similar undertakings in other cities have yielded $8 or $9 in private investment for every tax dollar spent. In the case of Pittsburgh’s Riverlife development, reads the plan, that ratio was 32 to one.
About $25 to $50 million in public money from sources like Penny for Pinellas and general revenue and parking fees would be used for projects like bike paths and “site furnishings” like shaded seating areas, as well as reconfiguring Demens Landing Park.
The plan, which can be found on the city’s website (stpete.org), covers six segments of the waterfront, and describes how each would be spruced up. Here’s a rundown of what’s in store, presuming it passes.
Coffee Pot Bayou
It’s a low-key stretch of waterfront lined by private docks and crowned by Northeast Exchange Club Coffee Pot Park. Its southern border is the northern tip of Northshore Park. Here, the plan is to install docks where kayaks can launch, more benches and even swings while enhancing the area’s lush, Mediterranean-inspired aesthetics. Eventually, the city could install public restrooms, concessions and a trailhead park, and would even reconfigure Coffee Pot Boulevard.
North Shore District
It’s an area with beach volleyball, an aquatic complex, a small arboretum and enough green space for large music festivals, and the plan wouldn’t change that. In fact, maintaining open vistas and environmentally sensitive areas offshore is key. Bike lanes are slated for both sides of North Shore Boulevard, and there are plans for art installations. Longer-term goals include moving parking away from the water, replenishing sand on the small beachfront, and installing roundabouts on the road to calm traffic. Some areas currently covered with grass could get replanted with native plants and fitted with elevated walkways, a way of filtering storm water before it flows out into the bay.
Pier District
This leg of the project goes from North Straub Park to just north of Demens Landing. To the east it borders the uplands and approach to the St. Pete Pier, which is slated to be redeveloped into Pier Park — a source, in case you haven’t heard, of major contention at the moment. While redeveloping the Pier isn’t part of this project, the plan could include a “grand entry” to the Pier approach with a feature like a fountain. The long list of planned improvements to this area includes a mixed-used promenade for Bayshore Drive, additional boat slips and transient docks, concessions and renourishment at Spa Beach and, eventually, a cross-bay ferry terminal and a footbridge connecting the Museum of Fine Arts and St. Pete Museum of History. Slated for the offshore area are breakwaters to calm wave action and slow erosion.
South Basin
Stretching from Demens landing to the Salvador Dali Museum, this area has plenty of potential new development sites near the Dali and the Mahaffey Theater. The initial plan included development of a hotel in the “Sports and Entertainment Zone,” but Council asked that it be removed out of concern that the public wouldn’t want one. (Clarification from city planner Sharon Wright: "The hotel/conference center is still being proposed in the South Basin, but with softer language based on community concerns mainly from "should" to "could" and the important note that a referendum approval would be needed for this type of infill development on that side.")
Projects include “small retail and concessions nodes” along the water at Demens Landing, expanded dockage, and linked pedestrian trails. The plan recommends redeveloping Al Lang Field with a “sports associated program” and its parking lot, site of the popular Saturday Morning Market, could get revamped into a “multi-purpose plaza.” The area may be another site for a ferry terminal. A redesign of Demens Landing will likely include signage about the park’s significance for the city’s African-American community; formerly known as “South Mole,” it was the only place blacks were allowed to swim during segregation.
Bayboro/Salt Creek
Noting the area’s scientific, medical and nautical/aeronautical institutions, the plan creates an “Innovation District” and leaves plenty of space for USF St. Pete to continue expanding, and includes expansion at the St. Petersburg Port as well. To the south, a pedestrian bridge over Salt Creek would link the Booker Creek area to the northern tip of the Old Southeast neighborhood, where it meets with a trail to Lassing Park. The plan aims to create a “streetscape” along First Street South and would dredge Salt Creek. Among this segment’s long-term aspirations are a new museum and a wharf for tall ships.
Lassing
Compared to most other segments, the changes at the southernmost downtown waterfront parks would be much less dramatic and would include shaded seating, improved stormwater treatment, restoration of the waterfront and, eventually, a kayak launch and a multi-use trail that would link up to Third Street South.
This article appears in May 14-20, 2015.