The developers who are spending more than $3 billion in private investment to transform downtown Tampa released a new rendering that shows how much the skyline will grow in nine years, and also revealed the name of the project: Water Street Tampa.
- Development will include 1st new office building in downtown Tampa in 25 years
- Tallest building will be 30 stories
- 1st building scheduled to open in Fall 2019
“Water Street Tampa is an existing street that runs through downtown Tampa along the waterfront and will be extended three blocks to the north,” said Strategic Property Partners CEO James Nozar, “creating a real spine of our overall downtown project.”
Nozar said the brand new Water Street will feature wide sidewalks, outdoor dining, retail and a heavily landscaped linear park with a double row of trees that form a shade canopy.
“Similar to a Bourbon Street in New Orleans or Broadway in New York or Newbury in Boston,” he said. “We really envision Water Street being one of those great streets for Tampa.”
SPP is a joint real estate venture between Bill Gates’ Cascade Investment and Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeff Vinik. This fall, crews will break ground on the first of 18 distinct buildings that have been under design for the past year.
“Our first projects will all come out of the ground concurrently,” said Nozar. “That includes approximately 1,400 residential units, apartments and condominiums, two new hotels, a couple of new office buildings and quite a bit of ground floor retail.”
According to SPP, they will build the first new office building in downtown Tampa in 25 years. The tallest building will be 30 stories high and one of the new hotels will be Tampa’s first five star resort.
The other hotel will be a companion to the Marriott Waterside, which will begin a $40 million renovation next month.
The first building to open in the fall of 2019 will be the University of South Florida’s Morsani College of Medicine and Heart Institute. The total project is 9 million square feet, 57 acres, with 13 of those acres becoming enhanced public space.
Water Street Tampa is slated for completion in 2026.
By Josh Rojas, Reporter
