by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
Only a developer could be delighted in the arrival mounds of dirt and the ever-present pounding of pilings being driven into the banks of the St. Johns River. For TriLegacy LLC CEO Jeff Spence, dirt and pilings are signs of progress at the $860 million Shipyards project.
A multi-use development, the Shipyards will eventually be home to 662 residential units, 150 boat slips, a 16.8 acre public park and almost one million square feet of Class A commercial office space. Today, the casual observer might have a tough time seeing what promises to be downtown’s premier work/live/play address. Spence, though, likes what he sees.
“I’m very happy with the progress,” he said. “The Riverwalk park is progressing on schedule. We should, by the end of the year or mid-January, have the water’s edge treatment done past Kids Kampus and Hogan’s Creek.”
Eventually, over 8,000 feet of riverfront will have been fortified and rendered developable for everything from a Northbank Riverwalk extension to small marinas that will dot the entire project.
According to Spence, the three-phase project is right on schedule, with Phase I set to be done, as planned, before the 2005 Super Bowl and its entourage rolls into town. By then, there will be a 100-unit residential complex — One Shipyard Place — consisting of three, six-story buildings all sitting on the space formerly occupied by the sheds that served as the old shipyards’ landmark.
Once the waterfront is secured, Spence said vertical work will get underway in earnest. Within the next six months to a year, the entire area will change dramatically. The residential units will be well out of the ground and the whole area will see major landscaping changes.
“We are kind of working back from the water’s edge,” said Spence. “There will be some terrain changes and sculpting of the ground and a lot of elevation changes.
“One Shipyard Place, by mid-January, should see some foundation work and by the end of the first quarter of next year, the vertical work on the condos should start,” said Spence. “There will have to be some significant foundation work done.”
Eventually, the entire project will reach north, abutting the Berkman Plaza property. Spence said that while the work today is aimed at completing Phase I on time, plenty of work is being done that encompasses the entire project.
“Physically, all the work is for Phase I, but we are constantly working on the design for the whole project,” explained Spence. “There’s a lot of paperwork, permits have to be pulled and lots of planning.
“We are still on schedule for late summer of 2004 to have occupancy in One Shipyard Place. By the end of 2004, Phase I will be done and there are elements of Phase II still projected to be done by Super Bowl.”
Five years after buying the property and a year after starting demolition and rudimentary construction, the site is still remarkably problem free. Considering that for decades the area housed a majority of Jacksonville’s shipping industry, the unpleasant surprises have been few.
“We have seen a few things here and there,” said Spence. “Sometimes when we drive a sheet pile we’ll find an old one, but nothing that’s insurmountable. A project of this scope, it’s anything but mundane.”