by Max Marbut
Staff Writer
Ceree Harden has a couple of reasons to be proud of what’s happening on Riverside Avenue. He’s helping create a “Brickell Avenue” for Jacksonville and that can only lead to an economic boom.
President of Harden and Associates, an employee benefits and risk-management firm, Harden and several of his associates are building a new $45 million high-rise office complex at the corner of Forest Street and Riverside Avenue between the Fidelity National campus and Fire Station No. 5. It will be the new home for Everbank as well as Harden’s and his development partners’ firms.
“It’s an initiative between us and some of our colleagues – law firms and accounting firms,” he said. “They are all locally-governed and locally-managed firms. It’s Jacksonville people committed to Jacksonville.”
As chairman of the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission, he sees the widening of Riverside Avenue as something that needed to be done and will lead to more business.
“Fifty thousand cars go through here every day. Forest Street and Riverside Avenue is the nexus of two six-lane thoroughfares three blocks from the new I-10 and I-95 interchange. This will be the new gateway to Jacksonville,” said Harden.
“It will be ‘corporate row’. We have Blue Cross Blue Shield, Fidelity, Everbank, St. Joe, the Haskell Company and the Florida Times-Union. It’s what people are calling the Brickell Avenue of Jacksonville,” he said, referring to Miami’s signature center of luxury high-rise condominiums and office buildings.
The commercial development on the river-side of the avenue has led to even more projects across the street. Harden said every piece of property from Riverside Avenue to Park Street between Forest Street and Downtown has either already been sold or has been optioned by developers.
“This is a contained area and an opportunity to have a significant long-range economic impact. There is a plan including mixed-use, housing and office space. It’s a great opportunity for a lot of people to make a difference in the development of Downtown. We have critical mass but in a contained area,” said Harden.
Preston Haskell, chairman of the Haskell Company, has been going to work at four different locations on Riverside Avenue since 1965. He moved his company into its present building near the T-U in 1985.
“For many years, this land on the river was overlooked. It was parking lots, vacant lots and empty buildings,” he said. “I thought to myself that people would kill to be on the river in this city. Here’s a mile of the best real estate in Jacksonville and it was not being developed.”
As soon as he purchased the land for the riverfront campus, Haskell said, he began urging the Florida Department of Transportation to widen and improve Riverside Avenue.
“It was a very narrow, congested four-lane street built all the way to the 60-foot right-of-way line. It was very constricted and clearly inadequate for the volume of traffic,” he said.
He believes that widening Riverside Avenue all the way to May Street is the best thing that could have happened.
“Clearing away the unattractive buildings opened up enormous potential for new development,” he said. “With the availability of the land, it’s logical that development will begin. We’ll wind up with a wonderful mix of offices, residential and retail from the T-U to the Fuller Warren Bridge on both sides of the avenue.”
Paul Crawford, deputy director of the JEDC, said the Department of Transportation’s choice of location for the new I-10 interchange has created an environment for development.
“It will make Forest Street the new entryway into 5 Points, Riverside and Avondale. That’s a pretty good hand to be dealt. I think we have a new, clear canvas with a couple of lines and a couple of boundaries. When we paint the picture, it will be one that everyone can be proud of,” said Crawford. “This is an opportunity to encourage business in the area between Riverside Avenue and the river. It may be commercial. It may have a hotel or residential element. All that will be driven by the market.”
Crawford also said much of the property on Riverside Avenue will be developed for housing for the people who work in the present and future office buildings on the avenue.
“If we can revitalize Brooklyn with not only high-end housing, but work-force and affordable housing as well, all of a sudden you have people who work in the area, live in the area and take pride in the area. You’ll have a small neighborhood that just blossoms,” he said.
Preserving Brooklyn’s architectural heritage is also part of the City’s master plan.
Joel McEachin, principal planner in the Historic Preservation Section of the Planning and Development Department, said several buildings in the area are being considered for designation as historic structures.
The Mt. Moriah AME church on Oak Street and the Church of God in Christ Temple on Chelsea Street will probably be preserved.
Fire Station No. 5 at the corner of Riverside Avenue and Forest Street is at the top of the list. Built in 1910, it replaced a wooden structure that was built for the growing neighborhood in 1897. An Oct. 3, 1910 news article in the historical archives states that the new fire station was, “large and commodious and will accomodate two pieces of apparatus, five horses and 14 men.”
McEachin said that there will be a new fire station built, but Fire Station No. 5 will be preserved for another use – residential or commercial or mixed-use and it may be relocated.
He also said that there is “some discussion” that a block of shotgun-style houses in Brooklyn might be slated for historical preservation.
Riverside Avondale Preservation Executive Director Bonnie Grissett said she believes business development along Riverside Avenue will create positive results for years to come.
“The people who work in those buildings are buying houses in our neighborhoods. We have housing available from bungalows to mansions. There is a lot of diversity in this neighborhood and we look forward to new residents,” said Grissett.
Mass transportation will be an important component of future development plans for Riverside Avenue and Brooklyn, according to Mike Miller, director of external affairs for the Jacksonville Transportation Authority.
“We’re having discussions with the developers. We want to be a good partner,” said Miller. He pointed out that designers are now required to include a mass transit component into every project from the first blueprint.
“It forces developers to recognize the transportation component long before a shovel goes into the dirt,” said Miller. “Public transit is an important element for mixed-use developments and we also want to provide a public transportation option to get people out of Avondale and Ortega to their jobs Downtown. Mass transit can provide that link.”
It has been suggested that the JTA is considering extending the Skyway down Riverside Avenue. Not any time soon, said Miller. “Maybe 30 or 50 years from now, if the demand and political support is there, plus ridership.”
He said that long before the Skyway slides down Riverside Avenue, trolley service will be part of the picture. That will happen when what he called “enhanced transit stops” are in place at future commercial, residential and mixed-use buildings.
The JTA will, however, retain the right-of-way it currently owns along Riverside Avenue with an eye to the future. “It makes more sense to keep what we’ve got rather than trying to buy it in 30 years,” said Miller.
“All in all, 20 years later, it’s turning into a marvelous realization of a long-held dream. I knew it would take place because the fundamentals were so strong,” said Haskell.