City council approved a long-planned, mixed-use waterfront development in Naples.
On June 17, council voted 4-1 in favor of the development, with one council member abstaining, due to a potential conflict of interest.
Years in the making, the project, overlooking Naples Bay, has faced challenges as it has evolved.
Formerly known as The Prom and now as The Viceroy, the development is planned on 1.81 acres of long vacant land, near the intersection of River Point Drive and the Fifth Avenue South bridge downtown.
Plans for the three-story development include short-term lodging, along with other retail and commercial uses, supported by surface and underground parking, as well as street parking.
Councilman Berne Barton, a longtime insurance agent in Naples, removed himself from the discussion and dais based on his “ongoing business relationship” with the petitioner.
“While I’m sure that I could have remained fair and impartial, the optics were not ideal, and I felt this course of action was in the best interest of the city of Naples and the petitioner,” Barton said.
Councilwoman Linda Penniman was absent from the meeting, leaving five council members to make the decision.
The petitioner and developer Harry Zea fought hard for the project, which had been in the works since at least 2022, when he first sought site plan approval, then faced issues with city staff, mostly due to misunderstandings about the marina uses and underground parking.
Developer’s attorney hoped for a unanimous approval
After much discussion and debate by city council, Naples attorney Burt Saunders, who represented Zea at the hearing, said he’d be disappointed if the decision to approve it wasn’t unanimous by those voting on it.
“There really isn’t anything about this project that should give you a concern,” he told council. “It’s low density. It’s a beautiful project in the gateway to the city.”
As for Zea, he told the council he’d just be grateful to get the required majority vote of approval, allowing the development to finally move forward.
On May 13, the city’s Planning Advisory Board voted unanimously to recommend approval of the conditional use petition to city council.
While the property was already zoned for commercial uses, city council had to approve the lodging. Hotels and other transient lodging are classified as a conditional use in the city, always requiring a thumbs up from council.
Councilman Bill Kramer moved to approve the petition with a long list of conditions attached. The motion was seconded by Councilman Scott Schultz.
The conditions included that if the marina uses cannot be built and sustained, for whatever reason, the development will have to come back to the city council for a review.
The only no vote came from Councilman John Krol.
During discussions, Krol raised concerns about adding more lodging in an already high-traffic area, questioning whether it would just create more bottlenecks and become a nuisance for the city and its residents.
More about The Viceroy
Plans include lodging on two floors, totaling 12 units. The units would have their own kitchens, garages and rooftop amenities, including private pergolas and pools. The idea is to sell the units so that buyers can use them for themselves and rent them out.
Residential-only condos aren’t allowed on the site because of its proximity to the Naples Airport and its flight patterns.
The Naples Airport Authority had to sign off on the lodging — and did.
City staff approved the site plan petition for the development in May, with a number of conditions, and will continue working with the developer throughout the permit process to ensure compliance.
In their detailed review, one of the city staff’s biggest sticking points had been the marina uses, which was finally resolved through a compromise with the developer.
The development will include 10 private boat slips, two public boat slips, and a 4,200-square-foot ship store. While boat repair services won’t be offered on site, diagnostic services will be available to both the public and private slip users.
As part of the approval, Zea agreed to make road improvements, particularly along River Point Drive, to help accommodate the added traffic from his development and improve traffic flow, and to upgrade a sanitary sewer lift station, or pump, on the property.
On the sewer upgrades, Zea said that they would ultimately “benefit our reality day-to-day, and our marketability.”
The project still requires a few more regulatory approvals, including a final thumbs up from the city’s Design Review Board.
The development evolved over many years
Originally, Zea planned a promenade of waterfront dining on the site, along with 10 dock spaces for boaters and a boardwalk wrapping around the property. Those plans had underground parking too, but they never went before city council.
The city’s Design Review Board gave the original project a final approval in 2017. At the time, Zea said he hoped to finish the development by the end of the tourist season in 2018, but he ran into legal and financial problems and never started it.
He then went back to the drawing board.
In revising the development, Zea told city council that his goal was to maintain his original vision to have something in the gateway to Naples that “gave a flavor to what we’re about,” while minimizing the impacts on the city and neighbors.
He highlighted the revised development’s curvy and soft design.
“It does look in a lot of ways like it’s water,” he said. “Because it’s not a square shoe box building.”
He told council the current project would be the best possible outcome for the property, as anything else that might go there would likely be driven only by economics “period.”
Due to the complexity of the project, the timeline for construction is not yet clear.
Construction is expected to create about 100 jobs, with the development itself anticipated to generate about 40 permanent jobs to operate and maintain it.
Laura Layden is a senior business and government reporter. Reach her by email at laura.layden@naplesnews.com.
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This article originally appeared on Naples Daily News: New waterfront development gets green light in Naples
Reporting by Laura Layden, Fort Myers News-Press & Naples Daily News / Naples Daily News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Laura Layden, Fort Myers News-Press & Naples Daily News | USA TODAY Network
