Little house a symbolic holdout

Lucia Capote’s hands, agile for a 90-year-old, fly across the piano keys as she plays the classic Mexican love song “Besame Mucho.”

But the soulful notes are quickly drowned out by the infernal beep-beep-beeping of a backhoe rumbling in reverse past Capote’s sun room.

Capote and her son Orlando used to enjoy sitting in the shade of their majestic mango tree. But the dust, clanging noises and risk of a crane dropping its payload on their heads have turned the yard into a torture chamber.

The Capotes live in the middle of a construction zone.

It is the last house standing in what was once a pleasant residential neighborhood. All other homes were bulldozed to make way for the largest commercial development in Coral Gables’ history, The Plaza Coral Gables, a $600 million mini city within a city along Ponce de Leon Boulevard four blocks south of Miracle Mile that will encompass 1.1 million square feet of condos, offices, shops, restaurants, parking garages and a 242-room hotel.

Lucia and Orlando refused to sell to developers, real estate agents or flippers who made offers up to $900,000 for the two-bedroom, two-bathroom, 1,300-square-foot house they purchased in 1989 for $135,000.

“This house was our American dream,” Orlando said. His parents lost their home in Cuba after Fidel Castro’s revolution and immigrated to Miami where they started from scratch.

The Capotes have said no 35 times since Orlando Sr. got sick and died at age 80 in 2005.

Other homeowners on the blocks that were demolished were bought out for amounts ranging from $500,000 to $1.2 million, Capote said. All their neighbors moved away.

Their little house is symbolic as a holdout against the proliferation of projects engulfing South Florida neighborhoods in the race to build, build, build — more condos, more apartments, more offices, more cafes, more stores. Seas may be rising but luxury towers are rising much faster. Cranes — giant rotating dollar signs — have become a fixture on the Miami skyline. Mega-development has become part of the local vocabulary.

The Capotes blame the city of Coral Gables for allowing expansion of the complex to four times its original size.

Goliath’s footprint has supplanted the Capote’s neighborhood.

“When powerful people throw money around, the rules go out the door,” Orlando said. “The city has given the developer everything he wants at the expense of our rights. Someone has to say enough is enough.”