STATE Planning board approves apartments

Luxury rental proposal heads to City Council despite concerns involving traffic, schools and bald eagles

A proposal to bring 348 luxury rental apartments to wooded land off Hoffner Avenue won approval from Orlando’s planning board over community concerns that roads and schools couldn’t handle additional residents and that the development would disrupt nearby bald eagles nests.

The plan now goes to the Orlando City Council, which would have to sign off on the planning board’s action and hold two public hearings on whether to annex 24-acre site.

After plans were filed with the city — as first reported by GrowthSpotter — residents decried the project, arguing that the strain on roads and schools would be too much. A Change.org petition against the proposal garnered about 450 signatures. The plan also drew opposition from nearby Belle Isle.

Tony Solo, a West Palm Beach developer, said he was interested in developing the property in part because of its proximity to downtown and Orlando International Airport. The proposal includes 162 one-bedroom, 156 two-bedroom and 30 three-bedroom units, which Solo said would be marketed toward a younger crowd. After the hearing, he said the traffic effects would be minimal.

“Once people come home here, they’re not inclined to go in and out,” he said, because of planned amenities.

Carlie Starr, a Conway resident, formed the petition and had pushed for concerned neighbors to wear red at Tuesday’s hearing. About 20 were there, and a half dozen spoke.

“I think that this development is being really rushed,” Starr said. “I think it needs to be postponed and taken a second look at.”

She read from an email sent to city planners blasting the environmental study done by Bio-tech

Consulting, Inc., which found no endangered species or bald eagle nests. However, in the email, Shawnlei Breeding, who oversees Audubon Florida’s EagleWatch program, said there are three documented nests within a mile of the property. She said the survey was the product of “gross negligence.”

“Even if eagles weren’t physically present at the nests at the