Packing District projects planned
Here is what’s coming to Orlando’s newest neighborhood
Two years ago, Dr. Phillips Charities unveiled a grand $700 million vision to transform more than 200 acres of industrial land and woods in northwest Orlando into a new urban neighborhood. Today, half a dozen projects have been announced for what will one day be the Packing District.
The area, just west of College Park and bordered by Princeton Street and Orange Blossom Trail, will be home to a mix of luxury apartments, townhomes, businesses and restaurants. It also will feature a 105-acre city park, YMCA, food hall and John Rivers’ new farm and agriculture center.
The area will need significant upgrades to its roads and stormwater systems, with portions of Princeton Street being narrowed from six lanes to four and a roundabout added to calm traffic. Development plans for the district also include new walking and biking trails and 10-foot wide cyclist and pedestrian paths along the streets.
The charity owned much of the property before announcing the project in December 2017. Construction on the park began this summer, and the first residential building broke ground last month.
“We don’t think of ourselves as developers, but more as community builders,” said Ken Robinson, president and CEO of Dr. Phillips Charities, which is serving as master developer for the project. “A developer is here today and gone tomorrow. A community builder is someone who’s here forever.”
The name, the Packing District, is a nod to the land’s beginnings as a packing and shipping hub for citrus growers, including citrus magnate Philip “Doc” Phillips, namesake of Dr. Phillips Charities and its other organizations.
Over the years, as the Phillips family transitioned out of citrus and into real estate, the land around the plant was developed into the present-day industrial yard, home to facilities for Sears, Howard Johnsons, Nabisco, Goodyear Tie, Porter Paint and
Sealtest ice cream, among others.
Robinson plans to rehabilitate about a dozen of the old industrial buildings so they can be used by the restaurants and businesses that move in. Robinson said his team chose buildings “that had the most personality.”
Dr. Phillips Charities estimates that over the next 10 to 15 years the district will add 800 jobs to the area, re-purpose up to 700,000 square feet of existing buildings, and generate $56 million for the city’s general fund and potentially $95 million in gross taxes.
There will be between 2,500 and 3,500 residential units, mostly apartments, townhomes and duplexes, and more than 1 million square feet of retail and office space.
Robinson anticipates most of the property to be built out by 2021 but emphasized that it will continue to change and grow.
“I’m excited to watch it develop,” said City Commissioner Robert Stuart, whose district includes the Packing District. “I think it’s going to mean a lot to our community.” Park and YMCA
One of the focal points of the future Packing District will be a large public park, near Princeton Street and John Young Parkway. The 105 acres the park will encompass was given to the city by Dr. Phillips Charities immediately after the charity purchased a total of 118 acres for the project for $4.7 million.
The park will include a 13-acre pond to help filter the water that travels to Lake Lawne and into the Wekiva River Basin as well as a 3,000-person open event space on which Dr. Phillips will consider building a 150-foot-long, 40-foot-wide pavilion.
Stuart said the city could explore renting kayaks and canoes and having dogfriendly areas, among other amenities.
Much of the land is currently a non-functioning wetland, Robinson said, that has been overrun by invasive plants and trash. Many of the trees, he said, had to be removed because of rot, along with truckloads of garbage and tires. The charity will bring in new trees to fill the park.
At the north end of the park, the downtown Orlando Tennis Centre will be relocated and a new YMCA will be built.
Construction of the YMCA will cost $12.1 million. The Dr. Phillips Charities board contributed $8.9 million and the Williams Family Foundation and Wayne Densch Charities recently donated another $3 million, Robinson said.
The two-story building will be 24,500 square feet and could expand up to 40,000 square feet. It will feature two swimming pools, including a kids’ pool with a water slide, and a rooftop yoga garden overlooking the lake in the new park.
The adjacent Tennis Centre will have 16 full-size, lighted tennis courts, a 5,000-square-foot clubhouse with locker rooms and shade cabanas.
Robinson expects the park and YMCA to open late next year or in early 2021.
Townhomes, duplexes
The first of the Packing District’s residential projects, The Cannery, broke ground in November. It will include 307 units and is expected to open in spring 2021. The four-story buildings will be at Orange Blossom Trail and Princeton Street just west of the CSX rail line.
The units, which replace a 1950s industrial building demolished last year, are being developed by Embrey Partners Ltd., a nationally recognized multifamily residential developer.
The first phase of apartments should be available for lease by spring 2021.
Robinson said Dr. Phillips has contracted with a grocer to go into the parcel south of The Cannery, but could not at this point say with which company.
Plans for that area of the property also call for a handful of restaurants and businesses, and future tenants for a former tire service building and fire station. At the same intersection, the charity will reconstruct the Dr. Phillips juice stand, where customers could buy 10-pound bags of oranges and 46-ounce cans of orange juice for 23 cents, on its original site and lease it to a coffee shop operator.
This summer, David Weekley Homes also submitted plans to build 111 townhouses and duplexes just south of Princeton Street and adjacent to the new YMCA.
“You won’t see the traditional single-family home suburbia,” Robinson said. “We want to see the walkability, the rideability.”
At this point, there are no plans for the community to include any subsidized affordable housing. Retail and beer
Another anchor of the district will be a 22,400-square-foot food hall inside the old Southern Box Company building, on the southeast corner of Princeton Street and Orange Blossom Trail. It will also house a 4,000-square-foot event space.
Dr. Phillips will seek to preserve the building, which dates back to the early 1930s and was used by Phillips as one of his orange crate manufacturing factories. It will be completed by early 2021.
On the same parcel, there also be a micro-brewery, a restaurant and bar and another 14,000 square feet of retail space and 10,000 square feet of office space.
At first, Robinson said, he and his team considered bulldozing the outdated buildings and starting fresh. But members of the community pressed the need to salvage the area’s rich history.
“As we laid out the vision for this once industrial area of the city, our goal was to repurpose as many of the buildings on the property as possible to capture and preserve a piece of the history of this special place in Dr. Phillips’ and Orlando’s history,” Robinson said. “This is a great example of how we’re working to blend the old and the new within the Packing District and will be a great addition to the community.”
Education and a farm
John Rivers, founder of the 4 Rivers Smokehouse chain, in November unveiled details about his future 4 Roots farm and agriculture center, which will sit on the southwest part of the district off John Young Parkway.
The campus will include greenhouses, a wetland boardwalk, classroom space and a potentially 20,000-square-foot discovery center, similar to a science center, where residents will be able to learn about Central Florida’s agricultural roots.
Land clearing will begin next year, and the project will be completed based on fundraising. It will also have a farm-to-table restaurant, supplied with vegetables grown on site.
Students from nearby schools will have the chance to take field trips to the farm, he said, and discussions are currently underway with Valencia College to possibly relocate its agriculture program there.