It’s true. By FourthFest 2027 Westlake might have a legal place to fish. Details below.
And on an admin note, there were four meetings last night. Too much info to include in one post, so I’ll just get some of the highlights in here.
1) FUTURE PARK – Remember, thanks to our lobbyist Karl Rasmussen, Westlake was awarded $600,000 in state appropriations to go toward Phase I of our future park at Sycamore and SPW! This was a matching appropriation, so the City had to match with its own $600,000 for a total of $1.2 million for Phase I.
And then SID swoops in, agreeing to split the matching $600,000 with the City! So that’s $600,000 from the State, $300,000 from the City and $300,00 from SID, all going toward Phase I which could hopefully finish up by FourthFest 2027.
Phase I is set to include: two driveways from SPW to a parking lot with two roundabouts and food truck parking; the roundabouts having their own flag poles and memorial monuments; bathrooms; park storage; and FISHING!!!
FISHING will be allowed in the three bodies of water lining the east edge of the park along Seminole Pratt Whitney! SID is looking into what type of benches or lean-on structures to add for all our fishing comfort. (Real talk: are these fish delicious???)
One of the monuments, a Blue Star Memorial honoring all veterans that have served our country, is being spearheaded by our own Stormi Bivins (from Cresswind) and the Wellington Garden Club; the other monument will be a 9/11 Remembrance Monument paid for by Westlake’s Art in Public Places fund.
Next up (if we can secure funding again next year for Phase II), the tot lot and tennis/pickleball courts!
2) THE AVERY APARTMENTS – had representatives on hand to answer a LOT of questions and concerns. But before I get to that. A lot of people were wondering about a timeline. If everything goes swimmingly, construction could start by the end of the year (!), then 15-16 months before the first residential building is fully erected, and a 30-36 month timeline till fully leased (which is never 100% FYI, maybe more like 95% or a little lower).
The Avery (Parcel L-3) is taking up 18 acres, leaving about 50 acres for the rest of Parcel L (Parcels L-1 and L-2) for a Towncenter, which apparently is similar to what Alton’s Towncenter takes up.
The developer, Eastwind, requested a waiver for reduced parking, which is definitely a pattern I see in commercial development here in Westlake, which makes me nervous. That’ll be our headache to contend with once the developers/builders are long gone. But the City approved the waiver. The apartments will have 72 rentable garages that are NOT to be used for storage. However, that’ll be enforced, we shall see.
The two outer corner apartment buildings were purposefully limited to three stories (no elevators, and the rent will be cheaper for it) for the aesthetics of the surrounding community. The inner six apartment buildings are four stories tall and will have elevators.
Section 8. Apparently there are two types of Section 8 programs. One is wherein the development itself is a Section 8 development. This is not that. These are market rate apartments, in this case “luxury”. Eastwind, with a bit more flexible lease terms (anywhere from 7-15 month leases), is planning on being able to house a lot of the equestrian community, who often have to drive out to Jupiter or Palm Beach Gardens from Welllington. Now, the second Section 8, is where renters get a voucher that fills the gap between what the renter can afford and how much the lease actually is. For The Avery, that gap would probably still be too large for the vouchers to fill, says the developer. So who really knows…
Minto and Eastwind were pretty savvy, having their ears to the interwebs, listening for feedback from us about the “leaked” details. So they did two things:
First, they went back to the drawing board and changed some of the aesthetic features of the apartment building facades to change from dark chalky blue accents to quieter tones that I think do look more elegant, less jarring, and added board and batten at some places (the images of these updates are too new, so I don’t have them yet). Shutters, which were always in the design, frame impact-resistant hurricane windows.
Second, in response to our neighbor Mike’s AI rendering of the visual at the west Hammocks gate looking out onto one of the apartment buildings, Minto and Eastwind had their own rendering made up to show us the difference. In the developer’s rendering there is a ton of foliage softening the corner of the apartment building. Apologies, but this is the best photo I could get. These is a rendering AT INSTALL. So not 3 to 8 years down the road.
So much more to come! Keep readin’!
Leave a Reply