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Orange & Robinson Apartments | 11-story residential [Under Construction]


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5 minutes ago, Flotex said:

But Orlando is also one of the fastest growing cities in America....

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Is it? The metro area definitely is, but not so much the city. Not sure how that impacts density if most of the people who move here are moving to the surrounding areas.

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22 hours ago, Uncommon said:

Is it? The metro area definitely is, but not so much the city. Not sure how that impacts density if most of the people who move here are moving to the surrounding areas.

The way central city limits and their jurisdictions are laid out now in the United States, especially in the sunbelt, makes comparing cities only by their populations and not metro area rather difficult or misleading. Like comparing Jacksonville and Miami or Atlanta. Orlando, although a smaller city proper has a much larger metropolitan area than Nashville or Austin. Orlando, for better or for worse, has numerous nuclei similar to most cities of the Sunbelt. 

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3 hours ago, aleonrivera said:

The way central city limits and their jurisdictions are laid out now in the United States, especially in the sunbelt, makes comparing cities only by their populations and not metro area rather difficult or misleading. Like comparing Jacksonville and Miami or Atlanta. Orlando, although a smaller city proper has a much larger metropolitan area than Nashville or Austin. Orlando, for better or for worse, has numerous nuclei similar to most cities of the Sunbelt. 

According to Google, the three metro areas are virtually the same size in terms of population.

Austin - 2,227,083

Nashville - 2,090,956

Orlando - 2,134,411

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3 hours ago, aleonrivera said:

The way central city limits and their jurisdictions are laid out now in the United States, especially in the sunbelt, makes comparing cities only by their populations and not metro area rather difficult or misleading. Like comparing Jacksonville and Miami or Atlanta. Orlando, although a smaller city proper has a much larger metropolitan area than Nashville or Austin. Orlando, for better or for worse, has numerous nuclei similar to most cities of the Sunbelt. 

Agreed, but my point was that Orlando’s population is mostly growing outside of the city in the surrounding cities of the metro and the unincorporated places of Orange County. If the growth was concentrated in city limits or close to downtown, I imagine the city would begin to build more vertical eventually. But right now, not only is there a lot of free space to build on but the city itself doesn’t have that high of demand to build in the core, like Austin and Nashville do.

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3 hours ago, JFW657 said:

According to Google, the three metro areas are virtually the same size in terms of population.

Austin - 2,227,083

Nashville - 2,090,956

Orlando - 2,134,411

Not to disagree, but you're citing 2010 MSA figures for the Orlando while using more updated estimates  for the others. A quick Google search shows the Orlando MSA (Orange, Osceola, Lake, Seminole) estimates at between 2,509,454 and 2,608,147.  That, of courses, rises if the suburban/exurban areas of Volusia and Polk Counties (CSA figures) were to be included. CSA seems to be a little bit of a reach in the counties included, but that figure would be close to 4,160,646 putting the Orlando CSA 15th in the U.S.

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12 hours ago, Uncommon said:

Agreed, but my point was that Orlando’s population is mostly growing outside of the city in the surrounding cities of the metro and the unincorporated places of Orange County. If the growth was concentrated in city limits or close to downtown, I imagine the city would begin to build more vertical eventually. But right now, not only is there a lot of free space to build on but the city itself doesn’t have that high of demand to build in the core, like Austin and Nashville do.

Absolutely! Being so decentralized over a large area for our population size has hurt that desire/demand for building vertical in the core.  

 

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7 hours ago, aleonrivera said:

Not to disagree, but you're citing 2010 MSA figures for the Orlando while using more updated estimates  for the others. A quick Google search shows the Orlando MSA (Orange, Osceola, Lake, Seminole) estimates at between 2,509,454 and 2,608,147.  That, of courses, rises if the suburban/exurban areas of Volusia and Polk Counties (CSA figures) were to be included. CSA seems to be a little bit of a reach in the counties included, but that figure would be close to 4,160,646 putting the Orlando CSA 15th in the U.S.

Yes, citing the 2019 metro population estimates for both Austin and Nashville, and then inexplicably citing Orlando’s 2010 census population doesn’t make sense.

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11 hours ago, JFW657 said:

According to Google, the three metro areas are virtually the same size in terms of population.

Austin - 2,227,083

Nashville - 2,090,956

Orlando - 2,134,411

The city of Nashville is bigger but Orlando has a larger msa. I am not sure how the cities compare in population density or acreage. 

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33 minutes ago, jack said:

The city of Nashville is bigger but Orlando has a larger msa. I am not sure how the cities compare in population density or acreage. 

If I remember correctly, Nashville has far more land area than Orlando and has less people per square miles. Both cities are pretty sprawly but by all accounts, Orlando is the larger city.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistical_areas
 

This is the MSA list generally used. Orlando’s MSA is definitely larger than either Nashville or Austin (Austin’s growing faster, though - all pre-COVID).

Nashville is consolidated with Davidson County, so their City population is increased (like Jacksonville and Duval).

The City of Austin is apparently quite large with 970,000 people; Travis County has about 1.2 million and the Austin MSA is at 2.2 million.

Orlando is a relatively small city at about 300, 000 while Orange County is slightly bigger than Travis at 1.3 million. Our MSA, however is about 400,000 larger than Austin’s at 2.6 million.

Orlando has been decentralized since its inception in the 19th century. Our primary economic engines are spread out.
 

Downtown, in fact, has become relatively less important since the 1980’s as one of its primary functions, as a regional insurance and banking hub, has much less importance as those industries consolidated in other cities (as an example, SunBank’s much lower head count resulting in a much smaller footprint).

Downtown’s major function as the region’s governmental hub has even taken a hit as OC departments including the sheriff, elections, tax collections, etc. have all left downtown. Heck, even the City moved OPD out of downtown.

Austin and Nashville are both state capitals (and they are both centered downtown).  That ensures a large and steady workforce that isn’t going anywhere. It also provides lots of jobs for housing legislatures, lobbyists, etc. who need higher-end apts/condos/hotels, etc. as their presence ebbs and flows throughout the year based on their legislatures’ calendars.

Nashville’s tourism industry is also primarily downtown and along nearby Music Row (after a detour out to the defunct Opryland theme park in the ‘70’s and ‘80’s - the huge Opryland Hotel complex is still in the ‘burbs and splits the Grand Ole Opry with downtown part of the year).


 

5 hours ago, spenser1058 said:

 

Edited by spenser1058
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1 hour ago, spenser1058 said:


Nashville is consolidated with Davidson County, so their City population is increased (like Jacksonville and Duval).

Austin and Nashville are both state capitals.  That ensures a large and steady workforce that isn’t going anywhere. It also provides lots of jobs for housing legislatures, lobbyists, etc. who need higher-end apts/condos, etc. as their presence ebbs and flows throughout the year based on their legislatures’ calendars.

 

I forgot they are a consolidated city. And it is interesting that the MSA is that much larger than Orlando's. But it shows you that you do not have to be big to have a compelling city experience. And it does not hurt that Austin and Nashville are state capitals and have universities downtownish. 

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If you wanted to compare us with someone, the apt comparison is, not surprisingly, Orange County, CA., home of Disneyland.

What you may not know is that our namesake in Cali has 3 million people, and while mostly suburban (the tallest building is 23 stories at the moment - that may change soon), it’s also one of the densest counties in the country. None of the cities particularly stands out (most of us wouldn’t know the county seat without Googling it).

It has a lot of low-paid folks in the tourism industry, but also many high-income residents near the beaches (not unlike us - Reality loves to scream about our low-end service workers but avoids the fact that our OC has been in the top 50 US counties for the number of wealthy households - think of Isleworth, Bay Hill, Winter Park, etc.)

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A lot of people think tech is going to be what makes downtown relevant. It’s not and here’s why:

Other than if EA’s move downtown spawns a huge influx of gaming tech to Orlando (so far it hasn’t, even though some have predicted it would going all the way back to when we were also told Disney-MGM Studios and Universal Studios Florida were going to make Orlando “Hollywood East” - those parks no longer even pretend to have anything to do with film production).

Instead, tech is likely to cluster around Central Florida Research Park at UCF, one of the country’s largest such facilities: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Florida_Research_Park

Orlando is known for its simulation and optics industries, which combines work for both our aerospace/defense industries and its theme parks. As the private space industry grows 35 miles east in Brevard, look for them to develop even closer ties with this area.

 

17 minutes ago, orlandouprise said:

Not really a great comparison. OC Cali is not really an MSA or a metro city, it’s just a suburban feeder county to a much larger LA just like Seminole County would be to Orlando. 

The only thing that makes us any different historically is the fact the region’s federal courts are here. I know you hate the idea, but Central Florida has been a thing much longer than the concept of “Orlando”.

What made downtown matter was the days when the publisher of the Sentinel and the head of the First National Bank at Orlando had offices just down Orange Ave. from each other. They brought much of the growth to the area but, ironically, spread it out all over the county.

Today, the Sentinel is owned out of Chicago and represents a declining industry and Joel Wells sold Sun Bank’s soul to Atlanta 30 years ago. Interestingly, the idea they had which would have permanently secured a spot for downtown’s relevance to the region is the one that got away: working with Claude Kirk to move the capital here.

Our elected leaders now do what the tourism industry and developers from out of town tell them to. The truth is, downtown is no longer the most important part of the region.

Don’t get me wrong - I love downtown and have lived here and been involved with it longer than many of our posters have been alive. It’s important to realize how it has stalled in order to decide what to do next.

 

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19 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

A lot of people think tech is going to be what makes downtown relevant. It’s not and here’s why:

Other than if EA’s move downtown spawns a huge influx of gaming tech to Orlando (so far it hasn’t, even though some have predicted it would going all the way back to when we were also told Disney-MGM Studios and Universal Studios Florida were going to make Orlando “Hollywood East” - those parks no longer even pretend to have anything to do with film production).

Instead, tech is likely to cluster around Central Florida Research Park at UCF, one of the country’s largest such facilities: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Florida_Research_Park

Orlando is known for its simulation and optics industries, which combines work for both our aerospace/defense industries and its theme parks. As the private space industry grows 35 miles east in Brevard, look for them to develop even closer ties with this area.

 

The only thing that makes us any different historically is the fact the region’s federal courts are here. I know you hate the idea, but Central Florida has been a thing much longer than the concept of “Orlando”.

What made downtown matter was the days when the publisher of the Sentinel and the head of the First National Bank at Orlando had offices just down Orange Ave. from each other. They brought much of the growth to the area but, ironically, spread it out all over the county.

Today, the Sentinel is owned out of Chicago and represents a declining industry and Joel Wells sold Sun Bank’s soul to Atlanta 30 years ago.

Our elected leaders now do what the tourism industry and developers from out of town tell them to. The truth is, downtown is no longer the most important part of the region.

Don’t get me wrong - I love downtown and have lived here and been involved with it longer than many of our posters have been alive. It’s important to realize how it has stalled in order to decide what to do next.

 

I agree, that downtown has stalled in some areas, but it’s flourished in others.

Downtown Orlando has stalled in terms of retail and tourist activities. There’s a little bit of good and bad in that. Most cities across the country are facing the same quandary when it comes to downtown shopping. In so many instances, brick and mortar shopping is nearly obsolete if it isn’t at big box stores, outlets, or malls. The largest cities can still afford to have downtown retail, but the great majority of mid-size cities, like Orlando is, can’t, so they don’t. Tourist activities that draw people to the core is unfortunately missing. Some things will get proposed or pop up here and there, like ax throwing or rock climbing gyms or skating rinks, but largely, fun or tourist activities have moved to almost exclusively International Drive. Unfortunately, Orlando has a separate tourist section, and that will continue to dampen downtown’s importance.

On the other hand, Orlando is building housing downtown at a feverish pace. More and more people are finding the benefits of living and working downtown. We’ll see what happens with COVID and if office space will see a huge decrease in demand, but at the very least, people want to live in the core, and that’s a feat that Jacksonville and Tampa (not sure I consider Water Street the CBD or not) can’t lay claim to.

Of course I wish I-Drive was in the core. I think the luring of people to downtown as the main hub of the region would improve the core’s vibrancy and density, leading to a better street experience and vertical construction (which I know you couldn’t care less about). Sadly, because Orlando is fractured between I-Drive and downtown, the city will likely not feel cohesive anytime soon.

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23 minutes ago, Uncommon said:

I agree, that downtown has stalled in some areas, but it’s flourished in others.

Downtown Orlando has stalled in terms of retail and tourist activities. There’s a little bit of good and bad in that. Most cities across the country are facing the same quandary when it comes to downtown shopping. In so many instances, brick and mortar shopping is nearly obsolete if it isn’t at big box stores, outlets, or malls. The largest cities can still afford to have downtown retail, but the great majority of mid-size cities, like Orlando is, can’t, so they don’t. Tourist activities that draw people to the core is unfortunately missing. Some things will get proposed or pop up here and there, like ax throwing or rock climbing gyms or skating rinks, but largely, fun or tourist activities have moved to almost exclusively International Drive. Unfortunately, Orlando has a separate tourist section, and that will continue to dampen downtown’s importance.

On the other hand, Orlando is building housing downtown at a feverish pace. More and more people are finding the benefits of living and working downtown. We’ll see what happens with COVID and if office space will see a huge decrease in demand, but at the very least, people want to live in the core, and that’s a feat that Jacksonville and Tampa (not sure I consider Water Street the CBD or not) can’t lay claim to.

Of course I wish I-Drive was in the core. I think the luring of people to downtown as the main hub of the region would improve the core’s vibrancy and density, leading to a better street experience and vertical construction (which I know you couldn’t care less about). Sadly, because Orlando is fractured between I-Drive and downtown, the city will likely not feel cohesive anytime soon.

The problem with downtown’s high rise residential is that, so far, they are mostly extended dorms for twenty-somethings living mostly 4 roomies to a 2-bedroom apartment. It makes sense given downtown’s primary attractions are the bar strip and the arena/soccer field.

Even here at UP, most of our posters leave for single-family dwellings outside downtown within a couple of years of living here.

The idea of downtown as its redevelopment began was to have one area of the city that did not require an automobile (even that was in tension - Mayor Bill never embraced it*) Until we attract retail and/or fix transit, that’s unlikely to happen.

* Rule #1 of a successful pedestrian- friendly/transit-oriented core: there has to be a scarcity of parking. When downtown was being redeveloped, OC Commission Chairman Lou Treadway (a Republican!) fought for that; Mayor Bill refused to go along and insisted on dozens of parking garages. Mayor Bill won.

Let me be clear - I’m agnostic about tall buildings. They are neither good nor bad to me (although we tend to get the latter for most things built since the courthouse). As you noted, downtown Tampa has had tall buildings for years but no one wanted to live there. It’s how the buildings relate to the folks on the ground that matter.

I might also add the conceit of living in soulless vertical downtowns was already on the way out even before COVID as most of our major cities began losing population. More important is to make downtowns user-friendly and pleasant places to be along with good schools. Initially, we covered those bases but have dropped the ball in recent years.

Oddly, economists have said going vertical should help make downtowns affordable. It’s unfortunate the greed of developers hasn’t made that true. If it were, I’d welcome much taller buildings downtown.

Edited by spenser1058
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One additional thought on the 1980’s decisions to rely on parking garages downtown in addition to the county’s tilt against adequate transit:

FREE PARKING IS NOT FREE

All those parking garages run up the costs of high rises. Additionally, the lack of retail and frequent transit makes the necessity of a car more important. The attraction of living in a high rise in a pedestrian- friendly core should be no need for car payments, auto insurance, repairs, etc.

Edited by spenser1058
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38 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

One additional thought on the 1980’s decisions to rely on parking garages downtown in addition to the county’s tilt against adequate transit:

What transit options are you suggesting? We have a commuter rail, even though the schedule is inadequate. We have buses, uber, taxis and an improving bicycle infrastructure. The only other thing I can think of that we don't have is a subway and I don't think Florida can have those. What else is there? I'm not trying to be a wise-guy, I'm genuinely curious because I can't think of anything else.

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1 hour ago, spenser1058 said:

One additional thought on the 1980’s decisions to rely on parking garages downtown in addition to the county’s tilt against adequate transit:

FREE PARKING IS NOT FREE

All those parking garages run up the costs of high rises. Additionally, the lack of retail and frequent transit makes the necessity of a car more important. The attraction of living in a high rise in a pedestrian- friendly core should be no need for car payments, auto insurance, repairs, etc.

 

35 minutes ago, orange87 said:

I think New Haven, CT recently banned the construction of new parking garages. They want to force people to ditch their cars and use public transportation.

Northern cities like NYC and Chicago etc, were built up long before the automobile came along. Mass transit was there from very near their beginnings. By the time cars really came on the scene, these places had already grown up  in and were designed for life in a non-car-centric world.

Rather than having to redesign themselves to accomodate/encourage people not using cars, it was the other way around for them. They had to change to accomodate more automobile traffic. 

I doubt downtown Orlando will ever be the kind of city where large numbers of residents don't own cars because they don't need to.  If it ever does eventually become that kind of city, that day is a long, long way off. 

Look for parking garages to be a major part of downtown high-rise construction for decades to come.

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