Lake Nona - Medical City

[HankStrong]

7 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

Whether the facility is owned by KPMG or an out of town developer (as is the case with the majority of local hotels not named Rosen), they’re still paying local taxes (minus whatever credits Tavistock wrangled), hiring local folks (both hourly and some number of professionals), provisioning from local sources and probably visiting at least one theme park or I-Drive venue while they’re here.

I laughed when I read this.  The (very paraphrased by me) tweet that was mad at Elon Musk came to mind.  "Why U spend this money on going to Mars?  U spend billions!  What a waste when we need that money here on Earth for jobs!"  Uh, they aren't spending that money and giving it to Martians, buddy.

[AmIReal]

30 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

it still seems a net plus to me

I agree it is a net positive, I was just surprised (again, having not followed it) that the venture is so self contained. There is some diminishment of economic impact if all the revenue is captured in one place.

The article did not state the guest rooms are actually a hotel and required to pay tourists taxes. I guess in my mind it sounded like they were corporate owned "apartments" that are being provided to their guest. So you're saying KPMG owns a hotel and is going to pay themselves nightly room rates? Interesting...

[spenser1058]

14 minutes ago, AmIReal said:

I agree it is a net positive, I was just surprised (again, having not followed it) that the venture is so self contained. There is some diminishment of economic impact if all the revenue is captured in one place.

The article did not state the guest rooms are actually a hotel and required to pay tourists taxes. I guess in my mind it sounded like they were corporate owned "apartments" that are being provided to their guest. So you're saying KPMG owns a hotel and is going to pay themselves nightly room rates? Interesting...

I wasn’t thinking in terms of TDT - like you, I assume it’s KPMG’s facility (whether they’re managing the physical facility is of course a different question). I was thinking more along the lines of property taxes and the various other taxes any business in the community pays, along with those of their employees.

Meanwhile, Tavistock, the city and the OEP all will, I’m sure, maximize bragging rights of having the “KPMG training facility” in town.

Edited July 22, 2019 by spenser1058

[AmIReal]

In retrospect I realize how silly my thinking was. If KPMG is having that number of visitors in at a time- probably on a fixed schedule of a full week or more- it would be nearly impossible for them to rely on local hotels. Of course they need their own facility so that they can control room availability. 

Nonetheless, it is not what I THOUGHT was going to happen in Nona and I still  don't THINK it is the best possible outcome for the community. Regardless, still a win for the area.

[prahaboheme]

An interesting article from 2018 that I came across on the challenges of designing the USTA national campus at Lake Nona:

https://www.bdcnetwork.com/game-set-match-united-states-tennis-association-national-campus

[AmIReal]

5 hours ago, prahaboheme said:

An interesting article from 2018 that I came across on the challenges of designing the USTA national campus at Lake Nona:

https://www.bdcnetwork.com/game-set-match-united-states-tennis-association-national-campus

Wow, 80,000 each 5 lb bags of red clay from Italy for 6 of the 100 courts. Fascinating story. Thanks.

[spenser1058]

Time-lapse of the Lake Nona Medical Center:

 

[Jernigan]

Photo from the VA

[spenser1058]

Indoor Soccer/Athletic facility coming to Nona:

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/os-cfb-lake-nona-soccer-world-20191025-igvdifvocjfupiuc6iz5cjyy2i-story.html

From the Sentinel 

[AmIReal]

On 8/14/2018 at 10:57 PM, Ivanhoe said:

Pharmaceutical firm seeks city incentives to build $149M+ plant in Lake Nona

An affiliate of New Jersey-based Amicus Therapeutics, one of the world's largest biopharmaceutical companies, is seeking up to $3.99 million in city and state economic incentives to build a manufacturing facility in Lake Nona's Medical City, an investment it tells city staff would be at least $148.85...

http://www.growthspotter.com/news/lake-nona-developments/gs-amicus-plans-lake-nona-manufacturing-facility-20180814-story.html

I believe this is in addition to the deal posted last year by Ivanhoe. This is a purchase of 350 acres- over half of the Nona Medical City land. 

https://www.bizjournals.com/orlando/news/2019/11/12/done-deal-tavistock-sells-land-to-new-jersey.html?iana=hpmvp_orl_news_headline

[spenser1058]

KPMG’s new training center opens:

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/os-bz-kpmg-lake-nona-training-center-20200114-gpkijlp23zfwvniopmvjluet64-story.html

From the Sentinel 

[KJHburg]

Yes I went here too today.  sunny cold this morning, then cloudy in Winter Park then light rain in Lake Nona.  

LOTS of construction going on here with medical offices, residential,  offices etc.   This is the next big thing in Orlando I can tell.  Loved that huge stainless steel dog! We have a huge stainless steel head in Charlotte.  

the LakeHouse which is KPMG's training center I think.  USTA facility    photos 1-4

then the Childrens Hospital. 

Lake Nona Town Center has a 10 story apartment building and some other mid rise buildings and dual brand Marriott hotel and office tower.  I saw another hotel being built.   Love the container village of restaurants too called Boxi I think. 

Last photos UCF Medical facilities. 

[Poe Tempkin]

I have to agree about the "next big thing" sentiment. I live in Laureate Park, which is the neighborhood closest to the Town Center, and moved here precisely because of the potential I see.  As it is today it's still typically suburban, but the expanded Town Center and proposed linear park may change that, with more to do within walking and (for me) biking distance. Add to that a fleet of self-driving Beep shuttles and the planned transit center, and we may have about as plugged in a suburb as one could hope for. My hope is that the transit center links to the multi-modal terminal at MCO as well as downtown, to truly tie is into the rest of the city.

[spenser1058]

26 minutes ago, Poe Tempkin said:

I have to agree about the "next big thing" sentiment. I live in Laureate Park, which is the neighborhood closest to the Town Center, and moved here precisely because of the potential I see.  As it is today it's still typically suburban, but the expanded Town Center and proposed linear park may change that, with more to do within walking and (for me) biking distance. Add to that a fleet of self-driving Beep shuttles and the planned transit center, and we may have about as plugged in a suburb as one could hope for. My hope is that the transit center links to the multi-modal terminal at MCO as well as downtown, to truly tie is into the rest of the city.

Welcome - it’s great to have you with us!

[aent]

26 minutes ago, Poe Tempkin said:

I have to agree about the "next big thing" sentiment. I live in Laureate Park, which is the neighborhood closest to the Town Center, and moved here precisely because of the potential I see.  As it is today it's still typically suburban, but the expanded Town Center and proposed linear park may change that, with more to do within walking and (for me) biking distance. Add to that a fleet of self-driving Beep shuttles and the planned transit center, and we may have about as plugged in a suburb as one could hope for. My hope is that the transit center links to the multi-modal terminal at MCO as well as downtown, to truly tie is into the rest of the city.

That was the plan.... The old Maglev proposal had Lake Nona as a phase 2/start of either the east or south route (one idea was to go east to UCF through Lake Nona/Innovation Way, the other was go to Lake Nona, then south to Gaylord Palms and Disney.

[Urban Mail Carrier]

Funny u mention that because I was thinking the same thing. Lake Nona is the next big thing but for the area to move forward it needs a train stop and become integrated to the rest of Orlando.  CSX tracks run south along MCO and cross over Lake Nona Blvd. The tracks are parallel  to 417 and close to Medical City.

Edited January 23, 2020 by Urban Mail Carrier

[KJHburg]

Yes I saw one of those driverless vehicles as I turned in front of it to get into the parking garage.  It seem to hesitate so I thought it was stopped then later I saw it move.  

I did see the mainline RR tracks too. I researched this place and could not believe it was 10,000 acre master planned community much larger than I thought.  

Here is a photo of the Drive Shack or Top Golf can't remember which.  

[Uncommon]

People here hate Avalon Park. What will be significantly different about Lake Nona?

[spenser1058]

14 minutes ago, Uncommon said:

People here hate Avalon Park. What will be significantly different about Lake Nona?

Please correct me if I'm wrong here (I mostly stay in the core) but, isn't the difference that Lake Nona is doing the things necessary to be an actual city (especially employment options) while Avalon Park is just a huge suburb (primarily residential)?

[codypet]

10 hours ago, aent said:

That was the plan.... The old Maglev proposal had Lake Nona as a phase 2/start of either the east or south route (one idea was to go east to UCF through Lake Nona/Innovation Way, the other was go to Lake Nona, then south to Gaylord Palms and Disney.

There's still a transit proposal in the books but Terminal C needs to be built out to Phase 4 or 5 before it'll be feasible.

16 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

Please correct me if I'm wrong here (I mostly stay in the core) but, isn't the difference that Lake Nona is doing the things necessary to be an actual city (especially employment options) while Avalon Park is just a huge suburb (primarily residential)?

Hey hey hey Avalon Park has plenty of places to work.   Like Publix or Tijuana Flats.

[aent]

30 minutes ago, Uncommon said:

People here hate Avalon Park. What will be significantly different about Lake Nona?

Avalon Park's "downtown" is designed to be a maximum of maybe 4 blocks filled with stores you find in any retail plaza. There's little reason for anyone not within a few minutes drive of it to visit there, and if you're living outside of its downtown area in most of the community, the micro downtown still isn't reachable by walking since the lots are so wide with entrances to the communities not walkable to the center.  I feel like it gets extra hate as its a reasonably well done suburban community.

Lake Nona is literally setup to be a modern, master planned version of Winter Park. Lots of high paying job businesses, its designed to be fairly architecturally unique, and the housing developments, where feasible, are designed to be walkable to the downtown, and to assist in that, they've even launched the first autonomous shuttle in our area: they want people walking in its downtown. The downtown is a reasonable size, could easily be similar again to Winter Park.

Plus, Lake Nona has got a ton of hate on this forum as well. My opinion is people wanted its location to be a redevelopment of Parramore, which would have been nice, but acquiring the land to do what the developer wanted to do any closer to real downtown would have been impossible.

[HankStrong]

4 hours ago, aent said:

Avalon Park's "downtown" is designed to be a maximum of maybe 4 blocks filled with stores you find in any retail plaza. There's little reason for anyone not within a few minutes drive of it to visit there, and if you're living outside of its downtown area in most of the community, the micro downtown still isn't reachable by walking since the lots are so wide with entrances to the communities not walkable to the center.  I feel like it gets extra hate as its a reasonably well done suburban community.

It is a glorified strip mall in disguise as a downtown.

[Poe Tempkin]

6 hours ago, HankStrong said:

It is a glorified strip mall in disguise as a downtown.

We took a trip to Avalon park just to see what other neighborhoods with similar inspiration to Lake Nona were like. We hit the downtown / town center first and thought it was cool, but were surprised at the sheer scale of the box house sprawl that surrounded it. There are some rows of homes close to it which, to me, lie in the sweet spot. One of the more far flung properties would make it downright inaccessible though.

11 hours ago, aent said:

Plus, Lake Nona has got a ton of hate on this forum as well. My opinion is people wanted its location to be a redevelopment of Parramore, which would have been nice, but acquiring the land to do what the developer wanted to do any closer to real downtown would have been impossible.

Did Lake Nona's development really come at the expense of redevelopment of Parramore? Did Tavistock sniff around, only to choose the current site instead? Also, when we say "redevelopment", do we mean "gentrification", with all it's attendant controversy?

[KJHburg]

Lake Nona is my humble opinion is a big winner for central Florida.   Large portion will be non theme park creating jobs and large spaces for them.  As the Space Forces grows up this is the perfect location for new offices and so forth and so close to the airport I mean at the end of the runways for the corporate park.  that KPMG training center is massive.  This is a great spot for back office operations and companies relocating from high cost high tax states.  And many times exec who choose new office locations want to live close by.  In Charlotte we have a 2000 acre community called Ballantyne that has a country club, office park, lots of apartments retail etc and is has 5 million sq ft of occupied office space with more to come.  

This large master planned community with employment nodes and housing is common place in Texas and other parts of the southeast.  No body can do any thing like in south Florida there is not enough vacant land.  Wasn't the Heathrow development like this north of Orlando?  I think this Lake Nona can help diversify your economy into other areas .   

Look up Las Colinas and Cypress Waters in Dallas, or the Woodlands in Houston,  or even Ballantyne in Charlotte.  

 

[spenser1058]

Heathrow was Jeno Paulucci’s baby (he of Chun King and Jeno’s pizza rolls fame).

He was about a decade ahead of himself, though. Although he did attract AAA’s HQ, he aged too quickly and went back home to Duluth to live out the rest of his days. It started to take off many years later. 

A high-end local grocery chain, Gooding’s, made Heathrow famous for gold shopping carts and a grand piano in their store there (it didn’t last,either, nor did Gooding’s).

Edited January 24, 2020 by spenser1058