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Lake Nona - Medical City


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21 hours ago, prahaboheme said:

Anytime I'm in Lake Nona a fall back to Nona Blue -- great ambiance, good people watching, decent food (in the past it was a bit better).

Many friends love Nona Blue.  I went once right before COVID and had one of the worst dinners I've had at a legit restaurant (vs. takeout or fast food or whatever) in many, many years.  Awful service.  Awful food.  Awful time.

20 hours ago, aent said:

I've found that most of the super high end restaurants disappoint me, but I've been very happy with Chroma, Bosphorous, and actually one of my favorites is the food at the Nona Adventure Park, thats a hidden gem.

I like Bosphorous a lot.  I actually like the food at Chroma, but they are so snooty that's it is insane.  I've not eaten at Chroma more than I've eaten there.  They wouldn't seat us in a nearly empty restaurant because they had reservations in 2.5 hours.  They had servers standing around doing nothing.  The tables with guests had food.  They wouldn't seat us because we might not turn the table over for 2.5 hours.  Another time they told us it was a 4.5 hours wait to get a table.  It was busy that night, but not BUSY BUSY.  Another time they told us (with reservations this time) that our party of 6 wouldn't be seated until 45 minutes after our reservation because they have trouble seating large groups.  I asked if there was a typo or something.  Did it say 16? or 66?  or 600?  She said it says 6 and that's a large party to us.  Another time we went they were having kitchen troubles and were closing.  It's just been a pain.  I have eaten there at least 3 times and been served, but it's always with this massive air of "we don't really want you here, but we'll serve you anyway."

19 hours ago, jrs2 said:

you really can't go wrong with Mediteranian food.   I spelled it wrong.  I said for the longest time, the vegetarian platter at Morocco at Epcot was the best or only good food in that park.  You would think you were at a Bosphorous-type restaurant.

I certainly wouldn't call it the ONLY good food, but it is highly underrated.  

 

If anyone wants to slum it a bit, I'd recommend Cappadocia on 436.  It's wonderful.  I would suggest you use extreme caution as it is in that drug-infested  1-mile stretch of 436 between Colonial and the 408.  I've thought I was about to get mugged a few times when we've gone.

On a funny side note:

I have a friend who says that the Bosphorous on Park Avenue is where you go to dinner if you love having an amazing & delicious meal served to you by people that hate your guts and wish you were dead.

Edited by HankStrong
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42 minutes ago, HankStrong said:

Many friends love Nona Blue.  I went once right before COVID and had one of the worst dinners I've had at a legit restaurant (vs. takeout or fast food or whatever) in many, many years.  Awful service.  Awful food.  Awful time.

I like Bosphorous a lot.  I actually like the food at Chroma, but they are so snooty that's it is insane.  I've not eaten at Chroma more than I've eaten there.  They wouldn't seat us in a nearly empty restaurant because they had reservations in 2.5 hours.  They had servers standing around doing nothing.  The tables with guests had food.  They wouldn't seat us because we might not turn the table over for 2.5 hours.  Another time they told us it was a 4.5 hours wait to get a table.  It was busy that night, but not BUSY BUSY.  Another time they told us (with reservations this time) that our party of 6 wouldn't be seated until 45 minutes after our reservation because they have trouble seating large groups.  I asked if there was a typo or something.  Did it say 16? or 66?  or 600?  She said it says 6 and that's a large party to us.  Another time we went they were having kitchen troubles and were closing.  It's just been a pain.  I have eaten there at least 3 times and been served, but it's always with this massive air of "we don't really want you here, but we'll serve you anyway."

I certainly wouldn't call it the ONLY good food, but it is highly underrated.  

 

If anyone wants to slum it a bit, I'd recommend Cappadocia on 436.  It's wonderful.  I would suggest you use extreme caution as it is in that drug-infested  1-mile stretch of 436 between Colonial and the 408.  I've thought I was about to get mugged a few times when we've gone.

On a funny side note:

I have a friend who says that the Bosphorous on Park Avenue is where you go to dinner if you love having an amazing & delicious meal served to you by people that hate your guts and wish you were dead.

I forgot to preface it:  vegetarian...good in that is was good + healthy...

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Tavistock announced they are getting approval from the GOAA to add about 3000 apartments in the town center area. These new units will be in the proper town center, and not across the street from it like the current apartments in the area. Also, Nami, a Japanese restaurant should open in the town center this summer along with a Starbucks.

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Also according to OBJ, the Disney contract with Lake Nona required 250,000 sq ft of space to be built out and opened on the property by September 2028, so while Disney can sit on the property for a few years, they can't sit on it forever. If they fail to have a few buildings done by then, Lake Nona gets to repurchase the property for the original selling price. Lake Nona also retains right of first refusal if Disney tries to sell it to someone else.

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13 hours ago, aent said:

Tavistock announced they are getting approval from the GOAA to add about 3000 apartments in the town center area. These new units will be in the proper town center, and not across the street from it like the current apartments in the area. Also, Nami, a Japanese restaurant should open in the town center this summer along with a Starbucks.

any idea about that 17 story apartment build that was slated right behind and across the street from those micro apartments?

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On 5/24/2023 at 9:47 PM, aent said:

Also according to OBJ, the Disney contract with Lake Nona required 250,000 sq ft of space to be built out and opened on the property by September 2028, so while Disney can sit on the property for a few years, they can't sit on it forever. If they fail to have a few buildings done by then, Lake Nona gets to repurchase the property for the original selling price. Lake Nona also retains right of first refusal if Disney tries to sell it to someone else.

here is the quote from the OBJ article about the land Disney owns and how it relates to Tavistock

""According to Orange County public records, a memorandum of repurchase option between Tavistock subsidiary Lake Nona Land Co. and Disney's related Dynamic Campus LLC said that Disney, as buyer, was to have hit the following construction milestones:

Completion of 250,000 square feet of interior construction and a certificate of occupancy issued by seven years from the property sale closing date. That puts it at Sept. 14, 2028.
Completion of a total of 500,000 square feet of the project by 10 years from the closing date, putting it at Sept. 14, 2031.
Those construction deadlines function as "repurchase triggers," giving the seller the right to buy back any undeveloped portion of the 60 acres for the original purchase price of $46.4 million or a prorated price, if any of the land is developed, per the memorandum. The document also notes some exceptions for unforeseeable circumstances and breaches of contract by the seller.

Of course, it's unclear whether Disney wants to hold the property; a Disney spokesperson told Orlando Business Journal last week that the company is "considering next steps for the property" but did not elaborate.""

I say give it  a year or two and I still think Disney will open some kind of office here.  They have 5 years from now and most mid rise office buildings could be built in less than 2 years. 

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19 hours ago, KJHburg said:

here is the quote from the OBJ article about the land Disney owns and how it relates to Tavistock

""According to Orange County public records, a memorandum of repurchase option between Tavistock subsidiary Lake Nona Land Co. and Disney's related Dynamic Campus LLC said that Disney, as buyer, was to have hit the following construction milestones:

Completion of 250,000 square feet of interior construction and a certificate of occupancy issued by seven years from the property sale closing date. That puts it at Sept. 14, 2028.
Completion of a total of 500,000 square feet of the project by 10 years from the closing date, putting it at Sept. 14, 2031.
Those construction deadlines function as "repurchase triggers," giving the seller the right to buy back any undeveloped portion of the 60 acres for the original purchase price of $46.4 million or a prorated price, if any of the land is developed, per the memorandum. The document also notes some exceptions for unforeseeable circumstances and breaches of contract by the seller.

Of course, it's unclear whether Disney wants to hold the property; a Disney spokesperson told Orlando Business Journal last week that the company is "considering next steps for the property" but did not elaborate.""

I say give it  a year or two and I still think Disney will open some kind of office here.  They have 5 years from now and most mid rise office buildings could be built in less than 2 years. 

...and this is tied into the $530+M tax incentives over 19 years too, right, at whichever scale they would receive them each year? So now the State will have to change that incentive based on how much they actually build here I gather.

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23 minutes ago, codypet said:

Dang I remember when the nursing school was supposed to be on campus between Engineering and Health and Public Affairs.  Those poor engineers won't have anyone to awkwardly hit on.   Those poor souls.

I guess they’ll have to catch the non-existent express bus to downtown to fulfill their desires. 

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7 hours ago, orlandocity87 said:

Thanks! 

"Proposed surface lot" yikes

Sidenote: thenextmiami.com includes a live Google Maps insert with each article, which is helpful. 

Yeah, but I think its still better they build the surface lot then the original proposal of a 2 story parking deck. The reason they took it out is they don't need a full parking garage as of yet, but they want to build one at a future date. The master plan has all surface lots being removed at full campus build out... whenever that happens. Of course, that seems to be forever delayed with UCF acquiring the Burnham Institute and their land, giving it a ton of extra land/square footage for facilities that were supposed to be built on this site plan block. The state not letting them build a dental school (thanks UF) means there really is nothing after the nursing building on the horizon at the moment unfortunately. Hopefully they'll try again for a dental school and maybe a vet school soon.

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19 minutes ago, aent said:

Yeah, but I think its still better they build the surface lot then the original proposal of a 2 story parking deck. The reason they took it out is they don't need a full parking garage as of yet, but they want to build one at a future date. The master plan has all surface lots being removed at full campus build out... whenever that happens. Of course, that seems to be forever delayed with UCF acquiring the Burnham Institute and their land, giving it a ton of extra land/square footage for facilities that were supposed to be built on this site plan block. The state not letting them build a dental school (thanks UF) means there really is nothing after the nursing building on the horizon at the moment unfortunately. Hopefully they'll try again for a dental school and maybe a vet school soon.

Go Gators, bruddah!

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On 9/21/2023 at 5:43 PM, aent said:

Yeah, but I think its still better they build the surface lot then the original proposal of a 2 story parking deck. The reason they took it out is they don't need a full parking garage as of yet, but they want to build one at a future date. The master plan has all surface lots being removed at full campus build out... whenever that happens. Of course, that seems to be forever delayed with UCF acquiring the Burnham Institute and their land, giving it a ton of extra land/square footage for facilities that were supposed to be built on this site plan block. The state not letting them build a dental school (thanks UF) means there really is nothing after the nursing building on the horizon at the moment unfortunately. Hopefully they'll try again for a dental school and maybe a vet school soon.

It was really the Florida Dental Association who was against it. A decision that I disagree with. At the time UF wanted to expand their own program, FAMU and UCF wanted to open up new programs. The new LECOM school in Bradenton just opened up. A report by the FDA was cited that the state didn't need more dentists as a whole, but only needed dentists in rural areas and new schools were not gonna fix that. They claimed the 3 dental schools that Florida has is enough to offset the amount of dentists leaving the state or retiring annually. Personally, I beg to differ and feel it's a flaws study not taking into account the enlarging Florida population. NY state has less population and has 5 schools compared to Florida's 3. 

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On 9/23/2023 at 6:23 AM, shardoon said:

It was really the Florida Dental Association who was against it. A decision that I disagree with. At the time UF wanted to expand their own program, FAMU and UCF wanted to open up new programs. The new LECOM school in Bradenton just opened up. A report by the FDA was cited that the state didn't need more dentists as a whole, but only needed dentists in rural areas and new schools were not gonna fix that. They claimed the 3 dental schools that Florida has is enough to offset the amount of dentists leaving the state or retiring annually. Personally, I beg to differ and feel it's a flaws study not taking into account the enlarging Florida population. NY state has less population and has 5 schools compared to Florida's 3. 

The State had a similar stance around twenty years back ala too many law schools in the state.  So the State does do that...

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