Other Metro Area Projects

[JFW657]

Just heard a report on channel 9 that said Orlando Fashion Square is about to undergo a major transformation into what they called a "town center", with more dining, housing & entertainment as well.

They said an announcement is forthcoming soon.... beginning of July-ish.

In searching for more info about it, I found this interesting pdf file of a very recent piece of state legislation called "The State of Florida Sprawl Repair Act", that the transformation is going to take place under, along with, to varying degrees, about 47 other shopping malls in the state, including Altamonte, Festival Bay, Florida Mall & Millenia.

State of Florida Sprawl Repair Act

This just contains general info about the reasoning behind & the overall scope & nature of the project, but no specifics w/regard to each mall location.

From the above link:

An opportunity to transform malls and their surroundings into town centers or transitready developments now exists. Malls are always well located at major arterial intersections

Edited June 30, 2009 by JFW657

[sunshine]

That sounds great. They should just put some new stores along 50 to cover up the parking lots. Expand the parking garage. Better yet...tear down that dump and build a new multi story mall in downtown. Anybody been to that mall in downtown Norfolk?

[cwetteland]

It looks like most of the mods are on the east side, but extend from 50 to Mcguire. Website: http://www.wrtdesign.com/project-Fashion-S...lopment-44.html

[VistaLakes01]

It looks like most of the mods are on the east side, but extend from 50 to Mcguire. Website: http://www.wrtdesign.com/project-Fashion-S...lopment-44.html

This project will be great if it happens. As far as a "downtown" mall goes, Fashion Square is in the center city area. If you look at the new sign on the 408 heading west after the east toll plaza it says "Downtown Next 3 Exits" which are Crystal Lake Drive (Maguire), Mills, and Rosalind. It frustrates me when people think if something is not at the corner of Central and Orange, it's not downtown. The neighborhoods in the Fashion Square area are considered our downtown neighborhoods. How come some people will recognize Midtown and Buckhead in Atlanta as "urban retail?" We are a big city now, with inner city neighborhoods, like College Park and Baldwin Park, Colonialtown, etc. Fashion Square is not a suburban mall, there are no suburbs where it is located. And Orlando is one of the few cities to still have a mall open and operating within the city. Most of the older malls in the country have closed down if they are in an urban area. What happened to Tampa Bay Center? Fort Lauderdale still has an inner city mall, The Galleria. The Circuit City that used to be on east Colonial was listed as "Orlando Central." We have to get a different mind frame about how we look at Orlando. If it's in the city limits, it's in the city. Just like if something is in the city limits of Chicago, it's in the city. This project will breathe new life into the mall and downtown residents will start utilizing the mall, like they do everything around it, like LA Fitness, Pei Wei, Barnes and Noble, etc. Right now it seems like they avoid Fashion Square and use Millenia, but they use everything else around Fashion Square, including Broad Street in Baldwin Park. Orlando is well designed as a city when it comes to retail. If you head up Orange Ave north you will go through the Antique area, then when you cross over in to Winter Park, you have that whole design area before you hit Park Avenue, where all those interior design shops are at. Give our city some credit for maintaining it's inner neighborhoods, when so many other cities have urban blight after the CBD until you get to the suburbs.

[spenser1058]

This project will be great if it happens. As far as a "downtown" mall goes, Fashion Square is in the center city area. If you look at the new sign on the 408 heading west after the east toll plaza it says "Downtown Next 3 Exits" which are Crystal Lake Drive (Maguire), Mills, and Rosalind. It frustrates me when people think if something is not at the corner of Central and Orange, it's not downtown. The neighborhoods in the Fashion Square area are considered our downtown neighborhoods. How come some people will recognize Midtown and Buckhead in Atlanta as "urban retail?" We are a big city now, with inner city neighborhoods, like College Park and Baldwin Park, Colonialtown, etc. Fashion Square is not a suburban mall, there are no suburbs where it is located. And Orlando is one of the few cities to still have a mall open and operating within the city. Most of the older malls in the country have closed down if they are in an urban area. What happened to Tampa Bay Center? Fort Lauderdale still has an inner city mall, The Galleria. The Circuit City that used to be on east Colonial was listed as "Orlando Central." We have to get a different mind frame about how we look at Orlando. If it's in the city limits, it's in the city. Just like if something is in the city limits of Chicago, it's in the city. This project will breathe new life into the mall and downtown residents will start utilizing the mall, like they do everything around it, like LA Fitness, Pei Wei, Barnes and Noble, etc. Right now it seems like they avoid Fashion Square and use Millenia, but they use everything else around Fashion Square, including Broad Street in Baldwin Park. Orlando is well designed as a city when it comes to retail. If you head up Orange Ave north you will go through the Antique area, then when you cross over in to Winter Park, you have that whole design area before you hit Park Avenue, where all those interior design shops are at. Give our city some credit for maintaining it's inner neighborhoods, when so many other cities have urban blight after the CBD until you get to the suburbs.

Sorry, but I have to disagree with the interpretation of history here. Colonial Plaza, and later Fashion Square, sucked the life out of downtown retail; otherwise there would still be department stores on Orange Ave. (Sears, JCPenney, Ivey's -now Dillard's-were all on Orange Ave., does that roster sound familiar?) Further, the Koger Center behind Orlando Fashion Square was built as a SUBURBAN office park; it, along with Orlando Central Park Phase I, was the Maitland Center of its day. And Audubon Park and Coytown (just to name two) are suburbs, pure and simple. Not as obnoxious as the cul-de-sac PUD's from hell the 70's brought us, but suburbs nonetheless.

As long as Fashion Square is there (and for that matter the bix box version of Colonial Plaza), easily accessible retail that DOES NOT REQUIRE AN AUTOMOBILE will not exist downtown. I gave up on mall shopping years ago - if I can't walk to it or ride my bike to it, I buy it online. For the record, when I lived in Atlanta - in Midtown and Virginia-Highland, we considered Buckhead "the 'burbs," just a more tolerable one than anything outside the perimeter.

Fashion Square is currently dying (along with the rest of E. Colonial east of Maguire if you saw last week's article in the Sentinel), and I suspect this is Penn REIT's attempt to salvage it, apparently with tax incentives. If Altamonte Mall does the same thing, I would indeed consider it an improvement for them, because Altamonte never was anything but a suburb and they have tried mightily to "desuburbify" themselves up there. For us, it is just one more thing preventing downtown from being restored. Lovely boutique retail is fun to visit if you don't live here, but when you need to buy underwear it truly is sad to have to get in your car to get it all because of a last vestige of the horrific planning of the 60's and 70's.

Edited June 30, 2009 by spenser1058

[VistaLakes01]

Sorry, metrowester, but that simply doesn't jive with the history. Colonial Plaza, and later Fashion Square, sucked the life out of downtown retail; otherwise there would still be department stores on Orange Ave. (Sears, JCPenney, Ivey's -now Dillard's-were all on Orange Ave., does that roster sound familiar?) Further, the Koger Center behind Orlando Fashion Square was built as a SUBURBAN office park, it, along with Orlando Central Park Phase I, was the Maitland Center of its day. And Audubon Park and Coytown (just to name two) are suburbs, pure and simple. Not as obnoxious as the cul-de-sac PUD's from hell the 70's brought us, but suburbs nonetheless.

As long as Fashion Square is there (and for that matter the bix box version of Colonial Plaza), easily accessible retail that DOES NOT REQUIRE AN AUTOMOBILE will not exist downtown. I gave up on mall shopping years ago - if I can't walk to it or ride my bike to it, I buy it online. For the record, when I lived in Atlanta - in Midtown and Virginia-Highland, we considered Buckhead "the 'burbs," just a more tolerable one than anything outside the perimeter.

Fashion Square is currently dying (along with the rest of E. Colonial east of Maguire if you saw last week's article in the Sentinel), and I suspect this is Penn REIT's attempt to salvage it, apparently with tax incentives. If Altamonte Mall does the same thing, I would indeed consider it an improvement for them, because Altamonte never was anything but a suburb and they have tried mightily to "desuburbify" themselves up there. For us, it is just one more thing preventing downtown from being restored. Lovely boutique retail is fun to visit if you don't live here, but when you need to buy underwear it truly is sad to have to get in your car to get it all because of a last vestige of the horrific planning of the 60's and 70's.

I know the history of Colonial Plaza (it was a field of dairy cows for TG Lee before it was built) What I'm trying to say is when The Plaza and later Fashion Square were built, people from the region drove IN to town to shop, not out of town to shop. I used to go to JCPenney, Sears, and Ivey's downtown with my parents, and even to Winn Dixie on Rosalind St. Penney's moved to Winter Park, as well as Ivey's,Belk was new to Orlando at Colonial Plaza as well as Jordan Marsh. Jordan Marsh was built in similar style to downtown locations in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale. But just as we went IN to Orlando when the stores were on Orange, people still came in to Orlando to go to these 3 malls. The only suburban mall was Altamonte, a city built with 70's style subdivisions and apartment complexes. What I'm basically trying to say is Orlando has always been a growing city, never lost population to the suburbs. And as the metro area has grown, all of Orlando's neighborhood's have become in-town and more valuable per square foot because of being in-town without a commute required to get downtown. Audobon Park and Baldwin Park don't live up to being classified as suburbs. I grew up in Englewood Park which I don't really consider suburban anymore at this point because you are already in Orlando when you walk out your front door. A suburb requires a city to city commute. You have to commute to Orlando from Lake Mary, there is not a network of streets connecting it with Orlando's streets, you have to travel on a highway from one city to the other. I'm not necessarily saying Fashion Square is "downtown", but Fashion Square is located in the city. It's not Manhattan style shopping, but Orlando grew up in a more modern time than the older cities. If we did have department stores downtown, I certainly wouldn't want the shopping to be in an enlcosed mall, but the stores should be at street level. What is the point of a mall downtown when the foot traffic is hidden from the street and herded off into a mall? A good example of the way downtown shopping should be done is West Palm Beach or Coral Gables. This renovation of Fashion Square looks similar to Coral Gables, it's better to try to keep the department stores (and the other stores) in Orlando by enhancing the mall then eventually losing Fashion Square which would mean the city of Orlando would lose those stores. I understand you and would like to see downtown shopping but not in an enclosed mall. What would the difference be for a family from Titusville driving to the city (Orlando) to shop at an enclosed mall (Fashion Square) than the same family driving a mile or two further to shop in another enclosed mall downtown? If they drove in to the city and actually walked and shopped the streets downtown that would be cool.

[JFW657]

Fashion Square is currently dying...

The last time I went in there, aside from the food court & the big anchor stores, there was hardly anything but a bunch of women's clothing stores, two or three sneaker stores, a Radio Shack, a video arcade & a movie store.

Not much else in terms of variety, & precious little I'd be interested in.

My trips there usually involve going into the Sears tool dept. thru the back entrance, getting what I'm looking for, then leaving.

[JFW657]

They should just put some new stores along 50 to cover up the parking lots. Expand the parking garage.

Absolutely!! Turn the Sears Automotive Center & that bank in the middle into eating establishments, then build a few more facing Colonial. Either that, or build about a 6' or 7' high, attractive looking masonry wall across the front with an opening at the main entrance. Maybe an arch over it. Plant a lot of shrubbery in front of it like the walls around these gated communities.

[demon]

I know the history of Colonial Plaza (it was a field of dairy cows for TG Lee before it was built) What I'm trying to say is when The Plaza and later Fashion Square were built, people from the region drove IN to town to shop, not out of town to shop. I used to go to JCPenney, Sears, and Ivey's downtown with my parents, and even to Winn Dixie on Rosalind St. Penney's moved to Winter Park, as well as Ivey's,Belk was new to Orlando at Colonial Plaza as well as Jordan Marsh. Jordan Marsh was built in similar style to downtown locations in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale. But just as we went IN to Orlando when the stores were on Orange, people still came in to Orlando to go to these 3 malls. The only suburban mall was Altamonte, a city built with 70's style subdivisions and apartment complexes. What I'm basically trying to say is Orlando has always been a growing city, never lost population to the suburbs. And as the metro area has grown, all of Orlando's neighborhood's have become in-town and more valuable per square foot because of being in-town without a commute required to get downtown. Audobon Park and Baldwin Park don't live up to being classified as suburbs. I grew up in Englewood Park which I don't really consider suburban anymore at this point because you are already in Orlando when you walk out your front door. A suburb requires a city to city commute. You have to commute to Orlando from Lake Mary, there is not a network of streets connecting it with Orlando's streets, you have to travel on a highway from one city to the other. I'm not necessarily saying Fashion Square is "downtown", but Fashion Square is located in the city. It's not Manhattan style shopping, but Orlando grew up in a more modern time than the older cities. If we did have department stores downtown, I certainly wouldn't want the shopping to be in an enlcosed mall, but the stores should be at street level. What is the point of a mall downtown when the foot traffic is hidden from the street and herded off into a mall? A good example of the way downtown shopping should be done is West Palm Beach or Coral Gables. This renovation of Fashion Square looks similar to Coral Gables, it's better to try to keep the department stores (and the other stores) in Orlando by enhancing the mall then eventually losing Fashion Square which would mean the city of Orlando would lose those stores. I understand you and would like to see downtown shopping but not in an enclosed mall. What would the difference be for a family from Titusville driving to the city (Orlando) to shop at an enclosed mall (Fashion Square) than the same family driving a mile or two further to shop in another enclosed mall downtown? If they drove in to the city and actually walked and shopped the streets downtown that would be cool.

I'm a big fan of West Palm Beach. Mostly because it isn't just a 2 story building. It interacts with the street nicely and is easy to get to.

In order for Fashion Square to survive it needs to be linked up with downtown proper via Lymmo. I know Fashion Square is only about 3 miles from downtown, and I've walked a lot farther for less, it isn't the most pleasant walk. If we hook this area up to Lymmo we can add some residential units to the area, and I think it would make downtown more attractive to Baldwin Park, and vice versa. Fashion Square also needs to interact with the street better.

[VistaLakes01]

I'm a big fan of West Palm Beach. Mostly because it isn't just a 2 story building. It interacts with the street nicely and is easy to get to.

In order for Fashion Square to survive it needs to be linked up with downtown proper via Lymmo. I know Fashion Square is only about 3 miles from downtown, and I've walked a lot farther for less, it isn't the most pleasant walk. If we hook this area up to Lymmo we can add some residential units to the area, and I think it would make downtown more attractive to Baldwin Park, and vice versa. Fashion Square also needs to interact with the street better.

I've always thought there should be some sort of people mover or Lymmo service linking downtown, Colonial Plaza, Fashion Square and Park Ave and WP Village. We need some sort of "Retail Connector System." It could link up the parks also, like Lake Eola and Central Park in WP. It's time to incorporate East Colonial into more of a pedestrian friendly shopping district and make it part of the city.

[JFW657]

In order for Fashion Square to survive it needs to be linked up with downtown proper via Lymmo. I know Fashion Square is only about 3 miles from downtown, and I've walked a lot farther for less, it isn't the most pleasant walk. If we hook this area up to Lymmo we can add some residential units to the area, and I think it would make downtown more attractive to Baldwin Park, and vice versa. Fashion Square also needs to interact with the street better.

In the legislation that covers the project, State of Florida Sprawl Repair Act, they mentioned integrating these converted malls nka "Town Centers" into local mass transit routes. Part of the main reasoning behind doing it to begin with, I think.

Edited July 1, 2009 by JFW657

[cwetteland]

In the legislation that covers the project, State of Florida Sprawl Repair Act, they mentioned integrating these converted malls nka "Town Centers" into local mass transit routes. Part of the main reasoning behind doing it to begin with, I think.

From the map, it looks like it's integrated into Cady Way trail. Maybe that's the transit route they're talking about.

[spenser1058]

I know the history of Colonial Plaza (it was a field of dairy cows for TG Lee before it was built) What I'm trying to say is when The Plaza and later Fashion Square were built, people from the region drove IN to town to shop, not out of town to shop. I used to go to JCPenney, Sears, and Ivey's downtown with my parents, and even to Winn Dixie on Rosalind St. Penney's moved to Winter Park, as well as Ivey's,Belk was new to Orlando at Colonial Plaza as well as Jordan Marsh. Jordan Marsh was built in similar style to downtown locations in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale. But just as we went IN to Orlando when the stores were on Orange, people still came in to Orlando to go to these 3 malls. The only suburban mall was Altamonte, a city built with 70's style subdivisions and apartment complexes. What I'm basically trying to say is Orlando has always been a growing city, never lost population to the suburbs. And as the metro area has grown, all of Orlando's neighborhood's have become in-town and more valuable per square foot because of being in-town without a commute required to get downtown. Audobon Park and Baldwin Park don't live up to being classified as suburbs. I grew up in Englewood Park which I don't really consider suburban anymore at this point because you are already in Orlando when you walk out your front door. A suburb requires a city to city commute. You have to commute to Orlando from Lake Mary, there is not a network of streets connecting it with Orlando's streets, you have to travel on a highway from one city to the other. I'm not necessarily saying Fashion Square is "downtown", but Fashion Square is located in the city. It's not Manhattan style shopping, but Orlando grew up in a more modern time than the older cities. If we did have department stores downtown, I certainly wouldn't want the shopping to be in an enlcosed mall, but the stores should be at street level. What is the point of a mall downtown when the foot traffic is hidden from the street and herded off into a mall? A good example of the way downtown shopping should be done is West Palm Beach or Coral Gables. This renovation of Fashion Square looks similar to Coral Gables, it's better to try to keep the department stores (and the other stores) in Orlando by enhancing the mall then eventually losing Fashion Square which would mean the city of Orlando would lose those stores. I understand you and would like to see downtown shopping but not in an enclosed mall. What would the difference be for a family from Titusville driving to the city (Orlando) to shop at an enclosed mall (Fashion Square) than the same family driving a mile or two further to shop in another enclosed mall downtown? If they drove in to the city and actually walked and shopped the streets downtown that would be cool.

Metrowester, thank you for your clarification - we can both agree that a "downtown mall" most certainly is not the answer. Any retail that we can coax should build into the existing grid and not be the stand-alone that enclosed shopping malls tend to be. A couple of points, though: Orlando never lost population to the suburbs chiefly because it wasn't very large to begin with (all of MetroWest, for example, was annexed much later.) The overwhelming majority of postwar population growth was in Orange County and beyond (Orlando is still an insignificant city, population wise, while Orange is now in the top 35 U.S. counties according to current census estimates).

I guess my concern, and one I feel passionately about, is that since Sonny King refused to sell Jordan Marsh the property it needed in 1960 to build downtown and forced it to go to Colonial Plaza, downtown retail has been at the mercy of the East Colonial Drive retail corridor. It's much too close to downtown to develop as a separate node unless we get a lot more density than I expect to see in my lifetime (and particularly as brick and mortar stores will continue to shrink as a portion of the total retail pie over time, thanks to incremental growth online). It would seem you do not believe non-boutique retail between the two nodes is a zero-sum game; while I hope you're correct, I can't agree at this time. When JCPenney and other mall stores decide to do replacements (Penney is 20 years old, Macy's is 36 and Sears is over 45), I want the relocation to be west of Mills Ave. That won't happen if the government is providing incentives to retain the status quo. No matter how much Fashion Square wants to be a town center, it's still lipstick on a pig compared to the real thing.

[JFW657]

Metrowester, thank you for your clarification - we can both agree that a "downtown mall" most certainly is not the answer. Any retail that we can coax should build into the existing grid and not be the stand-alone that enclosed shopping malls tend to be.

About two or three floors of "downtown mall" space on the bottom of a high rise on the Pizzuti block with a commuter rail stop adjoining it would be the answer to something, though.

Edited July 2, 2009 by JFW657

[codypet]

I would have to say they've been pitching that idea for a long time. The Denny's across the street just closed this week. In the last year Circuit City, AC Moore, TGI Friday's, UNO, Bennigan's, Denny's have all closed. Amigo's shortly before that. If the restaurants are closing then the mall's not doing enough business to support those restaurants. I would say the delivery business is the only thing keeping Pizza Hut afloat too. They either need to figure something out to make it alive again or tear the mall down, move the anchors to downtown, and build a Baldwin Park extension on the mall site. That may shake things up a bit.

[VistaLakes01]

I would have to say they've been pitching that idea for a long time. The Denny's across the street just closed this week. In the last year Circuit City, AC Moore, TGI Friday's, UNO, Bennigan's, Denny's have all closed. Amigo's shortly before that. If the restaurants are closing then the mall's not doing enough business to support those restaurants. I would say the delivery business is the only thing keeping Pizza Hut afloat too. They either need to figure something out to make it alive again or tear the mall down, move the anchors to downtown, and build a Baldwin Park extension on the mall site. That may shake things up a bit.

It seems businesses on the south side of East Colonial in the Bennet Road area have always struggled. That huge Colonial Promenade shopping center has never been a success and has always had problems. That was built in a field that used to be airport property. The whole Fashion Square district probably doesn't have the population density needed to survive. Since the bulk of east side suburban population is in Waterford Lakes area, I'm sure the development of Waterford has helped lead to the decline in east Colonial businesses closer to town. Today yahoo has an article about America's most struggling malls and the most successful. Fashion Square was not on either list, but Millenia was listed as one of the most successful. West Palm Beach mall was listed as one of the worst, probably because of it's close location to downtown. With a Macy's downtown and then the opening up of the Mall at Wellington Green in the western suburbs, it looks like it could be a Fashion Square type situation.

[spenser1058]

About two or three floors of "downtown mall" space on the bottom of a high rise on the Pizzuti block with a commuter rail stop adjoining it would be the answer to something, though.

Along those lines, and metrowester may be able to help me out remembering some of the history from the dark ages here, but if I remember correctly the Orange Buick property that Jordan Marsh wanted to buy may have been part of the dreaded Pizzuti block. What delicious irony that the deal that did not happen and did so much to kill downtown retail remains an empty lot almost 50 years later.

[cwetteland]

Along those lines, and metrowester may be able to help me out remembering some of the history from the dark ages here, but if I remember correctly the Orange Buick property that Jordan Marsh wanted to buy may have been part of the dreaded Pizzuti block. What delicious irony that the deal that did not happen and did so much to kill downtown retail remains an empty lot almost 50 years later.

I thought the Pizzuti was once the venerable Orange Motor Court ...

[JFW657]

I thought the Pizzuti was once the venerable Orange Motor Court ...

Nope. Orange Court was farther north where Camden now resides.

[JFW657]

Along those lines, and metrowester may be able to help me out remembering some of the history from the dark ages here, but if I remember correctly the Orange Buick property that Jordan Marsh wanted to buy may have been part of the dreaded Pizzuti block.

I can't say for sure, but I really don't think it was.

I remember back in the early 80's that block was fronted along Orange Ave. by a row of one story storefronts. One of the buildings, at the corner of Orange & Livingston, was an ornate little building with the year 1925 & the title "United Markets Building" or something like that, cast into a concrete cornice.

Around the corner on Ameleia by the RR tracks was a night club that in the late 70's was called Nickel's Alley, later called Angels.

I don't really see how there would've been room for a car dealership there.

Possibly could've been farther up Orange north of Colonial. I know there was a Cadillac dealership up there right near the Watkins Paint store.

[spenser1058]

I can't say for sure, but I really don't think it was.

I remember back in the early 80's that block was fronted along Orange Ave. by a row of one story storefronts. One of the buildings, at the corner of Orange & Livingston, was an ornate little building with the year 1925 & the title "United Markets Building" or something like that, cast into a concrete cornice.

Around the corner on Ameleia by the RR tracks was a night club that in the late 70's was called Nickel's Alley, later called Angels.

I don't really see how there would've been room for a car dealership there.

Possibly could've been farther up Orange north of Colonial. I know there was a Cadillac dealership up there right near the Watkins Paint store.

Good point, but remember the downtown car dealerships had very little space for storing new cars - it's one of the reasons they moved out on West Colonial (you're right about the Cadillac dealership - it was originally McKellar - Braun was added later.) In fact, one reason there has been so much space available along N. Orange north of Colonial is because several of the new car dealers originally had their used car lots up there, separate from the new car showrooms south of 50. Orange Buick was somewhere along Orange, it may have been across the street where BoA now is; again, the 4 story building Jordan Marsh wanted to build was supposed to go there (there are many variations of those buildings in the cities where Allied Stores were once located). One reason that later urbanistas studying the failure to make a deal were so flummoxed was that, by the mid-late 60's, Orange Buick had moved out on West Colonial so it wasn't as if the Kings planned to stay downtown. Heintzelman Ford (now Sun State) was in that area as well, but fronted along either Livingston or Jefferson (I remember actually going there when my sister bought a new Mustang in late '69). Central Florida Motors in those days was out on Garland along with Reed Motors (AMC at that point before adding Datsun/Nissan later). I have piqued my own curiosity now so I'm going to have to go see the folks at the History Center and Orlando Remembered to try and find a pic of the block back in the early '60's. If that doesn't work, I will go back in the microfiche at OPL and look for an Orange Buick ad in an old Sentinel with an address. Yes, I'm a total geek about researching local history, please pardon me while I obsess.

Btw, Nickel's Alley was one of the first bars I ever went to <g>.

[JFW657]

If that doesn't work, I will go back in the microfiche at OPL and look for an Orange Buick ad in an old Sentinel with an address. Yes, I'm a total geek about researching local history, please pardon me while I obsess.

Btw, Nickel's Alley was one of the first bars I ever went to <g>.

Don't feel bad. I've spent my share of time on the microfilm viewers at OPL myself.

What I would like to find is a pic of the "United Markets Building" (may have been "American Markets Building") that was located on the NW corner of Orange & Livingston. When I first heard that DuPont was going to demo that block, I thought about taking a picture, but never got around to it. It had a really nice, ornate facade.

I remember going to Nickel's Alley in the late 70's before I even lived in Orlando.

Edited July 3, 2009 by JFW657

[VistaLakes01]

Don't feel bad. I've spent my share of time on the microfilm viewers at OPL myself.

What I would like to find is a pic of the "United Markets Building" (may have been "American Markets Building") that was located on the NW corner of Orange & Livingston. When I first heard that DuPont was going to demo that block, I thought about taking a picture, but never got around to it. It had a really nice, ornate facade.

I remember going to Nickel's Alley in the late 70's before I even lived in Orlando.

I remember going to Nickel's Alley, which later on became a teen club, the name escapes me now......and when that closed down, the club Visage opened up off of Clarcona and OBT which was a new wave club, I remember going there and also "Spit" night at club Park Ave. on Mondays and Wednesdays. Park Ave was located on Lake Fairview on OBT. Spit was popular from the early to late 80's. I've also looked at lots of microfilm at OPL......I think I remember Orange Buick being in the Pizutti block, it wasn't very big, it seems like almost all car dealerships were downtown. I think the building of West Colonial, which was the first really wide boulevard with lots of property on each side is what attracted the car dealerships. I also remember the Montgomery Ward store on West Colonial where the OCSherrif's dept is located now. I know there was another Ward's at Interstate Mall in Altamonte, but I can't remember if there was a Montgomery Ward in Orlando before west Colonial. I believe the downtown Sears was located on Robinson, but not quite sure. I know it was off of Orange a bit.....

[codypet]

I believe the downtown Sears was located on Robinson, but not quite sure. I know it was off of Orange a bit.....

Photos I've seen indicate that Sears was located where the Copper Whopper is now.

[JFW657]

Photos I've seen indicate that Sears was located where the Copper Whopper is now.

That is exactly where it was. Caddycorner across from J.C.Penney.

There was another Monkey Wards on SOBT where the big Goodwill store is now.