What is an Edge City?

Over the Southside’s Blue Cross Blue Shield campus.

The term, Edge City, was popularized in the 1991 book Edge City: Life on the New Frontier by Joel Garreau,</b> who established its current meaning while working as a reporter for the Washington Post. Garreau argues that the edge city has become the standard form of urban growth worldwide, representing a 20th-century urban form unlike that of the 19th-century central downtown.

Edge Cities typically consist of mid-rise office towers surrounded by massive surface parking lots and manicured lawns. Instead of a traditional street grid, their infrastructure networks consist of winding parkways (often lacking sidewalks) that feed into arterial roads and freeway ramps. They develop at or near freeway intersections and airports and they rarely include heavy industry. They are large geographically because they are built at automobile scale.

Edge Cities are impossible without the automobile. In Jacksonville, the Southside’s J. T. Butler Boulevard corridor, respresents the first true example of an Edge City. Because it stands as the region’s only emerging Edge City, we have decided to highlight construction updates on a quarterly basis.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edge_city

Summer 2017 Construction Update

1. Portiva

Construction continues on Portiva, a 260-unit complex that’s going in at A.C. Skinner Parkway and Salisbury Road. There are going to be eight four-story buildings. Landsouth Construction was issued the eight permits totaling $24 million.

2. JTB

JTB is a 350-unit complex being built by Killashee Investments near the southwest quadrant of the Southside/Butler Boulevard intersection. Featuring four five-story buildings at the cost of $50 million, the luxury apartment development is anticipated for completion by 2018.

3. Vistakon Inc.

Jacksonville-based Vistakon recently completed a $4.6 million solvent tank farm at it’s disposable contact lenses manufacturing complex in Deerwood Park. Vistakon is now investing $300 million to expand the manufacturing complex over the next seven years. The expansion project is expected to create 100 high-wage jobs and add 35,000 square feet to the manufacturing complex. The new manufacturing space will include five new production lines, the tank farm, a 3D printing center and a site for medical device laboratory test method development.

4. 7111 Bonneval Road

Fresh-Mex & Company Urban Grill and Cabana, SMKN Q Fast Slow Food and Saucy Kitchen are all in the process of opening restaurants in this strip center that was formerly occupied by Corner Bakery Cafe.

For more information: https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/article/southpoint-corner-bakery-becoming-fresh-mex-co

5. Lake Lofts at Deerwood

Construction continues on Lake Lofts at Deerwood. The project will add 130 apartment units on an infill site adjacent to Deerwood Lake. Developed by Inland Diversified Real Estate Services, LLC. of Oak Brook, IL, the four story development includes a five-story parking garage.

6. The Point at Town Center

Block One Ventures is in the process of building the Point at Town Center at the intersection of Gate Parkway and Burnt Mill Road. When complete in summer 2018, The Point at Town Center will be a 246-unit luxury apartment complex featuring eight three-story buildings and a clubhouse.

For more information: https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/showstory.php?Story_id=548692

7. Town Center Promenade

Core Property Capital is in the process of building the Town Center Promenade development on 30-acres near the intersection of Town Center Parkway and River Marsh Drive. When complete, the project will include 350 apartment units, 150 hotel units and 100,000-square feet of restaurant and retail space. Announced tenants include:

ALDI Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers Taco Bell Starbuck’s Coffee Mattress Firm Piada Italian Street Food Aspen Dental Newk’s Eatery Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews Texas de Brazil Churrascaria Brazilian Steakhouse Texas Roadhouse Tru by Hilton Apartments by TriBridge Residential

Town Center Promenade is anticipated for delivery in summer 2017.