Coral Gables ‘Paseo’ project up for final approval Tuesday

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The controversial, mixed-use Paseo de la Riviera project — which would turn the Holiday Inn on U.S. 1 into a massive, highrise condo with a retail complex — is coming up for final approval before the Coral Gables commission Tuesday and it promises to be a long and heated debate.

Preliminary approval came after an eight hour meeting in October. Despite deep concerns from neighbors who overwhelmingly object to the size and scale of the development, commissioners voted 4-1 in favor. Only Jeannett Slesnick voted against the project. But the developer, NP International, was told to meet with residents and downsize the project before coming back, or it might not get the same support.

Vice Mayor Frank Quesada said back then, voting in favor of changing the zoning from lowrise commercial to highrise commercial, that he could not support it on a second round if it stayed the same.

But Quesada couldn’t say Monday if he would vote for or against the project, which hasn’t really changed significantly as far as the nearby residents are concerned.

“I’m against the notion that all development is bad. There are good projects and there are bad projects,” Quesada said. “It’s really going to depend on what I hear from residents.”

But if it really depended on what he heard from residents, why did he vote in favor the first time?

Riviera neighborhood homeowners and other residents are expected to pack City Hall once again — the meeting begins at 4 p.m. at City Hall — to air their concerns about traffic, overdevelopment and what some call “the Brickellization” of Coral Gables. 

A survey done of homeowners last week and distributed by Gables Good Government showed that an overwhelming majority of the surrounding homeowners do not like the idea of two 140-foot, 10-story towers — one a hotel and the other condos — linked by a public plaza lined with sidewalk cafes, restaurants and stores on the existing Holiday Inn property at 1350 S. Dixie Hwy.

They don’t care if it is designed in the Gables special Mediterranean theme, which almost guarantees approval from the commission, or how nice the parking garage is going to be.

Mapped out, the recent survey of homes in the Riviera Homeowner Association boundaries shows that a tiny minority, marked in green on the map, are in favor of upzoning the property so that the towers can be built. The vast majority, marked in red, are against it.

Take one look at the map and tell me how you think the commission ought to vote.

It seems to fly in the face of reason that this development has even gotten this far. It got a lukewarm pass from the planning and zoning committee, which voted 3-3 on moving it forward. And residents have been up in arms about it since even the April elections. More than 1,000 residents have signed a petition against it.

But the commission, which is elected by the people, approves it 4-1?

  Coral Gables, Frank Quesada