 Our top story. On Wednesday, Gateway Jacks announced plans for a $500 million mixed use development in the Northcore area of downtown Jacksonville. Over the next 10 years, the build out could expand across 22 acres and check up a price tag of $2 billion. Tim, we were talking a little bit earlier before we came on air and it's really apparent that you have your head wrapped all around this subject, so we're going to go to you first. What do you think? So it's a huge project and could have a truly transformational impact on that part of Jacksonville. A lot of the focus when we talk about downtown development rightly so is basically right around where we're sitting. It's the Jaguars project and all of that, but downtown Jacksonville can't bet at all on just one project. It needs some smaller projects. JWB is involved with this project, has been doing things spread across the urban core. There's other developments in the works, but this is on par with Water Street and Tampa. Some of the big massive mixed use developments in places like Nashville, it truly is a step up if it gets done, which I've been covering development in Jacksonville for long enough that the if it gets done is always the question. But signs are really good for this one. Yeah. Earlier, you were talking about how you had a folder of all the projects that were supposed to happen in Jacksonville. The city council member referred to this, not the first as Jacksonville being the place where projects go to die or where renderings are done more often than projects are. That is an issue. The big difference, and this is frankly why I'm most excited about this project, is the involvement of DOP Capital. Based in St. Augustine, started up north, came here about six years ago. Fast growing company, having an impact on multifamily development across the country, and they got money. The issue with development now is banks aren't lending. If you're trying to do a project, you can't get the funding. Every other time Jacksonville has had some momentum going, it hits this point in the cycle where the money dries up and the projects don't happen. Then when the money starts flowing again, work begins again, and we kind of strut out, not exactly back at ground zero, but close to it. With DOP's involvement, with the funding there, they can actually get the project done. They can actually get the project started. They can get this moving, and then when money frees up again, Jacksonville will already be somewhere. Dan, do we know exactly where they're talking about starting this development at? Part of this is it's basically between the First Baptist Church properties and the 7-Eleven, and they're across the street from FSCJ and places like that. It really is a wasteland right now of parking lots. There's not much there, and the only new development that I can think of really is the 7-Eleven, and that goes back a number of years. Tim is right. I came here in the 80s, and the big project was the shipyards when the shipyards were still there, and it all went fizzle. Now finally, 40 years later, we're developing all the shipyards property. We finally have a plan for Lachey, and that took two or three tries, and around. Finally, this looks to have the money, and let's not forget, we've got University of Florida planning that wonderful project. I don't know where it's going to be, but FSCJ would love to have it sort of next to them, which would put this across the street from that, across the street from FSCJ, and right on the cusp of what should be a really well-developed spring field as the homes and some businesses there get going. I was just about to say, so basically we're talking about that area of downtown that's kind of the corridor into spring field, where does this include the place that used to be an old hotel, then it got knocked down, and I think the only thing that's standing is the parking structure. Carter Jackson, and that's owned by someone else, and they're planning some development, and the previous owner to that was planning some development. We have yet to be able to get them to respond. It's across the street, it's across the street. Yeah, across the street and down the street, so no, that property isn't involved, but what you're pointing out is that part of downtown just has stuff going on. I mean, you have corner lots development on 1st and Main, it's going to be massive. You have plan for more apartments on 7th street, further up Main Street. You have, as the Jaguars do stuff here, that's going to bleed into the East side, so it kind of, if you look at a map of Jacksonville, it's that it's kind of following Hogan's Creek, kind of sort of, where you have the heart of downtown, the central business district, then you have North Core, then you get in the spring field, and all of the development is going there. Then you get things like the Emerald Trail coming online, that's going to supercharge development, and it's going to connect a lot of these projects in a way that makes it walkable, that makes it a place where UF students could walk to somewhere and meet up with FSCJ students, and then go and get breakfast at the big house on Main Street, sort of thing. Tim, you were saying before we went on the air, the shipyards or whatever, that stuff going down on a stadium can't carry everything as far as development goes. As I said before, it does appear that Jacksonville for the first time ever has got like what, five, six, seven major deals going on in downtown, so as I coined the phrase before, we've apparently we've reached our adolescent, or excuse me, developmental adolescents. They're so optimistic. Yeah, yeah. As I said before, I've been around for a while, it's like you know, Jacksonville, good ideas come to die, right? Go to die, like you say, you've got it, you've got a desk full of rendering, so but this looks seems to be a little bit more. It reminds me of when I came to Jacksonville in 93 after law school, you know, what was going out of the beaches, right? Jacksonville Beach was the blighted area, right? All of a sudden, we were running out of beachfront space, right? You know, Florida is growing up, you know, and so people are starting to discover Jacksonville has a lot of opportunity here, a lot of money's come in here, which is wonderful. And I'll give a shout out to Lori Boyer in the Downtown Investment Authority. You know, that was a brainchild, I think, of the Peyton administration, and it's working. It's working. Yeah, that was actually created under the Brown administration, so the Council was forward. I think John Peyton thought of it, but then I don't remember. Yeah, I mean, it was, it was, it is a necessary thing for downtown. The question I have is that like it feels like it pulls development a little bit closer to the stadium, of downtown development specifically, like it feels like it pulls it closer to the stadium and less away from what we would call the urban core. Do you think that's accurate? I think there's an interesting question of where does the development play out and who's hurt and who's helped? I mean, the other downtown writ large fight has been over a gas station being built in LaVilla that part of the reason that people are upset about it is it felt like LaVilla was a blank slate where you could do true urban development and the gas station, there was a little more of a suburban sort of feel to it, and then you have all the issues with the stadium. How does that affect out east? How do the people there benefit from the money being put in? So I think that is the big question of downtown Jacksonville development is not just where does it happen, but who benefits from a human standpoint, not from the business standpoint? Yeah, I mean, that's a good point. I think that, you know, I've seen developments all over the country, not just in Jacksonville, but all over the country. And they promise the developers always promise that they're going to find a way to work in like low income residences. They do like saying that. They like saying that. And in actuality, seeing it actually materialize, it's, I don't know. I mean, I'm not being scientific about it, but I think it's few and far in between. And given that we have a housing crisis. Yeah, it's interesting. We sent my office and an inquiry yesterday about that very issue. The developer came back said, undetermined at this point. So that's something that definitely needs to be addressed. And it gets into the politics of it as well. It does. Now, you know, still do you remember that Jacksonville has as much as rents have gone up the housing costs here. And I'm not downplaying at all of the affordable housing prices that we have. But, you know, rents are lower here than in pure cities. They're rapidly going up. That won't be true, for long necessarily. But the issue here really is we don't have enough housing. There's a lot of people moving in. There's not enough houses for them. And, you know, econ 101, not enough of a supply, you know, you end up with prices going up. So one of the ways, and there are other ways, and we'll talk about the tax that didn't happen. But there are other things that need to be done to deal with homelessness and affordable housing. But one of the ways is to just build more, build more housing, build more apartments, build more housing. Housing permits jumped last month for the first time in a while. That's a good sign. It's good that we have more housing stock coming online. And don't forget that this week there was an announcement that three blighted motels are going to be turned into micro suites as they're called $1,000 for rent. And those motels needed to be redeveloped into something that's cleaner. What side of town are those? That's outside. They off Bameda's Road and off I-95 in University. But still, that's a nice idea to make micro suites. And the renderings look lovely. What was the response of the mayor and the city council to this? Deegan was at the, oh, do you talk about Gateway? Deegan was at the press conference where it was unveiled. I mean, they're supportive of it. I mean, but if you're in the political establishment and you have people who are by and large putting their own money into a project like this, you would expect them to be supportive. They will be going for incentives. You know, obviously any project like this in Jacksonville's development cycle is going to go for incentives, but they have the rest of their capital stack pretty well established. And that's really important.