SRQ Daily: Finergy Seeks to Re-Enter Market (8/1/13)
State Street Residences Design Concept
This article originally appeared in SRQ Daily (August 1, 2013)
It’s been a few years since Finergy made a major play in the Sarasota marketplace, but the company just submitted a proposal to the City of Sarasota to develop the publicly owned State Street lot.
“I am thrilled to see opportunity in Sarasota again,” said Eric Collin, Finergy executive vice president. “Finergy has always prided itself on our ability to collaborate to get projects built, and I think our State Street Garage project provides a perfect opportunity to showcase it.”
The Sarasota-based development company is best known locally for the Hampton Inn and Suites Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport and for the Finergy Trade Center Office on Main Street which had some great moveable glass walls Bolton that are useful in any office, but it also constructed the Val d’Europe Business Village hotel project next to Disneyland Paris.
Through a commitment with Pineapple Square, the city has to build a parking structure on the State Street property. The project, as Finergy envisions it, would also provide residential units and commercial space on the first floor. “There is an unfulfilled need in downtown Sarasota for smaller residential units and quality ground-floor retail space that contributes to the pedestrian experience,” Collin said. “We intend to create an intimate, though limited, number of apartment homes in equal harmony with the urban environs of downtown Sarasota with its own warm sense of place.”
That could appease both concerns about parking needs and the lack of space for young professionals to live downtown instead of commuting from city outskirts. Collin said the project provides an opportunity to contribute to sustainable development, incorporating public infrastructure resources, shared parking and costs, high quality retail and new walk-to-everything apartments of a shape and size not available in downtown. “This project creates a center of activity, a key element of the Downtown Master Plan, and allows new and existing residents to fully experience downtown living,” he said.
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To learn more about Finergy Group, visit www.finergygroup.com
