✈️ Exclusive: PBIA pitches expansion
Welcome aboard. For you today, PBIA’s flight plan, FPL’s new digs, giant flowers in the Gardens and the Norton’s gift of a lifetime.
Airport growth back in play
Laura Beebe, Palm Beach County director of airports, avoided the dreaded P-word last week when she addressed county commissioners about expansion at Palm Beach International Airport.
“To ensure that PBI does not exceed its airfield capacity we’re recommending that we start the preliminary planning needed to implement the extension of an additional aviation runway,” she said.
Missing from her wording — but not the proposal — is the P-word: “parallel” as in “parallel runways.”
It’s a word certain to provoke anxiety among homeowners east and west of the airport in West Palm Beach and Palm Beach as well as the most famous PBIA critic of all, former President Donald Trump.
What happened: Commissioners gave the go-ahead April 16 to embark on a 10- to 12-year effort to extend the parallel runway at PBIA to 8,000 feet from 3,214.
Runway 10R-28L now is too short for commercial jets. It is solely used by small aircraft.
In 2012, the Federal Aviation Administration shelved the full-fledged parallel runway, which neighbors feared would mean more aircraft flying more often over their homes. It also raised concerns from Trump, whose Mar-a-Lago Club is almost due east of the parallel runways.
What killed it? A huge falloff in demand during and after the 2008 Great Recession.
Yes, but: Then-Airports Director Bruce Pelly warned that parallel runways eventually would be needed.
"Regardless of the current economic situation, we are certain that a serviceable parallel commercial service runway will be needed at some point in the future at PBIA," Pelly wrote to the FAA in 2010.
Of note: Pelly has since retired but serves as chairman of PBIA’s Aviation and Airports Advisory Board, which recommended moving forward.
Why an 8,000-foot runway? It might get through federal studies quicker than a 10,000-foot runway recommended in the airport’s 2018 master plan, Beebe said. A previous FAA study found no significant impacts with the 8,000-foot runway.
“We think moving forward with that project, because the FAA has already seen it, already made some determinations about its impacts, that it would help to move that project forward a little bit more quickly,” she said.
What’s behind the move? Total aircraft operations, which include commercial airliners and private jets, have been rising rapidly since the pandemic and are expected to reach the airport’s maximum of 220,000 by 2028 to 2032, Beebe said.
Aircraft operations now are at 173,000. A runway expansion at North County Airport could help.
Why parallel runways? While parallel runways would not allow simultaneous arrivals and departures (they are too close together) they would allow for staggered departures, increasing airport capacity, said Gary Sypek, senior deputy director of airports.
Still, it will be a long haul.
The first step is reaching out to the citizens committee that advises the airport on noise issues. A consultant may be hired to oversee “community engagement.”
It will be at least four years before the project reaches the design stage, Beebe said.
What’s next: The proposal goes before the Citizens Committee on Airport Noise at 9:30 am May 23 at Building 846 at the airport. The meeting is open to the public.
🔌 FPL: ‘The timeline for the project’s implementation is under review’
We’re trying to figure out what’s going on with Florida Power & Light’s plans for a second Palm Beach Gardens office building.
Here’s what FPL, a subsidiary of NextEra Energy, had to say:
“In connection with bid proposals received, the timeline for the project’s implementation is under review.”
When asked if that meant construction would be delayed, we got this from FPL spokesperson Kam Eppinger, formerly of WPTV:
“As I mentioned yesterday, the timeline for the project's implementation is currently being reviewed. At this time, we do not have any additional information or updates to provide.”
Here’s what we were able to dig up:
After winning city site plan approval in December 2022, FPL applied for a building permit for the 249,130-square-foot office building on Nov. 6.
The permit hasn’t been granted yet, city records reveal.
To further questions, Eppinger added this detail: In its initial filing with the city in 2022, the company “anticipated starting construction in Q4 2023.”
It is now the second quarter of 2024. The land has been cleared but no construction is taking place.
Perhaps, construction bids came in higher than anticipated.
FPL isn’t saying.
The company valued construction of the office building at $118 million and the three-story, 701-space parking garage at $20 million.
It’s on 86 acres at the northeast corner of Interstate 95 and PGA Boulevard.
The second building would sit next to and mirror the first, which opened in 2023. That building, like the second one, has a capacity of 1,000 employees but FPL retains its Juno Beach headquarters.
Ultimately, the publicly traded NextEra, which reported $28 billion in 2023 revenues, can build three buildings in Gardens.
🌻But on to the art
Whenever Florida Power & Light opens its second Palm Beach Gardens office building, it is proposing to adorn it with a $1.2 million stainless steel sculpture of three sunflowers, 6 feet in diameter and up to 23-feet high, suffused with customizable LED lighting.
“Solaris,” designed by artist Dan Shaughnessy, would be planted on the southwest corner of Kyoto Gardens and RCA Center drives and must be in place before the second office building can be occupied.
“It will be a magnet. People will be drawn to this piece,” Shaughnessy told the Palm Beach Gardens Art in Public Places Advisory Board on April 11, the board’s first meeting in two years.
The board recommended approval to the City Council, which will consider the art work on May 2. (Full details here.)
Also approved by the board, a $47,000 mural to adorn the parking-lot-facing side of the Palm Beach County Tax Collector’s new building on PGA Boulevard across from the Gardens Mall. (Full details here.)
A little background: City rules require builders to set aside 1 percent of the cost of vertical construction to go toward art.
NextEra estimated the vertical construction cost of its second building, not counting the parking garage, at $69.5 million. (The building permit reviewed by Stet puts the project cost at $118 million.)
The already open first building came in lower, at $51.4 million.
That puts the combined art budget for both buildings at $1.2 million.
A bit about the artist: Shaughnessy, born in Norway and now living in Brooklyn, designed “The Blooms” flower sculpture at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens.
He described Solaris as “a hybrid fusion between a yellow milkwort and a sunflower.”
“These structures prosper underneath the natural light, reaching for the sun. Not only are they grand in stature they display an extraordinary array and pulsating sequence of colors. Their blooms have the ability to create unforgettable light arrays, seen nowhere else in the world.”
The lighting system, budgeted at $80,000, is called Color Kinetic Flex Elite. Each of the 128 petals will have a light source, which can be customized for holidays or special events.
The proposal for the Tax Collector’s Building, with a vertical construction cost of $4.7 million, is a 20-foot tall, 140-foot long mural of tropical flowers backed by geometric patterns by Ben Heller of Key Largo.
☀️ The juice
🏢 Following up: Palm Beach County commissioners opted to move forward with the renovation of their 1984 Governmental Center in downtown West Palm Beach with one important change. Rather than expanding the building, the county would build new space for the tax collector and property appraiser at Airport Center, county-owned land northwest of Interstate 95 and Southern Boulevard. Commissioners on April 16 also expressed interest in pursuing a combined airport car-rental center north of Belvedere Road in Westgate.
🌊 At the third of three West Palm Beach community meetings about the downtown waterfront, a city consultant reported that about 88% of about 1,300 survey respondents oppose adding a marina there. The survey will remain open for about two more weeks.
📈 More than 2,100 people are homeless in Palm Beach County, an annual count shows, a 15 percent increase over 2023. (WLRN)
🔎 By now most of you know that Bob Graham, former Florida governor and U.S. senator, died April 16 at age 87. But this personal account from Florida Bulldog’s Dan Christensen, detailing Graham’s efforts to root out the truth behind the 9/11 attacks, exemplifies Graham’s tenacity. (Florida Bulldog)
🌽 Forget about hot dog-eating contests, check out the corn-on-the-cob athletes April 28 at the South Florida Fairgrounds. Major League Eating’s reigning corn queen, Miki Sudo, will be there. (ByJoeCapozzi.com)
🖌️ 561 insider: A prince of prints
Many years ago, Jonathan “Jack” Frost began collecting work on paper by master artists.
What happened: The West Palm Beach developer amassed hundreds of prints by such great painters as Marc Chagall, Angelica Kauffman and Grant Wood.
Why it’s important: Frost, 76, has promised to give his entire collection of almost 700 works to the Norton Museum of Art.
Many are on display until Aug. 11 at the West Palm Beach museum. It is the first public showing of the Frost collection.
What you’ll see: Seventy-five prints are arranged chronologically tracing Western printmaking through the centuries. The earliest dates from the early 1500s.
They include wartime propaganda, religious imagery and landscapes.
The museum reframed the works and restored some of the prints. Their detail pops against the lush violet gallery walls.
Frost is a Harvard- and Stanford-educated businessman with a law degree, a real estate broker and a contractor. He is well-known for his decades of community service to such organizations as the South Florida Fair, the West Palm Beach Police Pension Fund and Leadership Palm Beach County.
What he said: During a tour last week, Frost gave a large measure of credit for the quality of the collection to family friend Dorothy Braude Edinburg, who guided the acquisitions.
She encouraged Frost to collect at least one significant print from each of the many notable painter-engravers.
“I’ve always known the Norton was world-class,” Frost said. “To actually get involved in this exhibition has shown the staff’s excellence, enthusiasm and professionalism.”
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