TAMPA, Fla. — In the heart of downtown Tampa, just blocks from the Florida Aquarium and Amalie Arena sits Ardent Mills Tampa Mill. The facility is permanently closed.
Sandwiched between Nebraska Ave and Meridian Ave, the 1938 mill will be demolished starting Friday. The goal of the mill's demolition is to reconnect the neighborhoods surrounding it. The facility currently blocks off four blocks of Channelside to downtown Tampa.
"It's going to be magnificent," Mayor Jane Castor said. "The new block system and the way we're going to be able to connect the greenways with our complete streets, our segregated bike paths. As you all know, we're a vision zero city. With a 48 percent increase in traffic fatalities over the last year, we have a lot of work to do."
Tampa is one of the worst metro cities in the nation for pedestrian fatalities. Tampa Downtown Partnership said flattening the site will make moving around downtown safer and easier.
"So complete streets are really turning roadways back into neighborhood roads as opposed to fast highways," Castor said. "We are having larger sidewalks, segregated bike lanes, providing greenways, and connecting all of our neighborhoods through that form of safe transit."
What's a demolition without some pomp and circumstance? The project began with a ceremony. Tampa Mayor Jane Castor climbed into an excavator and started the teardown by knocking down part of the structure.
A two-story building will be taken apart, piece by piece. The mill's silos will be preserved and repurposed, according to Tampa Downtown Partnership.
“This is a moment to celebrate the continued transformation of our Downtown," Lynda Remund, Tampa Downtown Partnership President and CEO, said. “If you stood in this spot 50 years ago, you’d be surrounded by warehouses, a lumber yard and an asphalt factory. Today, we have amazing cultural attractions, a startup hub/technology incubator, world-class hotels, and one of America’s top 50 medical schools for research. Our future is bright.”
For businesses in surrounding areas, this project means easier access to their storefront.
"It'll be cool that people don't have to dangerously walk on the train tracks to get over here and it'll open us up to more of the downtown business," Josh Glass, the co-owner of Gingerbeard Coffee said.
The redevelopment, Glass said, is a needed facelift for the downtown area.
"I think it's the next step in a good direction for water street and bringing downtown to actually being a downtown where it's walkable, useful, and people actually want to go and visit," Glass said.
While this facility is closed, flour production is still taking place — just down the way. The flour mill has relocated to a new, modern facility at Port Tampa Bay’s Port Redwing, near Apollo Beach.
The downtown Tampa property is now owned by Strategic Property Partners.