I Love Downtown

Something for all downtown lovers. Click on the link to read the full article with photos:
http://www.biscaynetimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=489:dwntn-uptrn&catid=46:features&Itemid=162

DWNTN UPTRN

Written by Pamela Robin Brandt Photos by Silvia Ros

If you haven’t walked around downtown Miami for a while, you’re in for a surprise -- a big surprise Tre Italian Bistro owner José Goyanes with partner Jennifer Porciello. Headline from a January 2006 article in the New York Times: “Downtown Miami: What’s Hot and Trendy and Not South Beach?” The writer of the story, I’m embarrassed to say, was me. That headline, which I did not write, was, to put it kindly, premature. The article was written during the height of South Florida’s most recent real estate boom, slated for a part of the paper’s travel section aimed at buyers of second homes. While the piece itself did make clear this was a downtown Miami soon-to-come, not one already here, it still glowed with confidence that the 3041 new downtown condominium units just completed, plus 13,890 units then under construction in the area -- not to mention plans filed for buildings containing 10,534 more -- would transform Miami’s central city from a strictly 9-to-5 office area into a vibrant, 24/7 high-density urban center where people lived, worked, and played. And soon! The conclusion didn’t seem to be mere hype or pure delusion. After all, buyers were lining up around the block on the days when some luxury high-rise residences opened for pre-construction sales, snapping up $600,000 one-bedrooms like they were Hannah Montana concert tickets. What actually happened, of course, was the recession. The real estate boom turned into a bust, and many buyers turned out to be speculators looking not for homes but for quick and profitable resales, which weren’t about to happen in hard times. Some condo construction stopped cold; some stalled indefinitely. And newspaper stories about newly completed high-rises no longer talked glowingly of bay views but instead about unlit windows in unoccupied condos. But recently I noticed something strange. In my role as the Biscayne Times “Dining Guide” dominatrix, I watched as the Downtown/Brickell listings section practically exploded, nearly doubling in the past 18 months. Odder yet was the fact that most of the new restaurants were not located south of the Miami River, in already restaurant-rich Brickell but rather in the rougher-edged area north of the river. When the trickle of intriguing downtown eateries at the start of 2009 became a deluge by fall, I knew it was time to investigate. Gusman director Margaret Lake: “Truly, I can now walk to get almost everything I need!” Restaurants are renowned as reliable urban-gentrification barometers. Commonly they’re the first retail businesses to open in emerging neighborhoods. Boutiques, snazzy salons, theaters, and galleries rapidly follow. Granted, the downtown cuisine scene had improved since the 1990s, when lawyer friends constantly whined that there wasn’t even one business-district restaurant suitable for a power lunch except the City Club. But to have four such places open in July alone? With residential skyscrapers showing very few lit windows at night, no way could downtown have become so hot again, so fast. You couldn’t help but wonder: Was the owner of Mia at Biscayne out of his freakin’ mind? What was a 14,000-square-foot, ultra-high tech restolounge serving cutting-edge global cuisine till the wee hours doing on the corner of Flagler Street and Biscayne Boulevard, an area that had, for decades, been dead after sunset? Feeding a lot of hungry new residents, according to Downtown Development Authority executive director Alyce Robertson. These were not the affluent, older empty-nesters and snowbirds, nor were they foreign jet-setters with Euros to burn -- the people who, in 2005, were expected to occupy downtown’s new luxury condos. They were young renters. “The perception has been that all of downtown’s condos are empty because of the real estate bust -- that a picture of downtown would look like one big empty condo. But that’s not true,” Robertson insists firmly. “We did a residency study, completed last July, that showed a 62-percent occupancy rate for downtown condos.” The DDA is currently compiling new figures, she adds, which are not yet available. “But based on last summer’s study, which indicated that sales and leasing activity of new units increased over the three-month period from April through June over the first three months of 2009, we expect to find that occupancy is now significantly higher than 62 percent.” That figure, she adds, is an average: “Basically, condos that came on the market after 2008 are still empty. Condos before then have largely been filled.” Why have luxury condos filled up at the same time the economy has tanked? One reason, says Metro 1 Properties broker Tony Cho, who has been active in downtown since 2003, is that condo prices, which developers doggedly kept at boom levels for way too long, finally dropped to an “appropriately affordable” level. “If you look at the prices of so many of the luxury buildings -- condos that were originally going for $600 or more per square foot -- you can now get them for the low 200s, even the high 100s,” he says. “Rents have gone from $2 per square foot a month to between $1.10 and $1.30. Prices have come down elsewhere too, but in downtown there’s been a more dramatic reduction than in South Beach.” In agreement is Realtor and recent SoBe transplant Abraham Ash, who now lives downtown. His own condo, 50 Biscayne, is a new central-business-district high-rise whose features include a full-service concierge, a tropically landscaped “urban oasis” pool deck, a two-level spa/fitness center, a two-level club room, a two-level party room, an outdoor bay-view party deck. You get the idea. Says Ash: “I’m in a luxury condo for half the price I’d be paying in South Beach for a second-floor walk-up in a building with no security and no amenities. I’m stuck in downtown and I love it!” Brian Basti at Ecco Pizzateca: “Everyone who has a business here lives here, and really cares passionately about the neighborhood.” The DDA’s Robertson points out that downtown’s rental market barely existed before the bust, but now it’s proving a boon in developing a vibrant new identity in the area where most renters live: the central business district. “In a way,” she says, “the condo sales bust has been a cloud with a silver lining, because many speculators who bought condos when prices were at the high end want to hold onto them until the market goes up again. Therefore there has been a lot of renting for very favorable prices, and that has brought more young people into downtown than would otherwise have been here. So there’s a lot of youth-oriented energy going on.” Hence the recent explosion of new restaurants concentrated in the central business district. The district’s younger energy is especially apparent at night, in its brand-new, open-late restaurants (as well as some older restaurants, formerly lunch-only, that started serving dinner in the past year or so). A restaurateur who has experienced, and currently caters to, both the 9-to-5 business crowd and new residents is José Goyanes, who has owned businesses in the district for 15 years. Among them are Tre, a new, casual-chic Italian bistro/lounge at the eastern end of Flagler Street, and the more Old World Italian La Loggia, one of the few upscale restaurants in the area suitable for a power lunch when it opened in 2000. “La Loggia is in front of the courthouse,” Goyanes says, “so diners are a lot of judges and lawyers. The atmosphere is more clubby. They like to sit at certain regular tables and be seen. At Tre, which is near the new condos, days go by when you don’t see a judge. We draw a residential crowd.” Locals-orientation is typical of new enterprises in the emerging central business district, even at Mia at Biscayne. Though the mega-restolounge outdoes any South Beach nightspot in ultra-high-tech décor (like an “iBar” with a touch-screen top patrons can manipulate), Mia aims for convivial accessibility in its entertainment, says homeboy chef extraordinaire Gerdy Rodriguez. To reflect downtown’s multicultural population, events have ranged from neighborhood offerings like Monday Night Football to an upscale Latin party running from 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. How’s that for a 24-hour downtown? Goyanes feels that concentrating on locals rather than tourists is vital to building a solid 24/7 area. “In the 1990s, downtown businesses were centered on tourists,” Goyanes says. “What was typical to see was, during the daytime, groups of 150 tourists going into discount electronics and luggage stores. That makes you susceptible to the tides of foreign currency. You can’t do that.” Tre actually was a luggage store before Goyanes transformed it into a place locals frequent even on nights normally slow for restaurants. “Monday is often our busiest night,” he notes. DDA executive director Alyce Robertson says the condo bust brought young renters, and their energy, to downtown. But Goyanes did more than focus on locals. He became one, moving from Coral Gables 18 months ago. “I began to be so excited about the new quality of life downtown, I wanted to be more a part of it. I don’t ever leave downtown!” Nor is there practically any need to, according to Loft 1 resident Margaret Lake, director of the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts. “It’s got some great stores, and downtown’s easily walkable. Truly, I can now walk to get almost everything I need!” she enthuses. “I didn’t even buy a car for the first six months. I wouldn’t have bought one ever if downtown had a decent supermarket.” When downtown resident Alex Gonzalez started his social-networking website Miami Urban Life in 2007, “it was mostly just some happy hours listings,” he recalls. “Now I can go way beyond drinking.” Last month’s listings ranged from a DDA-sponsored free concert series in Bayfront Park and “Meet Your Neighbor” events to a benefit for Haiti and, during the cold spell, a blanket/clothes drop for the neighborhood’s homeless. “Plus I try to organize my own creative ways to get people together,” Gonzalez continues. “We’re now doing Friday night happy hour dodgeball events.” Games are at the Downtown Athletic Club, which, says club marketer Rob Aylward, is doing extensive outreach to new residents. “I don’t live downtown. I live on the Beach,” confesses Jessica Wu, a holistic practitioner and dodgeballer. “But I play downtown. It’s less pretentious here. When I go to a club downtown, I don’t get harassed by doormen or wait in lines. I love eating out and there are some great little bistros. I attend a lot of free downtown events like the DWNTWN Concert Series in Bayfront Park, or the free events they have at the Gusman frequently. “In 2006 I did live in downtown for a year,” she adds, “but there wasn’t enough for me to do. Also I found it a little dangerous and seedy at night. Now it reminds me of Philly, where I was raised. There was a community feel and always something to do as soon as you stepped outside your house. It’s where a lot of young professionals lived, and artists, musicians, and up-and-coming entrepreneurs. And now downtown Miami is the same.” “Four years ago I wouldn’t have dreamed of living in downtown,” says Realtor Andres del Corral, who was the first tenant to move into the Met 1 condo, in May 2008. “I spent two weeks in an empty building, and downtown still had some ghost-town feel I could sense. After the first month it was 20 percent full. Now it’s 70 to 80 percent full, and the neighborhood has suddenly bloomed. After work there are lots of happy hours in the nabe. The nightlife’s excellent. And there are suddenly a lot of restaurants. I go jogging after dark, too, through Bayfront or along the river on Riverwalk, and stroll the street with a nice watch on and feel absolutely no fear. This is a new downtown! Those who haven’t been here in the past year haven’t really been here.” All that might sound like cock-eyed optimism, and no one’s suggesting that downtown Miami is suddenly New York or San Francisco. It’s just that downtown’s new residents are feeling the pull-together spirit early pioneers had when their gritty clumps of sod finally started sprouting something decent. Two years ago, for instance, when Margaret Lake moved to Miami to revive the historic Gusman, she settled in one of downtown’s few nonbayfront condos, Loft 1, located in the then still-under-construction city center. “I figured, to restore the Gusman to its role as the city’s heart, I had to live there to understand it. And I saw it blossoming. It was phenomenal!” she exclaims. “From my window, I watched the lights in Loft 2 go on one by one as people finally moved in. It was like watching a garden grow -- and participating in it!” It’s natural for people to get excited about revitalizing a blighted urban area when they all live and work in the same compact, densely populated area, says Brian Basti, owner of Ecco Pizzateca, a welcoming alt-culture hangout he co-owns with Aramis Lorie. They were formerly the team behind PS 14, located in the isolated, still-tough neighborhood west of the Arsht Center. “We’ve always been in desolate neighborhoods,” Basti says. “I want to be the first guy in!” But now he prefers doing it in the central business district, where he also lives in one of the new high-rises. “Everyone who has a business here lives here, and really cares passionately about the neighborhood. It’s not like parts of Miami where owners are douche-bag investors who live in some foreign country and only care about making money from their business. Here everyone knows everyone, so you can get credit everywhere. It’s like a small town.” Adds Lake: “We work together to increase the market for all our businesses. Like, I want to encourage downtown people to participate in building an audience for this theater, which should be their home. So I’ve partnered with Tre and Ecco. José told me: ‘Tre does so well when you do shows.’ So I call him and say, ‘We’re having a show next Saturday, you should stay open late.’ And then he’ll distribute my flyers to his customers beforehand. Brian does the same. We’ve been discussing we should do ‘Dinner and a Movie’ cooperatively. It’s all about using community.” That’s the grassroots DIY approach to developing downtown. Meanwhile, the DDA has developed an official approach to attract new residents and businesses, support those that have already migrated to downtown, and sustain the growth. Often the DDA partners with established entities such as the City of Miami and Miami-Dade County, FDOT, the City of Miami Police Department, the Downtown Miami Partnership, American Airlines Arena, Gusman Center, and many more. The list of initiatives -- based on surveys to determine what downtown residents wanted most -- that have already been implemented is mind-boggling. “The revitalization of downtown is like the chess game on Star Trek,” Robertson explains. “Three dimensional. It’s about working on many levels at once. But what residents most wanted was a downtown that looks and feels clean and safe. So since I came on as director in April 2008, we’ve spent a lot of time on beautification -- which is important. The idea is, if it looks broken, it is broken. My orientation is: ‘Clean it up, green it up.’” For example, if you’ve been on Flagler Street recently, have you found yourself thinking: “Hmmm, were those palm trees always there? What about those mammoth decorative planters on the sidewalks? Actually the sidewalks look awfully new themselves. Hey, why aren’t there any cigarette butts in the street? Oh, sorry officer! I swear there wasn’t a crosswalk here before.” Fratelli Milan is one of many new downtown restaurants. Robertson continues: “One idea behind a high-density, high-rise downtown is that it’s a walkable area, not just a place people drive in and out of, so we focused on amenities a pedestrian would want. So we’re landscaped. We installed new sidewalks and crosswalks. We’re pressure-washing Flagler Street at least a couple of times a week, and there’s a Downtown Enhancement Team of homeless people picking up litter. “Better lighting is coming in the next six months; FPL is installing poles now. And the new chief of police committed, in a meeting last week, to putting significantly more police on the streets.” Among the DDA’s projects is a public-transportation treat: a cute, smart-looking, rubber-tired Brickell/Biscayne trolley, modeled after those in Coral Gables. The initial route, only five months from launch, will run from the Rickenbacker Causeway to 18th or 20th Street on the north. And because 67 percent of surveyed downtown residents favored extending the route farther north, to Midtown and the Design District, Robinson promises that’ll happen too -- eventually. “The trolley will help reduce road congestion, air pollution, and parking problems. Mainly, it will enhance connectivity throughout all downtown’s areas.” Walking the streets of downtown, you’ll also notice numerous big, shiny, high-impact glass picture windows instead of old metal shutters. That’s because there are “Façade Improvement and Shutter Removal” grants for storefront businesses to encourage window-shopping and decrease the war-zone feel. To support top-quality retail and entertainment venues, there are “Tenant Improvement Grants” that reimburse for property improvements, but only for businesses that residents have said they want. Yes: Bookshops, music/video stores, home accessory stores of the Williams Sonoma or Restoration Hardware type. No: Dollar stores, electronics and luggage shops, cafeteria-style breakfast/lunch joints. Oh, and about that supermarket? A first-rate supermarket topped the wish list of every resident questioned about downtown’s current deficiencies. Whole Foods, which signed a lease in 2004 but pulled out in 2008 when it seemed unlikely that downtown would have the residential base it needed by its projected 2011 opening, hasn’t yet come creeping back. But there’s hope. Robertson says several markets are now being “actively recruited.” Though she refuses to name names, Fresh Market slipped out after relentless pestering. “I do think the occupancy study convinced them that the area is close to having sufficient population density,” she says. Should Robertson and the DDA need any recruitment incentives, they need look no further than their own survey. Second on residents’ wish list, by an overwhelming margin, was -- no joke -- “two or three dive bars.” Here’s the incentive: Natural foods markets like Whole Foods and Fresh are very self-conscious about their “green” profile. If they’d like to burnish their image by helping to reduce air pollution in a dramatic way, just open a store in downtown Miami -- and sponsor a couple of dive bars. With the market and the dive bars in place, scores of new high-rise dwellers would immediately get rid of their cars. Hell, they’d never leave downtown.