We have a winner. And it’s obviously not “Vinikville.”
After more than two years of working on developmental details around Amalie Arena, Jeff Vinik and partners no longer have to work around the lack of an official name for their imposing, $3 billion, 50-plus-acre revitalization project. It’s officially “Water Street Tampa.”
Personally, I liked the working appellation of “Waterfront District,” although I would concede it had its generic downside. Then there was “Channelside,” which had already been taken. And then “LoDo,” (for Lower Downtown,) a cute riff on SoHo, but not to be taken seriously.
“Water Street Tampa” works. It connotes what needs to be connoted when you are near water. It also has the cachet of history. There actually is a Water Street, and it dates back to the 1800s. Now it will become the “main spine” of the new neighborhood, according to James Nozar, the CEO of Strategic Properties Partners, the real estate firm backed by Vinik in tandem with Bill Gates’ Cascade Investment.
Not to rain on the Water Street parade, but I do detect an ample measure of marketing hyperbole. It’s understandable that what Vinik & Co. want to do is evoke the sort of connection we have long seen between certain iconic streets and their famous host cities. So why not think big? Indeed. As in Bourbon Street, Michigan Avenue and Broadway. Some day.