Mayor Ken Welch has selected Blake Investment Partners and the Pinellas County Housing Authority.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Mayor Ken Welch announced the names of the two developers chosen to redevelop the Historic Gas Plant District, the area where the Tropicana Field sits.
The proposal by “The Burg Bid” development team will take up most of the 86-acre site. It includes more than 3600 units of affordable and workforce housing, new public infrastructure, a large park dedicated to showcasing museums and other cultural landmarks, as well as a workforce training and small business success center.
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The other proposal selected comes from the Pinellas County Housing Authority. They plan to build affordable senior housing on 3rd Avenue- south, between 16th and 17th streets.
This announcement comes more than a year after plans to build a new baseball stadium on that site fell through. The mayor and the developers said this will be the restart of a community that was forced out to make way for I-175 and Tropicana Field.
“Jobs, housing, economic opportunity and honoring the promises made to the community and to the city when the land was acquired,” Mayor Welch said.
It’s a promise St. Pete resident Abdul Karim Ali will never forgot.
“If the stadium is built, the surrounding area would be redeveloped. So that’s what we bought into, giving support of that. Unfortunately, those promises were not kept,” Ali said.
Blake Investment Partners said in the heart of the development will be the Woodson African American Museum of Florida.
“The Historic Gas Plant was a real place, with real people, real churches, real businesses. Our project begins with honoring those people,” Thompson Whitney Blake with Blake Investment Partners said.
The Pinellas County Housing Authority plans to tear up pavement to make way for homes and the return of a community.
“We’re talking about these 94 beautiful units with a preference for residents who were displaced from the Historic Gas Plant District,” PCHA Executive Director Neil Brickfield said.
This announcement is just the first step. City councilman Corey Givens Jr. sent the following statement: “Today a selection has been made. Not a final binding agreement. Term sheets and negotiations must still be finalized before it’s brought to city council for a final vote. Regardless of what happens after this election, I still support a plan first, rather than develop first approach when it comes to reimagining the future of this site.”
“I just want somebody to get going over there and putting a shovel in the ground,” Mark Ferguson with Ferg’s Sports Bar & Grill said.
Ferguson said it’s still waiting on a final plan but sees opportunity in whatever comes next.
“We’re looking at maybe a convention center, maybe keeping baseball, maybe baseball leaving maybe having a convention center and a baseball stadium. There’s endless possibilities — that’s what we need to keep our minds open to,” Ferguson said.
Now, the Tampa Bay Rays are expected to play at the Tropicana Field through 2028. The team is looking into moving to Tampa in 2029, but plans for that are still in the early stages.