Dales column about the State of the Island meeting As I sat through the presentations at the first State of The Island meeting Wednesday I was, like many there, a little overwhelmed by the change that is coming at us. For a complete account of the content of the presentations see the story in this issue; but to sum up the next fourteen months are going to see a metamorphosis on The Island, both Padre and Port Aransas, from residential to tourist. The changes that are already in the pipeline alone will push this process past a tipping point, and more change is certain to be added to the bandwagon between now and then. According to plans now on the table, by the end of summer next year the Schlitterbahn park will be complete with meeting rooms, restaurants, concert venues, and of course water rides. A 75,000 square-foot former casino building will be at the park site and provide a live music venue and the community meeting space neither end of The Island has ever had. Also by next summer the marina on Lake Padre will either be complete or well under construction, the Beach Walk canal lined with retail and residential buildings will be dug and bulkheaded, dropping a transformative feature the size of Oklahoma City’s Bricktown in the middle of Padre Island. An apartment/condo development on the south end of the seawall will be either complete or under construction. This all is in addition to the continuing house-building boom that has been ongoing on Padre Island for two years and vast improvements to the road system along SPID leading to The Turn onto SH 361 heading to Port Aransas, and the new development along SH 361 on the south end of Port Aransas. One Big Island Port Aransians and North Padre Islanders each refer to their end of the sandbar as The Island; never has that name been more appropriate. What we are seeing is a melding of Mustang and Padre Islands into one contiguous metropolitan (I believe that is the correct work here) area. But there are some limiting factors which will ultimately define the pattern of growth; the main one being traffic flow. Port Aransas will never have a bridge. A recent study found that the amount of inbound Port Aransas traffic coming over the ferry system has barely increased in ten years even as growth and tourism numbers have exploded; a greatly limiting factor for the growing number of Port Aransas residents who don’t want to see the town lose its “Port Aransas’ flavor. But change of that order doesn’t come as a flood but a trickle and will keep trying to find an opening, such as the rumored recent interest of a 40,000 square-foot Walmart Neighborhood Market (read grocery store) which appears to have been shut down by the Port Aransas City Council’s ban on Big Box stores. Rest assured while this battle may have been won the war is only beginning and will take many forms. Property values in Port Aransas are still higher than on Padre Island but the real estate industry is betting on those numbers evening out in the next five years. Padre Island Padre Island got a head start on managing growth ten years ago with the passage of the Island Overlay Zone which regulates architecture and places some limits on what can be built within its borders, which basically includes current retail zones on Padre Island. But holding off Big Box stores on Padre may be a fool’s errand for the opposite reason from that which limits growth in Port Aransas; North Padre does have a bridge. The JFK Causeway allows easy access to North Padre through the highway system from the major Texas metropolitan areas; in fact this easy access is key to the business model that is driving Padre Island development. As Port Aransas grows and attracts more visitors more of them will pass through Padre Island and this “intercept’ opportunity, which cuts an hour off a weekend drive to The Coast, is part of what will drive growth on Padre Island. Change You get a feel for where Island growth is going when you consider the shear scale of what is planned. By this time next year five hundred acres of Padre Island will be in the midst of a complete transformation. The number of visitors it will take to drive this new tourist economy is a harbinger of what is happening. To those who lament the “Old Days’ and wish the waterpark would simply go away I say consider the alternative. If not a waterpark, the old Padre Island Country Club would by now be well on its way to becoming a 700-unit housing development. If you want to see out of control traffic put 700 more houses on The Island and stand back. If the status quo is removed from the equation – which market forces did long ago – I believe what is coming to Padre Island is the best possible alternative. The water park is drawing the attention, but it is only a small part of the bigger picture. The riverwalk and the things it brings will bring will impact the Island lifestyle in a way I don’t think it is possible to understand until it happens. We’ll find out in fourteen months.
Posted on: Wed, 21 May 2014 18:36:22 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015