GlobeSt.com UPDATE: $500M Mixed-Use Posner Park Stalls

HAINES CITY, FL-The development of the $500-million mixed-use Posner Park, planned on a prime 365-acre tract adjacent to the high-traffic Interstate 4 and US 27 intersection in Polk County, has run into a major roadblock and another nearby project may surpass its completion, area brokers and local government sources confirm for GlobeSt.com.

The Posner Park developer, Miami Beach-based Boardwalk Land Development Co., and Polk County planning officials are trying to resolve a sewage capacity issue that affects the development of 2.5 million sf of retail, commercial and business park space; 2,600 hotel rooms; and 1,991 apartments, townhomes and single-family residences on a 365-acre tract at Baseball City. The land is the former spring training camp site of the Kansas City Royals. The development site is 60 miles southwest of Downtown Orlando.

Meanwhile, county officials confirm for GlobeSt.com that Joe Griffith Inc. of Charleston, SC has obtained preliminary commitments from the county to provide water and sewer services for Four Corners Town Center. The project is an estimated $102-million, 1.2-million-sf retail campus in an unincorporated area of Polk County, about 15 miles south of Walt Disney World and about a mile north of Interstate 4 where Posner Park is planned.

Boardwalk Land Development’s lawyer, Cecelia Bonifay of Orlando-based Akerman & Senterfitt, didn’t respond to GlobeSt.com’s inquiries for further details on the sewage capacity issue. Boardwalk Land Development, a subsidiary of Victor Posner Enterprises, already has demolished the baseball stadium and cleared the site for the start of development, area brokers monitoring the project’s progress tell GlobeSt.com.

The first of three development phases was supposed to have 1.3 million sf of retail, commercial and business park space; 626 hotel rooms; and 268 residential units, according to preliminary plans filed with the Central Florida Regional Planning Council in Winter Park, as GlobeSt.com previously reported.

The project has been planned since early 2001 when Victor Posner Enterprises bought the 365 acres from St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch Corp. at an estimated $100,000 per acre or a total $36.5 million, Polk County land brokers familiar with local land prices at the time tell GlobeSt.com.