ST JOE COMPANY PLANNING SOMETHING BIG FOR WEST PANAMA CITY

Big things are happening from West Panama City to Freeport, FL. This is a great opportunity for the area.

The St. Joe Company has entered into agreements with The Haskell Company and TranSystems Corporation, a transportation planning and engineering firm, to develop a master plan for land owned by St. Joe adjacent to the new Panama City - Bay County International Airport which is scheduled to open in May 2010.
The initial parcels are being planned and positioned for office, retail and industrial users, totaling approximately 1,000 acres, the company said in a release issued today. The land is a portion of approximately 71,000 acres that St. Joe owns within the West Bay Sector, a large mixed-use master-planned project located in Bay County in Northwest Florida.
“With the scheduled opening of the airport now less than one year away, we are accelerating our preconstruction activity and stepping up marketing outreach to global users who need ready access to the new airport,” said St. Joe’s president and CEO Britt Greene. “Our land at West Bay is a world-class asset, and our marketing outreach is to global users. Our initial marketing focus will be aerospace, logistics and defense-oriented technology companies.”
As part of the master-planning process, the team is creating a development node capable of joining the Gulf Coast's aerospace corridor. A concentration of U.S. Air Force, Navy and Army aerospace and aviation facilities along the Florida, Alabama and Mississippi Gulf Coast have created a cluster of aerospace and aviation businesses and workforce talent in the region.
St. Joe’s project at West Bay is part of the larger West Bay Sector Plan, a product of Florida's sector planning process. A planning framework is in place for approximately 75,000 acres, which includes the airport, to ensure long-term land-use compatibility. Approximately 41,000 acres in the West Bay Sector have been preserved through the establishment of the West Bay Preservation Area.