DESTIN HARBOR WALK TO GROW WITH A HOTEL AND PARKING GARAGE IN THE PLANS

As you see on TV, the Ever Ready Battery Bunny keep going and going, so does Peter Bos, a local developer in the Destin area. With tremendous success in the local tourism and even more success in the future, the time in right to invest and growth our economy. Waiting could mean higher costs. Many thanks continue to go out to BP. In the worst of times came some of the best of times. The millions of dollars provided by BP in promoting our local area to the world is paying off in a big way. Last year, our tourism broke all kinds of records and so far, we are expected to break those records.

Growth eyed for HarborWalk
Hotel and parking garage are in the works for just east of Emerald Grande
By DUSTY RICKETTS
315-4448 @DustyRnwfdn dricketts@nwfdailynews.com  
DESTIN — The two towers of the Emerald Grande have become a landmark, easily recognizable from as far away as Okaloosa Island and even Shalimar. Destin’s skyline could be changing againas Legendary Inc., the developer of Emerald Grande, is working on plans for the next phase of HarborWalk Village. Legendary CEO Peter Bos said the company is looking to build a new 100- to 150-room hotel and a second parking garage just east of the towers. Rumors have been swirling that new construction at HarborWalk Village was months or even weeks away from starting. While work on some smaller additions is under way now, Bos still is finalizing his timeline for the hotel and parking garage. “A lot of people just build single projects where they build a building and that’s all they put on the land, and that’s all there is,” Bos said. “For me, I spend a lot of time, and I’ll spend an extra year just working on details of planning, trying to figure out where everything goes. When it’s all done, it all needs to fit together and not just look like a bunch of buildings jammed on one site. “We think the timing is about right,” Bos said. “The rumor is a little ahead of reality, but not much.” The primary construction at HarborWalk Village — which includes the Emerald Grande, a parking garage, shops and restaurants — began in February 2005 and continued through June 2007. The initial master plan included a second set of towers that were almost identical to Emerald Grande. While the proposed hotel will not be identical, Bos said it will be architecturally compatible. The next construction phase also will include “several” buildings, he said. The hotel and other buildings will be constructed on what is now a parking lot and The Shed Barbeque and Blues Joint. Bos said The Shed likely will move closer to Destin Harbor. Because of downturns in the real estate and construction markets in the past five years, Bos said it will be much more affordable to build the HarborWalk expansion now than when the original development was built. That, along with the need for more rooms at HarborWalk Village, are among the reasons Bos is moving forward. “I think we have bottomed out in the real estate market, and the real estate market is coming back,” Bos said. “We’re working on all kinds of things. We’ve gotten a permit for development order, but we are working on all kinds of new things to get moving with.”