Doral Central Park will soon have a brand-new parking garage and recreation area.
Last week, the Doral City Council told staff to move forward with acquiring a design firm and construction management to build an estimated $34 million garage and recreation area buildings at Doral Central Park at 3005 NW 92nd Ave.
Three-level garage would have about 532 parking spaces and include nine pickleball courts on the rooftop. The adjacent two-level recreation entertainment concession facility would have 24,000 square feet, with each level about 12,000 square feet, Lazaro Quintero, the city’s capital improvements division chief, told the city council.
The first level of the recreational building is a vision to provide a space for entertainment and concession components, which will complement the use and amenities provided by the park, he said.
The second level would be a flexible, advanced space with a suitable kitchen for event cooking, and additional infrastructure components to allow for a variety of events to be hosted.
In addition, the garage will feature a dedicated drop-off area for the city’s trolley to allow for a direct, alternative, convenient transportation method for residents to visit the park.
The third level of the garage shows the inclusion of nine pickleball courts with areas for restroom storage and a park staff office. This area also includes a designated spectator seating area, Mr. Quintero explained.
“As far as the project timeline is concerned, we’re anticipating approximately eight months for design work, followed by an additional 90 days for permitting and development of a guaranteed maximum price proposal by the construction manager for construction,” he added. “We’re anticipating an 18-month construction period. The schedule will be further refined once we both have the awarded design firm and construction manager on board.”
City staff presented preliminary revenue estimates starting in 2029, which would be the first full year of operation for the garage, assuming the 532 spaces are at about 65% capacity for about 350 days a year.
“We’re assuming about $2.4 million in revenue just on the parking operations alone, and that is based on the current cost of on-street parking right now. On the expense side, the debt service on this is estimated to be about $2 million a year. So, $32 million in today’s interest environment,” said Fernando Casamayor, Doral’s assistant city manager and chief financial officer. “This facility could be generating upwards of $5 million a year in additional revenue to the city of Doral, meaning the parks department would be less reliant on ad valorem taxes in order to fund their services. The 30-year net revenue estimate would be about $63 million additional to the city of Doral.”
The city already has some money budgeted for the project in this fiscal year, he said.
“The bulk of it, which is about $32 million of it, would be a debt issuance, not a general obligation debt, which is what funded all of our parks several years ago, that is raising your tax rate in order to pay for debt,” he explained to city officials. “This is a special obligation bond, so it is pledging our own general fund revenues to cover debt. We’re not asking taxpayers to pay any more. We are going to find it through ourselves.”
It’s extremely important that Doral becomes less reliant on property taxes and finds ways to create revenue in creative ways, Mayor Christi Fraga agreed, which the city is actively doing, and this project would be the first example.
“I’m very pleased to see the numbers, which I do think are very conservative. I don’t think we even took into account potential rentals of the parking garage for special events at a higher rate per parking space. So, I think having a parking garage within our portfolio of assets is extremely valuable,” she said.
“It also brings additional recreation, which is extremely needed and very popular in Doral,” the mayor said. “I think that this will generate potentially a good amount of revenue to offset costs for the parks and, therefore, free up general revenue funds for additional services that we can provide for our city.”
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