Slicing the Cheesecake: Council embraces Downtown plan calling for Cheesecake Factory to go

ShopCore Properties wins city approval for massive changes at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens.

View post to subscribe to site newsletter.

The biggest step in the transformation of Downtown Palm Beach Gardens won city council approval Thursday without a single word about the popular restaurant about to be served by a wrecking ball. 

Continue reading “Slicing the Cheesecake: Council embraces Downtown plan calling for Cheesecake Factory to go”

No more Cheesecake? Gardens council to vote Thursday

Shopcore Properties proposes tearing down Cheesecake Factory, adding hotel, apartment building at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens.

View post to subscribe to site newsletter.

Plans to remake Downtown Palm Beach Gardens, including the demolition of The Cheesecake Factory restaurant to make way for a 280-unit apartment building, go before the city council Thursday.

Continue reading “No more Cheesecake? Gardens council to vote Thursday”

City road shutting down for two weeks to add roundabout

After shutdown, Campus Drive construction will continue for six months as part of $1.3 million project.

A roundabout designed to calm traffic outside Palm Beach State College’s Palm Beach Gardens Campus will force the closure of Campus Drive starting Friday July 23, and continuing until Aug. 6. 

Work on the half-mile length of road, which links PGA Boulevard to RCA Boulevard, will continue for six months after the closure.

Continue reading “City road shutting down for two weeks to add roundabout”

‘Abuse of power:’ Gardens ready to sue county over Bay Hill stoplight

Residents says they take their lives in their hands at Northlake Boulevard west of Ibis but Palm Beach County says intersection is not dangerous enough for a stoplight.

The hostility building in recent months between Palm Beach Gardens and Palm Beach County officials has reached a boiling point.

The two governments have feuded in the past, from the spat over a regional park to the ongoing showdown over the city’s mobility fee

But a long-simmering dispute over a stoplight on Northlake Boulevard seven miles west of Interstate 95 may blow the lid off the kettle.

On Thursday, the Palm Beach Gardens City Council gave their attorney the authority to take the county to court — not over the county’s refusal to allow the stoplight, although that remains likely, but over the county’s failure to promptly fulfill a city public records request.

Continue reading “‘Abuse of power:’ Gardens ready to sue county over Bay Hill stoplight”

Railroad quiet zones two years away in north county

Faster Brightline trains raise specter of more deaths even as quiet zones two years away.

Railroad quiet zones are coming to Palm Beach Gardens and north county. 

But not until 2023, at the earliest. And not without some risk.

The sounds of silence won’t break out over north county any earlier than 2023, officials say, even though the $2.2 million needed to pay for more gates and other safety features at 26 crossings is in hand. 

That’s because the final testing of safety measures can’t start until the Brightline passenger service completes construction on a second set of tracks, not just in Palm Beach County but all the way to Orlando. That $2.7 billion job is not scheduled to be done until the final months of 2022. 

Continue reading “Railroad quiet zones two years away in north county”

Meet your new neighbors: Council welcomes Tekno and The Blooms

New artwork to rise on Donald Ross Road outside Alton and at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens.

Two artists. Two works of public art. Two attempts at whimsy.

The public sculptures proposed for two major Gardens developments met with the approval of the city council on Thursday but ultimately it will be for residents to judge.

Heading for a prominent spot along Donald Ross Road outside the Alton Town Center is Tekno by Alexander Krivosheiw, a New York-born artist with a studio in Palm Beach.

In the mall area south of the courtyard at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens, six stainless steel dandelions dubbed The Blooms will sprout by Norwegian-born Chicago artist Dan Shaughnessy IV

The color-changing dandelion-like stainless steel Blooms would rise in May in the pedestrian shopping strip at Downtown Palm Beach Gardens just south of the courtyard. (Material supplied to the city council)
Continue reading “Meet your new neighbors: Council welcomes Tekno and The Blooms”