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Downtown Fort Lauderdale has been transforming itself for years now. The skyline tells the story. So do all of the people choosing to make it their home.
Now, we are seeing the next stage of its reimagining as a cosmopolitan center — burgeoning commercial enterprises that make it truly a neighborhood. In recent weeks, the first grocery has opened in Flagler Village and a popular weekly open-air market has relocated to the area.
These sorts of businesses will cement downtown and particularly the greater Flagler Village area as a walkable, livable community that is very attractive to everyone from young entrepreneurs, people beginning families, and even some empty-nesters. More is to come. For instance, when the Ombelle opens, it will have a high-end Equinox gym.
For years, I have said that a successful downtown must offer more than housing, office space, bars and restaurants. It needs the practical things that anchor daily life: grocery stores, neighborhood services, inviting parks and gathering places that create a sense of community.
We are now seeing that vision take shape block by block. What once might have seemed like a small retail opening is, in fact, part of a larger civic transformation. Downtown is becoming more complete, more convenient and more welcoming to the people who now call it home.
The numbers help explain why this matters so much.
More than $10 billion in investment has reshaped the city’s core. Since 2018, downtown has seen an 83 percent growth in families with children, and children under 14 are now the fastest-growing age group downtown.
That is a striking fact. It tells us that people are not just choosing downtown for nightlife or novelty. They are choosing it as a neighborhood. They want parks, schools, walkability, culture, safety and convenience. They want a place that feels alive in the morning, at lunch, after work and on weekends. That is the kind of downtown we are building.
Go Grocer chose Fort Lauderdale for its first Florida location, opening at Motif in Flagler Village as a convenience-driven grocery designed for such high-density neighborhoods. As the Sun Sentinel said, it’s kind of a cross between a 7-Eleven and a Whole Foods. Residents can grab fresh foods, staples and prepared meals close to home.
Then, there is Smorgasburg South Florida. It’s the other major addition that will help animate the downtown vision.
After years as a weekend institution in Wynwood, the open-air market has a new weekly home in Flagler Village.
Operating on Saturdays and Sundays, it will create a recurring destination built around culinary creativity, small business energy and outdoor community life through its offering of dozens of food, dessert, drink and retail vendors.
Organizers have described Fort Lauderdale as a city with incredible energy and say they have wanted to bring Smorgasburg here for a long time.
That says something important about how our downtown is now viewed. People see momentum here. They see opportunity here. They see a community ready to support bold ideas.
Markets like this draw residents, visitors, entrepreneurs and artists into the same space. They encourage people to linger. They help emerging restaurant concepts test themselves and grow. You come for one thing and discover three others. You meet neighbors. You sample flavors from around the world. You leave feeling that your city has something new to offer.
These new amenities are especially powerful because they are arriving alongside our renewal of public spaces. Huizenga Park continues to draw daily crowds following its two-year, $15 million makeover. We want to create the same atmosphere and activation in the next couple years on the site of the old One Stop Shop.
That is the larger story here.
One amenity supports another. A park makes nearby retail more valuable. A grocery store makes residential life more practical. A weekend market brings people who then explore restaurants, shops and the Riverwalk. Investment in the public realm helps private enterprise succeed, and private enterprise helps give public spaces more life.
Once, many thought of our downtown as a place that emptied out after business hours. That is no longer true. Downtown Fort Lauderdale is evolving and becoming more and more exciting — a truly great city center that is active, walkable, welcoming and full of possibility.
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