Taylor Gangis · August 5, 2026

3 weeks of filings, approvals and ribbon cuttings, and the two biggest stories both come down to a room full of people voting. The Rays deal is running out of calendar. The Gas Plant finally has a name on it. Meanwhile ONE Tampa is about to top out (Friday) and somebody just paid $40 million for 1 acre on Ashley.

6 stories. Let's get into it.

Before we dive in, just want to take a moment and thank Tom and thank Crowbar for many amazing memories over the last 20 years in Ybor. Special place with a ton of special memories for many people. They shut their doors on Friday, July 31 but from the sounds of some of Tom’s instagram videos, he already has things in the workings for what’s coming next.

⚾ THE RAYS DEAL HITS THE WALL WITH 18 DAYS LEFT

What happened: Tampa City Council voted 4-3 on July 23 against sending a land-use amendment for the Hillsborough College Dale Mabry campus to the state, then pulled a separate $100 million CRA vote off its August 20 agenda.

The details: The non-binding MOU covers a $2.3 billion ballpark in Drew Park with public funding capped at $976 million. The Rays wanted $100 million of that from the Drew Park CRA. Hillsborough County will not vote on the deal until Tampa City Council approves the binding agreement first, and Commissioner Ken Hagan has said as much publicly. August 20 was the original deadline. Renderings dropped in July showing a translucent roof, a plaza entrance with a cownose ray aquarium, and a mixed-use district with offices, hotels, retail and a rebuilt Hillsborough College campus.

Why it matters: Drew Park is one of the last large redevelop able footprints inside the city limits, sitting between Westshore and the airport. Whatever gets built there sets values for a square mile.

My take: Nobody killed anything on July 23. Council declined to move a land-use amendment forward, which is a procedural step, not a verdict. But the sequencing is the story. The county will not move until the city does, the city just slowed down, and the clock the team set is a team deadline, not a legal one. Watch what happens to land prices along Dale Mabry and Hillsborough Ave over the next 60 days. Speculators do not wait for votes.

[Note: if you've shot in Drew Park or know owners sitting on parcels there, that's the lived detail this block wants.]

🏗️ COUNCIL GREENLIGHTS 1,150 HOMES ON THE OLD ARMY/NAVY SITE

What happened: Tampa City Council unanimously approved the agreement with PMG Affordable to redevelop four properties between N Tampa Street and E Ashley Drive.

The details: Five phases, 1,150 residential units, roughly $530 million in total project value. The council action itself was an $8.625 million land agreement. At least 568 units go to households at or below 80% of area median income. Another 230 land between 80% and 140% of AMI. Those limits hold for 50 years. The deal adds 150 public parking spots at $7 million to the developer and about 28,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and community space. PMG Affordable is a subsidiary of Property Markets Group, working with the Tampa Housing Authority, Banc of America Community Development Company and DuCon.

Why it matters: 798 income-restricted units locked in for half a century is the largest affordability commitment the city has landed downtown.

My take: The 50-year term is the number that actually matters here, more than the $530 million. Most affordability deals in Florida run 15 or 30 years, which means they expire right as the neighborhood matures and the units convert to market rate. Fifty years means the people moving in are still there when north downtown connects to the Heights. That is a different city than the one this deal would have built at 30 years.

🏙️ ST. PETE PICKS ITS $8.1B GAS PLANT TEAM

What happened: Mayor Ken Welch selected "The Burg Bid" from Blake Investment Partners to redevelop the Historic Gas Plant District.

The details: Roughly 58 acres of the 86-acre district, an estimated $8.1 billion buildout, and a $275 million land offer that came in above the two competing bids. The team is led by St. Pete native Thompson Whitney Blake with Miami's Related Group as co-developer and Elliott Investment Management as capital partner. The plan includes more than 3,600 affordable and workforce units on site and across the city, a permanent home for the Woodson African American Museum of Florida, and the largest new city park St. Pete has built in 119 years.

Why it matters: This is the third attempt in six years. The first two collapsed. An $8.1 billion program in a city of 260,000 changes the entire Pinellas market.

My take: The bid that won is the one without a baseball team attached. That is the lesson from the last two failures. Blake's group is building a neighborhood that pencils on housing, museums and park frontage, not on a stadium anchor that can walk. Meanwhile the Rays are across the bay trying to get Tampa to fund a ballpark. Both sides of the bridge just placed opposite bets on the same question, and we get to watch which one is right.

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🔝 ONE TAMPA TOPS OUT, AND SOMEBODY PAID $40M FOR AN ACRE ON ASHLEY

What happened: ONE Tampa is very close from its structural topping out at 507 N Ashley. Four blocks north at 601 N Ashley, Stock Development is demolishing a century-old office building to make room for a 48-story tower.

The details: ONE Tampa runs 42 stories and 510 feet with 225 condos, more than 400 workers on site daily, and a 2027 completion target. It will be Tampa's tallest residential tower. The 601 N Ashley site is a different animal. Naples-based Stock Development paid TLR Group $40 million in July for one acre, and FAA permits are already reissued for 540 feet across 48 stories with condos and hotel rooms. That would make it the tallest building in Tampa, period. No architectural plans, unit counts or timelines have been filed with the city yet.

Why it matters: Two towers, one street, 1,050 feet of new vertical between them. Ashley Drive is becoming the spine of the skyline.

My take: $40 million an acre is the number to sit with. That is Miami pricing on a Tampa block, paid by a Naples developer who has never built here. The demolition is real and started, which means the capital is committed before the drawings exist. When somebody spends that much on dirt with no filed plan, they are not speculating on Tampa. They already decided. Everybody underwriting downtown land off 2024 comps needs to redo the math.

🚁 33 STORIES TOPPED OUT AND 3,600 APARTMENTS RISING ACROSS ST. PETE

What happened: KAST Construction topped out 3rd & 3rd, a 33-story, 262-unit luxury apartment tower at 235 3rd Street South in downtown St. Pete back in March.

The details: Temporary certificate of occupancy is expected in October or November, with move-ins following. St. Pete Rising's drone imaages document vertical progress on seven major developments totaling roughly 3,600 apartments: affordable communities near Mazzaro's and in the Warehouse Arts District, a Grand Central live-work-play project, Sky Town in the Skyway Marina District, and Amara Bay on Gandy.

Why it matters: 3,600 units delivering into the same 18-month window is real supply, and supply moves rent.

My take: Everybody talks about St. Pete like it is one downtown. That drone footage shows five distinct submarkets going vertical at once, and the Warehouse Arts District and Skyway Marina projects are the ones nobody outside Pinellas is tracking. Those are the neighborhoods where the price gap is still open. If you are looking at Pinellas and only looking at Beach Drive, you are late.

🍔 COOK OUT, A DEFENSE-TECH LANDING, AND A BEATLES MUSEUM

What happened: A run of openings across both counties, plus one closing nobody saw coming.

The details: Cook Out opened its first Tampa Bay location July 17 at 5501 E Fowler Ave in Temple Terrace, in a 3,272-square-foot former Boston Market, with two more Bay locations planned in Carrollwood and St. Pete. Orion Edge, a defense-tech firm building tactical electronic-warfare systems, is taking 8,008 square feet at 5555 W Waters Ave in Westshore, roughly $6 million in capital investment over three years and 25 jobs averaging $120,000. In St. Pete, the Penny Lane Beatles Museum opens August 5 at 146 2nd Street North with 1,600 artifacts including Ringo Starr's drum kit. Atlanta's Rreal Tacos bought the old Red Mesa Cantina building at 128 3rd Street South and plans three concepts there. Lucky Cup is opening a second location inside The Factory in the Warehouse Arts District. On the other side, Rumba Island Bar & Grill closed its 6445 4th Street North location with no warning. Staff showed up to a locked door.

Why it matters: Cook Out and Orion Edge are the same story told two ways. National operators and out-of-state employers are treating Tampa Bay as a market they have to be in, not one they might test.

My take: The Orion Edge number that matters is $120,000 average wage, not the 25 jobs. Westshore has been chasing office tenants while the actual growth is defense and aerospace contractors who want proximity to MacDill and cheap square footage. Twenty-five households at $120K land in South Tampa and Carrollwood, not downtown. And the Cook Out expansion is a tell too. Three locations means they ran the density numbers on the whole Bay, not just USF.

🌴 THIS WEEKEND: BANKSY, NEON WATER SLIDES AND BBQ

The Art of Banksy · Now through August 30 · Straz Center, Morsani Hall stage 160 authenticated works valued at $35 million, staged on the actual Morsani stage. Tickets run $29.99 to $99.99. You enter through the backstage loading bay, which is the most Banksy thing about it.

Penny Lane Beatles Museum opening · Wednesday, August 5 · 146 2nd Street North, St. Pete The only museum in the country dedicated solely to the Beatles. Four times the size of its old Dunedin space.

AquaGlow · Thursday and Friday, August 7-8 · Adventure Island Adventure Island after dark with neon and music. Limited capacity, so it stays walkable.

Bier Fest Brews & BBQ · Saturday and Sunday, August 8-9 · Busch Gardens Craft brews and BBQ, running weekends through August 30.

🗣️ RUMOR ROUNDUP

• Plant City commissioners authorized negotiations with Mosaic Development on a 17-acre Midtown project estimated around $110 million, after years of stalled attempts.

• Cook Out has two more former Boston Market buildings lined up in Carrollwood and St. Pete. No opening dates announced.

• Rreal Tacos says three concepts are coming to the Red Mesa building. No timeline, no names.

• Oldsmar is outlining terms for downtown development, per Pinellas County Economic Development.

• Malio's owners are prepping Moon by Malio's, a coastal seafood spot at 109 8th Avenue in Pass-a-Grille.

Nothing on paper yet on any of it.

Two votes and a demolition permit tell you where this region is going. St. Pete just committed $8.1 billion to a neighborhood without a stadium in it. Tampa is 18 days from deciding whether it wants one. And on Ashley Drive, somebody spent $40 million on an acre without waiting for either answer to come in.

We're all in on Tampa Bay.

See you next week. — Real Tampa Bay

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