MAIMI | Miami Cultural Center (101 West Flagler Street) | FT | FLOORS (2+ towers)

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County wants to turn downtown Miami cultural center into mixed-use high-rises

Miami-Dade County is exploring the possibility of putting up privately-leased high-rise towers atop both the region’s most significant history museum and its central library.

In a presentation to construction executives, bankers, attorneys and others involved in crafting so-called public-private partnerships with local government, the county’s director of cultural affairs unveiled the proposal to turn the home of both HistoryMiami’s and Miami-Dade’s central library into a large mixed-use development.

The county would seek to ensure any new towers have enough room to host the existing cultural facilities, which sit on an architecturally renowned plaza finished in 1983. A priority for the county is that any new development improves pedestrian access to the current cultural sites, which sit raised two stories from street level.

“This segment of downtown is about to be activated with All Aboard Florida,” said Michael Spring, county cultural affairs director, of the rationale for pursuing a development there, noting any new square footage would be prime space for office or civic uses. Spring said a team was looking at options for executing a project, some of which would include demolishing part of the existing complex.

The idea for creating a high-rise development was one of the standouts shopped by Miami-Dade municipal executives at the beginning of a two-day “P3 Pipeline” conference organized by the P3 Institute in North Miami. The South Florida Business Journal is a sponsor of the event.

County and city executives will expound on proposals where government is looking to private developers in order to execute infrastructure deals. A packet handed out at the beginning of the conference spelled out some other potential projects already identified by county bureaucrats.

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