Fort Lauderdale is promoting real estate development downtown and in the northwest area of the city, said Jeremy Earle, deputy director of the department of sustainable development.
“The northwest area of the city is our No. 1 project,” Earle said Friday at a membership meeting of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Realtors.
He spoke as a member of a panel that included the economic development directors of Hollywood and Sunrise.
“Whoever are the first movers are going to get the most city support,” Earle said, referring to developers who launch real estate projects in the area between Sunrise Boulevard and Broward Boulevard east of I-95 to U.S. 1.
Earle also said the area around Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, for example, has good development potential: “We have acres and acres around the airport that we need to develop.”
Among other city goals, “we hope to add 5,000 more residential units in our downtown area,” he said, in addition to about 5,000 built in recent years.
Gus Zambrano, the assistant city manager for sustainable development in Hollywood, said the a surge in beachfront development is likely to spread to the downtown area.
“Our downtown is really going to explode after the beach,” he said. “Our downtown is a very significant area of investment.”