THURSDAY
September 19, 2019
Mathis Report: SoFi moving quickly on Jacksonville office PAGE 3
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Daily Record JACKSONVILLE
SALVAGING
Eco Relics is JACKSONVILLE harvesting pieces of the Downtown landmark before it is demolished.
Downtown parking garage goes to VyStar
Daily Record
THE LANDING
DIA terminates lease with Barnett Tower LLC.
Daily Record Daily Record JACKSONVILLE
BY KATIE GARWOOD STAFF WRITER
The Eco Relics team
JACKSONVILLE removes the bar top from Hooters restaurant at The Jacksonville Landing in August.
Special to the Daily Record
BY MIKE MENDENHALL STAFF WRITER
E
co Relics founders and owners Annie and Michael Murphy had three days worth of picking in The Jacksonville Landing, but the memorabilia salvaged from the shuttered Downtown shopping mall, headed for demolition, already are best-sellers at their Rail Yard District warehouse. A door marked “River Room Music and Banquet” from second-floor bar Deep Blue sold and is headed with a buyer to Georgia. As soon as the Murphys heard the city would demolish the riverfront shopping center and hired a wrecking contractor, Annie
picked up the phone. “I made a lot of phone calls. It turns out the demolition company heard about us from one of our customers. They said we are ‘a cool company,’” she said. The Murphys founded the Eco Relics architectural salvage business in March 2014. At their 50,000-square-foot former railroad freight depot at 106 Stockton St., the Murphys reclaim wood and keep old doors, light fixtures, cabinets, tools and memorabilia from the landfill. Eco Relics now is taking its picking skills to the 32-year-old Landing, the fenced-off riverfront shopping center at 2 Independent Drive W. SEE ECO RELICS, PAGE 8
Photo by Mike Mendenhall
From left, Eco Relics owners Michael and Annie Murphy and manager John Cooper with light fixtures salvaged from The Jacksonville Landing.
The Downtown Investment Authority voted Wednesday to partially terminate a lease agreement between Barnett Tower LLC and the city to construct a parking garage at the southwest corner of Main and Forsyth streets. VyStar Credit Union will instead purchase the property for $943,403 to construct the garage. As part of the terms of the agreement, it will construct at least 550 spaces, and lease up to 250 of those spaces to the city for tenants in the Barnett Building and Laura Street Trio. Until the Laura Street Trio is complete, VyStar will lease up to 125 spaces to the city. The redevelopment agreement between Barnett Tower LLC and the city stated that the Barnett Building and parking garage must be “substantially completed” within three months of each other. The Barnett’s substantial completion deadline was Sept. 13. On Wednesday, developer SouthEast Development Group announced the city issued a certificate of occupancy for The Barnett Building at 112 W. Adams St. The certificate allows for marketing of the remaining apartments and retail space. Work on the remaining commercial and retail spaces will continue through the first quarter of 2020. The 107 apartment units began leasing in April, and half are rented. SouthEast Development Group now will shift toward the group’s second phase of the project – the Laura Street Trio.
KGARWOOD@ JAXDAILYRECORD.COM (904) 356-2466
MY VIEW
How shopping malls can fill those big, empty spaces Donn Carr managed The Avenues for 13 years. PAGE 5 VOLUME 106, NO. 215 • TWO SECTIONS