Lake Martin News

from Lake Magazine August 2023

Stay safe in the heat

“It will work,” Fuller said. “This year not getting to have it, I think a lot of people have asked them about doing this.”

~ Cliff Williams

Publix to break ground this month in Alexander City

Officially named The Gateway at Lake Martin, the new shopping center at the intersection of the U.S. Route 280 and Highway 63, will feature a Publix supermarket as an anchoring retailer.

The 46,000 square-foot store will include a grocery store, pharmacy and deli.

River Fest may return next year

For two years the Tallapoosa River Fest attracted kayakers to view the Cahaba lilies on the river.

Tallapoosa County Tourism created the event to bring visitors and their tax dollars to the area. The event outgrew its location at Kylee Cooper Farms, and logistics saw the event not come together last year. But Tallapoosa County Tourism Director Sandra Fuller and New Site Mayor Phil Blasingame are hopeful for the future of the event.

“We want to add a festival feel to it with vendors, food trucks, live music, just a larger type of festival for New Site,” Fuller said.

Blasingame sees the possibility of River Fest coming to New Site as a positive. He envisions kayakers spending the day in town eating and more.

“We think it could be built into an extremely nice project for our community because the river is so valuable,” Blasingame said. “You could go a lot of different directions with that. You could do a trade day. You could have people sing, have a cook out. There are all sorts of avenues to spin off on that.”

New Site offers opportunities to grow River Fest, according to Fuller. She said the festival has maxed out at about 150 paddlers.

“There are places there in town we could easily add 50 more the first year,” Fuller said.

Ideally the festival needs to be held between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, the prime season for Cahaba lilies on the river. Fuller and Blasingame want to look at New Site and beyond for potential partners.

“We are trying to establish whether the fire department uses it as a fundraiser or maybe school clubs get involved,” Blasingame said. “Let’s see who we can pull together there in the center of town.”

There are still things to work out. Blasingame said the town wants to make sure it knows what it is getting into.

Two meetings have already occurred between Fuller and New Site officials to begin the process of bringing River Fest to New Site but more are in the works.

Evan Conder with Venture South Investments also confirmed a Starbucks and a Barberitos Mexican Grill among the shopping center’s dining options.

Other retailers set to join the shopping center include a national specialty discount store, a footwear retailer, a national wireless company and a nail salon.

These afore-mentioned companies will announce new store locations within the shopping center in the coming weeks, Conder said.

The shopping center will comprise 93,000 square feet in total with a cost of $35 million.

Conder said he looked forward to breaking ground on the development during the first or second week of August.

~ William Marlow

McDaniels leave legacy at Lakeside

The McDaniel family has retired from Lakeside Marina –passing the torch to Josh Russom and Andrew Campbell of Momentum Marine.

The previous owner, Donnie McDaniel, died of heart failure on Dec. 5, 2022. Survived by his brother Buddy McDaniel, the two had discussed selling the marina earlier that year.

Buddy said he believes the new owners can take Lakeside to new horizons with the foundation Donnie had built up for the past 20 years.

According to Buddy, Donnie took the marina from barely on the map to one of the top single-owned, small business marinas in the county.

“It was an enjoyable time of servicing people and also having the No. 1 line of pontoon boats in the county, Bennington,” he said.

With Donnie’s legacy at Lakeside, Buddy said he first got into the marina business with his brother about six years ago. Currently he is the owner of Lakeside Marina at Bay Pine, which he will continue to manage and run.

shoreline with at least 100 feet of shoreline each.

Robinette said the potential development would be under the Amadeus umbrella but meet many of the requirements of Russell Lands developments.

“We can’t just turn around and sell it,” Robinette said. “We have to be involved. It will be pretty much like a Russell Lands’ development because we are using their covenants, restrictions and restrictions on docks not being covered.”

Robinette said just land sales in the development are not allowed. Instead, potential home buyers would select a home model and lot with the home built by Lake Martin Signature Construction, also affiliated with Amadeus. The construction company is already an approved builder for Russell Lands developments.

“It will be a very nice community,” Robinette said. “It will be something that hasn’t been done on this end of the lake.”

SpringHouse wins Best of Bama award

Alabama Magazine named SpringHouse at Russell Crossroads as the state’s best fine dining destination in their 2023 Best of Bama awards. Visit https://www.russelllands.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/ best-of-bama-2023.pdf for the complete list.

As the new owners of Lakeside take over, the marina will continue to sell Bennington, Centurion, Robalo, Monterey and Starcraft deck boats.

~ Abigail Murphy

New lakefront neighborhood in the works in Alexander City

Amadeus Development Group is close to closing a real estate deal with Russell Lands to develop a lakefront property within the city limits of Alexander City.

Amadeus’ David Robinette and Russell Lands’ Steve Arnberg said the potential new neighborhood is between Coven Abbett Road and Elkahatchee Creek.

Robinette said the development, potentially to be named “The Pines,” is approximately 440 acres with about 150 lakefront homesites along more than 4 miles of Lake Martin

Robinette said it is a master planned development with a clubhouse, pool, dog park, walking trails, golf cart accessibility, community docks and a community boat ramp.

“The interior lots will have access to the water, but not necessarily a deeded slip,” Robinette said. “They will have docks to use for the day.”

~ Staff Reports

Arnberg said Russell Lands is comfortable with Amadeus and its partners having worked together for years on various projects around Lake Martin.

“These are folks we have long-term relationships and knowledge of,” Arnberg said. “They know how we think. We know how they think, and we are comfortable with each other.”

Robinette said Amadeus is proud to be working with Russell Lands.

“It is an honor to be able to purchase a piece of land and do something this large,” Robinette said. “It is an honor they put their trust in us with something of this magnitude.”

~ Cliff Williams

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