TAMPA, Fla. — The University Mall off East Fowler Avenue is turning into a mixed-use development neighborhood.
Christopher Bowen, Chief Development Strategist for RD Management, manages the redevelopment project.
The development includes retail, entertainment, hospitality, education, medical, office space and residential units.
The property is located off East Fowler Avenue and easily accessible by highways I-275 and I-75. It's also located near the University of South Florida.
The mixed-use urban neighborhood is called "Rithm."
"Rithm stands for research, innovation, technology, habitat, and medicine, so those are five really key fibers that rub through our community that we want to take a hold of," said Bowen.
The Rithm campus includes Sprouts Farmers Market, which opened about 1.5 years ago. Burlington will move closer to Fowler Avenue, and a health/wellness center, which has not been announced yet, will go next door.
The project also includes Hub Tampa, a off-campus student housing development, which is open and available to renters. A second phase is also planned with additional housing units.
"This was one use, retail, and now we have pages and pages of uses. We have hotels, conference centers, research labs, medical buildings, movie studios, tech centers, data centers, you name it. We've got the zoning to do all of that, but in a neighborhood that is connected and works together," said Bowen.
In December 2014, Bowen said the project first started when RD Management acquired its first part of the mall, the JC Penny site.
Bowen explained it takes years to acquire ownership of an old mall.
"There were no guarantees. We had no special rights in buying the pieces of this mall and putting them back together and this was the sort of risky, dangerous part of it. There were no guarantees that we could own all of it someday," said Bowen.
Bowen said the multi-billion dollar project is expected to be completed in the next decade.
"I felt like it was really strong-arm robbery."
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