For decades, the Festival Marketplace flea market stood at the junction of Sample Road and Florida's Turnpike in north Broward, a 390,000-sq.-ft. bazaar with hundreds of vendors offering discount perfume, electronics, dried papaya, shoes and thousands of other items. Kids with report cards in hand trekked to the arcade to trade good grades for tokens to play Skee-ball. VisitFlorida promoted the landmark as a place to shop.
Then, last year, the owner, North Miami Beach-based IMC Equity Group, sold the 25-acre site. IMC CEO Yoram Izhak told the South Florida Sun Sentinel that flea markets don't work anymore. "It's a dying business."
A thriving industry will take its place. Developers Orlando-based Foundry Commercial and Greenwich, Conn.-based Wheelock Street Capital broke ground in February on Festival Logistics Park, a three-building, 485,000-sq.-ft. industrial space. Completion is expected in the fourth quarter.
Ted Elam, principal at Foundry Commercial, says the site offers an "exceptional location and access to labor."
Stream Realty Partners is handling leasing. Plans call for buildings with 32- to 36-foot heights and flexible configurations for logistics, distribution and light manufacturing. "Festival Logistics Park is more than a new industrial development — it's a continued legacy," says a Stream managing director and executive vice president, Nick Wigoda. — By Mike Vogel