Tampa hockey team owner plugs hole in project site

A company co-owned by Jeff Vinik, owner of the Tampa Bay Lightning hockey team, acquired additional land in downtown Tampa where it plans to build a 40-acre, multi-use waterfront development.

Vinik’s company, Strategic Property Partners (SSP), bought a 0.26-acre parking lot on Channelside Drive adjacent to a parcel SSP already owned.

“The acquisition of this centrally located parcel within our project area,” Jim Shimberg, executive vice president and general counsel of SPP, said in a written statement.

Shimberg also said the 0.26-acre parcel allows SSP  to create a contiguous retail street frontage along Channelside Drive in Tampa, “which is key to achieving the active streetscape that we desire.”

SSP, owned by Vinik and Cascade Investment, plans to redevelop the parking lot as a retail property. But the parcel will remain a parking lot until SSP builds a $2 billion development in a pedestrian waterfront setting with six million square feet of offices, residences, retail stores and hotel rooms.  [Tampa Bay Times]  — Mike Seemuth