It’s getting so that the City of North Miami Beach has become the Rodney Dangerfield of municipalities in Miami-Dade County. We get no respect.
Not that we’ve done anything in the past thirty or forty years to deserve any, but a little common courtesy would be nice. As one reader wrote to me, “just about every business opened over the last five years in our city, from auto dealers, to day care centers to cafeterias and window treatment stores have the word “Aventura” as their first name.”
Now that you mention it, what’s up with that?
He went on to say, “I start to think that maybe there is some conspiracy to eliminate our city’s current name from people’s vocabulary. And the more I think about it, given our current trend, I wonder: Is that really such a bad thing?”
Hmmm. Now that you mention it…
The truth is, North Miami Beach is sandwiched in between truly progressive cities – Aventura to the north, Sunny Isles Beach to the East, and even North Miami (crooked mayor and all!) to the South. I want to say “compared to those cities…,” but there really is no is no comparison. All three of them, even North Miami, have made drastic improvements to their infrastructures and business environments, and have literally placed themselves on the proverbial map.
North Miami Beach, on the other hand, seems to have gone backwards instead of forward – that’s how little progress we’ve made. For the seventeen years that Jeff Mishcon occupied the mayor’s seat, the only noticeable improvement made was the construction of Mischon Park. (Notice? Same name?) Other than a ball field, absolutely no new development or progress was made in our city. Even the Publix that was on on Northeast 15th Avenue (next door to Mischon Park) relocated to greener pastures as soon as its lease was up. Sooner, actually. Publix became the flagship store for the then brand new Shoppes of Skylake, a block outside our city limits, and never looked back.
Now, I don’t have anything against parks. Two of my kids played baseball and I was the president of the NMB Little League for a few years, so I know that parks are very, very important. The thing is, cities can only build parks if they have the money, and they can only get the money by luring businesses into town and enticing home buyers to plant their roots in our soil. The exact opposite is happening here in North Miami Beach. While former mayor Mishcon thought he was doing a great thing by building a ball park for the kids of NMB, he gave little thought, if any, to helping bring our city into the 20th century, never mind the 21st. Instead of having any vision for our future at all, he simply built a vanity park to honor his own name. If anything, the city could have used all that money and rebuilt Allen Park, Uleta Park or even Taylor Park. Allen and Uleta are in horrendous condition and Taylor is unusable. Definitely poor planning.
Businesses have been fleeing North Miami Beach at lightening speed. Remember Honey Baked Ham? Gone. Remember Macaroni Grill? Gone. South of the Border? Gone. Corky’s? Gone. Mr. Donut? Gone, gone and GONE!
Jeff Mishcon was known to say, “If you don’t build it, they won’t come.” Well, he was sure right about that.
His successor, former Mayor Ray Marin, attempted to bring development to North Miami Beach. He held charrettes on Smart Growth and commissioned the Glatting Jackson firm to prepare an incredible urban growth plan that pretty much every resident thought was awesome. What happened to that? No one seems to know.
A vacant lot now sits where the now infamous 24 story Marina Grande project was supposed to be built, but was halted by a lawsuit filed by a citizens group, which court action scared off three other projects that were waiting in the wings. Then the economy and building industry took a massive hit, and all construction everywhere stopped in its tracks, not just North Miami Beach. There was much controversy about the height and density of the original Marina Grande plans, and from what I understand the developer (or his successor – I’m not entirely clear on that) is still trying to get something built. Obviously height will still be an issue, so I’m hoping saner minds will prevail if anything ever does get developed on that lot.
Needless to say, North Miami Beach is at a major crossroads. Our city sits in what should be a prime location in northeast Miami-Dade County. A main exit off I-95 is at our western boundary, which would bring tons of visitors right to our doorstep. If only they weren’t just passing through on their way to Aventura Mall or Sunny Isles Beach. Our eastern boundary is right on the Intracoastal Waterway, which is a hop, skip and jump to the beach. (More on that beach thing in a minute.) With Aventura to the north, Sunny Isles Beach to the east, and North Miami to the south, our city is just begging to be Now More Beautiful. Unfortunately, today NMB stands for No More Business.
Our Main Street Corridor, which is unfortunately shared with Miami-Dade County, is victim of an epidemic of vacant stores and is a drive through one of the ugliest, most congested thoroughfares in the county. You’ll literally drive through a hell that includes monster clouds of smoke emanating from an outdoor-illegal-in-NMB-but-located-on-
The current council and mayor have their hands full dealing with the wreckage of past councils, as well as the horrific economy. While there are projects in the works, progress will remain slow until the city’s fiscal problems have been resolved. And, boy are there problems! But, that’s for another column.
What started this rant (you knew I’d get to it, right?) is that I came across an advertisement in the Biscayne Times for Denise Rubin Group, a real estate agency, which features four properties for sale. Two of them are in Aventura and the other two are in Eastern Shores of Sunny Isles Beach. WHAT???
When did Eastern Shores secede from NMB and annex itself to Sunny Isles Beach? Yeah, that’s right. It hasn’t. Not yet, anyway. Although I probably wouldn’t blame them if they did. (But class envy is a whole other topic.)
Hey! If you want to play Fun with Realtors, why don’t you give Denise Rubin a call and ask her where in Sunny Isles Beach that Eastern Shores house is located? I’m just saying.
In case you didn’t know it, unlike Denise Rubin, Realtor, Eastern Shores is still located in North Miami Beach.
Then again, we’re called North Miami BEACH and we don’t have a beach, so no wonder everyone’s confused. You can thank some previous administration (even before Mishcon) for selling our beachfront property for what I’m told was a song, to what is now known as Sunny Isles Beach. So, yeah, we did have the word “Beach” in our name for a reason. But that’s ancient history.
Almost as ancient as the present city known as North Miami Beach. Which is CONSTANTLY getting confused with North Miami by outsiders who have no clue that we are two separate municipalities. Considering the crap going on in North Miami now, that’s the last place we need to be associated with! Therefore, in order to clarify things for realtors like Denise Rubin, I propose to the North Miami Beach City Council that we change our name and put ourselves on the map!
In fact, let’s have a Rename Our City Contest. Post all your suggestions and let’s see if we can come up with a great name. One that stands out from the crowd. One that will distinguish us from all our neighbors. Get creative and then we can start a petition to let our city leaders know that we’re tired of being the Rodney Dangerfield of Miami-Dade County. Here’s one for starters: Chopped Liver!
Stephanie Kienzle
“Spreading the Wealth”
Great article Steph. NMB is still living in the early 80’s. And I say early 80’s because right after Pembroke Pines was built, we saw the mass exodus of residents to the West, and the steady decline of this once thriving City.
In regards to the current Council, I feel they are from the same mold of previous Councils.
An example is last week’s Council meeting where they took over 2 hours on a Resolution which already had a previous First Reading, Workshop, and Commitee meeting in which everything was finalized. So what happens when the resolution comes up for final reading. It gets “tabled” for another meeting. That is why nothing ever gets acomplished, there are more and more vacant lots, and you have less and less participation from the residents who really care about their City.
How about Fulford? It’s short, simple, historic and pertinent. No need to re-invent the wheel here. Although my spell-check wanted to change it to “fluffed”
Steph, you neglected to recognize the redevelopment of the Biscayne Blvd corridor through our City. It is a much more appealing landscape than the old run down stretch of road, filled with dilapidated motels, vacant land and campground. If only the City took the same steps to beautify the 163 St / NMB Blvd corridor, things might start looking up. NE 19th Ave should be re-developed into a “Main Street” full of shops and cafes. Forget Hanford Blvd, that was a joke of a project and waste of money.
As for giving away the Sunny Isles area once a part of our city, there was sinister politics at play in that move. Little did they know what the future held at the time.
I don’t think they should allow businesses to be named “Aventura” anything in our city, but I don’t know if that can be blocked by a resolution or ordinance.
As for our city’s name, how about North Miami Beachless?
🙂
PH
Yes, you are correct about Biscayne Boulevard for the most part. I do feel that we need more to be done, though, and Biscayne Boulevard isn’t really the “heart” of our city. We also desperately need a hotel! I’ve been saying that for years. I would LOVE to see a five star hotel in NMB, although I have very little hope that one would be built here. Why would a first class hotel bother to plant itself in our midst? Just saying.
I also agree that 19th Avenue would have been PERFECT as a main street. It is, after all, THE main street (aside from 163rd/NMB Boulevard). Hanford turned out to be a bust, but honestly, I am not even sure why they thought that street would be able to pass as a main street. It’s way off the beaten track, and has nowhere near the traffic of 19th Avenue.
I’m not sure if there could be a resolution banning the name “Aventura” from new businesses, but I certainly would like to see one passed!
As for renaming our city, Snarky Steph came up with “Aventura Shores.” If for nothing else than to just horrify the snooty peeps who run that city. Imagine their collective cringe! 🙂
Chopped Liver is good. But I’d propose Puréed Pâté. That would surely make the Ritz-Carlton stand up and take notice!
Here are some things that I have seen. I agree with everyone that Hansford BLVD was a waste of money. I remember when they were working on it. I said to myself, why are they wasting all of this money on a side street with very little traffic and NO appealing businesses. I remember the pitch…The downtown of NMB where it would attract nightlife. Nightlife? From where? No movie theater. NO entertainment. A potpourri of mismatched buildings. Apartment buildings, a church, a law office, out of business abandoned buildings (Winn-Dixie), an AT&T center and parking lot, an office building, a post office, an abandoned gym, the rear parking lot of vehicle repair shop, and a Walgreens, just to name a few. What were they thinking when they planned it? It should have been 163rd St. The main artery through the city where we would have gotten the most exposure.
The other thing is, look at how much money was poured into beautifying Eastern Shores (Sunny Isles Beach sub-city, lol). Why does the rest of the city get ignored? Sure, there were some “beautification” projects here and there, but nothing compares to how Eastern Shores looks. Eastern Shores got the “eye candy” treatment. The rest of the city gets some sidewalks, skinny palms, and paved alleys. Paved alleys? Who sees that?
As for businesses wanting to jump on the Aventura train, I don’t blame them. This city was well on its way to get wet by the Aventura wave, but because of a select few, who had their own agenda, those big projects never materialized. Result? More abandoned buildings and empty lots and businesses that don’t want to start up here because they don’t want to deal with fighting those select few.
There is a real city with real people and real pride that live west of Biscayne Blvd. I’d hate to think like this, but sometimes I feel like there is a sinister plan to devalue the properties west of Biscayne Blvd, so that sleazy investors can buy them real cheap and sell them at a high price to whomever pays the highest price. There are people (you know who they are), that are pulling the threads of the beautiful tapestry that was once called North Miami Beach, and leaving nothing but a pile of threads on the floor. Don’t let these people destroy OUR CITY!!!!!!
Rippys Inc is leaving NMB after having done business in NMB under Rippys Italian Market, Rippys Sub Shop and today as Pauls Sub Shop for 54 years. The New Rippys will be on the south side of 167st and ne 4th ave in Unincorporated Dade. Rippys Inc. was litterally driven out of NMB by the NMB Planning & Zoning Office Chief and NMB Code Office persecution. Rippys Inc. tried for years to expand their business and was blocked time and again by the P&Z office. Both of the buildings on the corner of 167 st and NM Ave were sold to buy the building at ne 4th ave and 167 in Uninc Dade. Many other businesses want out of NMB as they find they are not wanted in NMB by the powers that be. As the businesses move out the P&Z office will roll out the red carpet for more massage parlors to take their place.Grand places for our Children to get after school and summer jobs one would think as the NMB P&Z Chief seems to love them.
Stephanie, rumor has it that Biscayne Gardens wants NMB to take them over and annex… They were told by the county to either incorporate and become their own city or annex. According to credible sources, they want NMB to take over( annex) due to our stellar Public and Police services. Biscayne Gardens is a large area with great tax base…. See what you can dig up, thxs.
Wow! I haven’t heard that one at all. If your source is credible, I personally think this is good news. Biscayne Gardens is a great area with nice homes and is in an excellent location. To my knowledge, there is almost no commercial property, though, but the residential lots are huge and are probably a good source of tax revenue. I’m also pretty sure the crime rate is low, but I don’t know exact statistics. I will definitely try to dig up some more information. Thanks for the tip!