Planning Board - Redevelopment of Radisson by the Marriott & More

Sitting through several hours of this June 16, 2006 experience in capitalistic democracy one could not help but feel that the presenting corporations could have saved us all a lot of time and merely said “We are proposing to build something that starts with the letter ‘A’”. As in a hotel, a condo, a timeshare, a vacation experience, a boat, a car, a spaceship, a mall. As we all have come to know and love, corporate America basically agreed with whatever it was being called in order to get whatever approved.

And of course the planning board, that seemed to show up without a plan, for the most part went along for a ride. With the exception of Mr. Needle’s occasional poignant and insightful comments, nobody – including the attorneys (recall Shakespeare) – could figure out what the heck to call whatever it was that the Marriott was proposing to build.

Intermixed into the nomenclature discussion was the issue of density. The most salient comment of the meeting came from a citizen who stated that there was less density in Manhattan (where he was from) than in Marco Island. It was unclear if density is measured in units per acre, or in people per acre or in 26 keys per acre. Are “keys” in this context the things we use to open doors?

To Mr. Moss’ credit, he expressed concern with the density. Since by this point the seven (read: 7) citizens that showed up were not allowed to speak, all we could do was roll our eyes and wait for the next tax increase to pay for the infrastructure improvements that assuredly will come with more people coming to the island.

On the entertainment side of things, the 175 foot height for the new building is arbitrary. For those 7 residents that care, the height is measured from the flood line to the median height of the roof – which brought the sanguine question “what about if it’s a flat roof?” Oh, by the way, whatever height is decided upon, it can be higher since architectural structures (isn’t the whole building an architectural structure?) and things on the roof (like air conditioners) are not taken into consideration when measuring the height. Now, city planners, this may be hard to fanthom, but if you leave the reg like this, our friends at the Marriott can sell space on their roof to put up a freaking cell tower of any height, or one of those docking stations used by zeppelins.

Summary: Corporate America will get what it wants, it can call it what it wants, more people will crowd our city and the rest of us will pay for the infrastructure to support the new … what is it?