Over the past few decades, Boca Raton -- because of FAU's growth and the city's location, securely known as "really far away from busy Miami" -- has filled with college kids and lots of old folks. But much of the city is still quaint and quiet and small.
That's about to get upgraded.
The City Council has approved 2,046 residential units to be built downtown. Some have rooms that are 522 square feet, according to the Sun Sentinel, which is the size of many premium hotel rooms.
Not all of the units are close to being ready or even being built, necessarily, but many are.
The Sentinel reported that three projects in particular are closer than others:
Camden Boca Raton (located at 131 S. Federal Highway, with 261 units) is only a few weeks from leasing. Heavy equipment has arrived at Via Mizner (located on 300 S. Federal Highway), a 434-unit complex whose height will be the highest allowed in the city -- 140 feet. And this week, $75 million in financing came in for 229 units located at 30 SE Seventh St. that are under construction.
Other units have had trouble getting off the ground. Applications for the permits to build 378 units on Palmetto Park Road have still not been made despite its being more than two years since the City Council gave its thumbs-up, according to the Sentinel.
The slowly developing nature of the project, though, has its benefits.
"The development is going to cause particular difficulty because of the way in which the traffic patterns are," local resident and economist Ann Witte told the Sentinel. "I think it would be far better... to see how these first two projects rent out before we add more of the same kind of units to the market."
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