Destination St. Pete Pier is top choice in survey

ST. PETERSBURG - Destination St. Pete Pier, the project created by local architects and designers, was he clear winner in the two-week public survey ranking the seven finaproposals to replace The Pier landmark.

The St. Pete Design Groups proposal collected 10,751 votes, 6,306 of which have been verified as city residents, in the voting that ended at midnight Friday.

The Pier Park, by Rogers Partners Architects, finished second with 6,811 votes, 3,999 verfied, and Blue Pier, by W-Architecture and Landscape Architecture, was third with 4,728 votes, 2,700 verified.

In all, 16,797 people participated in the survey, with 9,631 verified city residents over the age of 18.

The results, available online at newstpetepier.com, will be used by the Pier Selection Committee, among other things, to rank the top three proposals to refer to Mayor Rick Kriseman and then to the City Council.

Kriseman is expected to make a final recommendation to the City Council to consider at its meeting April 2. Contracts are expected to be finalized in May or June, and Kriseman has said a new pier should be up and running in 2017.

In a written statement, Kriseman thanked those who participated The key to this process has always been transparency, and that is why it was important to take the pulse of the community and hear their voice, the statement said.

The city has budgeted $33 million for the project, and another $13 million to demolish and repair the pier approach that dates to the original Million Dollar Pier in 1926.

The St. Pete Design Group includes Yann Weymouth, whose work includes the Dali Museum and the renovation and expansion of the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, Wannemacher Jensen, and architects from Harvard Jolly, founded William B. Harvard who designed the original pyramid more than four decades ago.

The other finalists are: ALMA, by Alfonso Architects; Discover Bay Life, by VOA; rePier, by Ross Barney Architects; and Prospect Pier, by FR-EE, with Civitas and Mesh.

Here is the original post:
Destination St. Pete Pier is top choice in survey