IMAGE COURTESY CITY OF DELTONA
IT TAKES A VILLAGE — Above is the planned location for Deltona Village, a BPUD, or business planned unit development on the city’s north side. The long-awaited project is expected to bring more work and play near the Epic Theatres off of Normandy Boulevard. In the distance are the Integra Myst apartments.

An advisory panel has endorsed the plan to create a long-awaited marketplace on Deltona’s north side.

The city’s Planning and Zoning Board March 15 voted to recommend the City Commission approve an ordinance amending the Deltona Village Business Planned Unit Development.

The amendments incorporate additional land and cap the number of apartments that can be built. The City Commission will conduct a public hearing and act on the proposed measure April 3.

The owner and developer of the property is Deltona Retail Holdings LLC, whose president is Frank DeMarsh.

Asked when more earth may be turned for major stores, offices, restaurants and the like, DeMarsh would not say.

The mega-development promises to deliver what Deltonans have long desired: places to shop, work, dine and interact with one another without having to go outside their city limits.

“Everyone wanted commercial, commercial, commercial,” Planning and Zoning Board Member Eric Alexander said.

The BPUD ordinance provides for 26.57 acres to be added to the 140 acres already within the Deltona Village tract. That brings Deltona Village to a total of 166.57 acres, east and southeast of the interchange of Interstate 4 and State Road 472.

The Deltona Village property fronts on Graves Avenue, North Normandy Boulevard and Howland Boulevard. Epic Theatres is now the anchor attraction, but under construction and vying for attention nearby are the Integra Myst apartments. A total of 652 multifamily dwellings will be allowed, up from the 414 originally planned.

As well as serving the people now living in Deltona, the BPUD will be a retail center to attract new settlers, people in neighboring cities and a population in transition, such as those who work at Amazon on North Normandy Boulevard and those who will work at other warehouses or industrial facilities under construction nearby.

“We don’t have a lot of apartments, quality apartments,” Planning Board Member Alexander said. “We’re getting them now.”

Also on the Deltona Village land are a RaceTrac convenience store/gas station and a Burger King. The city planning staff’s report on Deltona Village notes a Starbucks coffee shop may be built close to Burger King.

Deltona Village, as now planned, may have as much as 900,000 square feet of retail commercial space. This entitlement of space would allow big-box stores and shopping centers.

Now, most of the tract is undeveloped, and sometimes livestock graze in the green pastures.

Deltona Village is not to be confused with the multi-business-center vision recently unveiled by Mayor Santiago Avila Jr. Avila has called for the creation of three new retail-commercial districts within Deltona. He labeled one of them One Deltona, to be situated on Deltona Boulevard and similar to One Daytona in Daytona Beach. The other two are known as Uptown and Downtown, and would be at opposite ends of Howland Boulevard.

The Deltona City Commission will conduct a public hearing on the Deltona Village ordinance at 6:30 p.m. Monday, April 3, at Deltona City Hall, 2345 Providence Blvd. The meeting is open to the public.

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