Developers eye Wagon Wheel flea market land

Tonight at 10, we all know of the iconic Wagon Wheel Flea Market building that's on Park Boulevard. It continues to sit empty, though, after being closed during the pandemic. Well, there are some new plans in the works to bring it back to life in some fashion. Fox 13's Jennifer Vagelis is in our newsroom tonight with more on this. Hi there, Jennifer. So what is the vision for the Wagon Wheel space? Yeah, Mark, so this is a massive property, 156 acres, and it's right in the heart of unincorporated Pinellas County. But the Bel Air Development Group wants to annex it into the city of Pinellas Park and eventually redevelop it. Now, the Wagon Wheel Flea Market was an iconic destination for more than 55 years, where you could find and pick up fresh fruits and vegetables. close or even enjoy some live music and dancing. Well, the COVID pandemic temporarily closed it in March 2020, but the owners called it quits and closed the market by the end of June that year. Now, the Bel Air Development Group, which owns a number of commercial properties in Pinellas Park, recently went under contract to purchase the site. Now, their vision isn't quite clear yet, but the developer promises it won't be a data center, rather possibly apartments and commercial space. But again, nothing is confirmed. Well it's not very often you get a hundred plus acres in the middle of Pinellas County that's undeveloped so we're trying to carefully look at each step and each opportunity and each And each, um... really possibility with the property so yeah I mean there's there's a lot of things that we could go a lot of different directions that we could go and with the property but right now we're looking at what's the best fit for this area of the county. There are still a number of steps before anything can move forward. The developer has submitted a permit application to the Southwest Florida Water Management District for a wetlands delineation. Now, traffic studies will also help determine what infrastructure improvements may be needed to support future development. Now, this developer says annexing the property into the city of Pinellas Park would help streamline the permitting process for them. But the city tells me it is still waiting on more paperwork from the developer, so it won't go before the Planning and Zoning Committee until early next year. Mark. All right, Jennifer Vagelis in our newsroom. Jennifer, thanks much.