By Logan MacDonald, Action News Jax | March 06, 2025 at 4:56 pm EST

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Jacksonville’s Eastside – one of the city’s most historic areas – is now looking to stay in step with the future vision of a new and improved downtown Jacksonville.

City officials and community members gathered Thursday to unveil the new and improved Union Terminal Warehouse.

First built in 1913, the building served as the largest industrial building in Jacksonville for decades.

Now, it’s a 330,000 square foot mixed use development, with apartments, office and restaurant space, and a grand rooftop view of downtown and the stadium district.

“There’s not been substantial investment in the Eastside for almost six decades,” Suzanne Pickett, President and CEO of the Historic East Side CDC, said. “So this is a substantial investment, and just a catalyst for continuing investment and our work in revitalization in the Eastside.”

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Source: Action News Jax

By Will Brown | Published on March 6, 2025 at 6:01 pm

After years of work, the 112-year-old Union Terminal Warehouse on the Eastside has been reborn as a mixed-use facility offering business space, mixed-income housing and — more broadly — hope for other historic buildings in Jacksonville.

The project was celebrated with a ribbon-cutting Thursday where its Atlanta-based developers said the success was possible only because of communication with partners and connection with community leaders

Seven years after Columbia Ventures acquired the building, the Union Terminal Warehouse has been redeveloped as a place where Vantage Point Coffee Co. and other local businesses can operate as well as 228 residential units. The project welcomed is first tenants March 1.

“These deals don’t get financed without great partners,” said Columbia Ventures Development Manager Ryan Akin. He credited the Downtown Preservation and Revitalization Program through the Downtown Investment Authority, the city of Jacksonville and a supportive lender.

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Source: Jax Today

David Bauerlein | Jacksonville Florida Times-Union

The big red water tank standing on top of the Union Terminal Warehouse that thousands of motorists drive past on their way into downtown is among the features an Atlanta-based developer kept intact while turning the century-old warehouse into an apartment building.

In the building’s heyday as a warehouse, the tank held 50,000 gallons of water connected to a sprinkler system that run throughout the building where dozens of metal-plated doors also were ready to swing shut to keep any fire from spreading.

Built in 1913, the warehouse opened when memories were still fresh of the Great Fire of 1901 that destroyed much of Jacksonville.

“All of that was a signal to prospective tenants and users of the building — the city burned down but your stuff ain’t going to burn down here,” said Ryan Akin, development manager and partner at Atlanta-based Columbia Ventures.

These days, the message behind the water tank and other historic features preserved in the building is its connection to the Eastside neighborhood.

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Source: Jacksonville Florida Times Union