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| Senior Living Facility, Avalon Park, Orlando, FL |
ORLANDO, FL --- When the first homeowners moved into Avalon
Park in 1999, developer Beat Kähli and his staff wanted to establish the
emerging neighborhood as one of Central Florida’s first neotraditional
communities when “neotraditional” was the “next big thing” in community
development and almost no one knew exactly what it meant.
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| Beat Kahli |
Today, Avalon Park is a mature community of 13,000 residents
in neatly-tucked neighborhoods and Downtown Avalon Park, with six local
schools, four banks, 15 restaurants, a YMCA community center and 16 miles of
bike and hiking trails linking neighborhoods with retail and recreational
facilities.
Disney’s Celebration claimed title as the area’s first
neotraditional community, but two books and dozens of trendy news articles
focused on apparent inconsistencies in the Osceola County community and muddied
the “neotraditional” water.
Coined by Andrés Duany, the architect and urban planner
who founded the Congress for the New Urbanism and designed Seaside in the
Florida panhandle, “neotraditional” hoped to make a better world by combining
traditional community values with efficient urban-style planning and design.
The idea was to create a self-contained community with
multiple residential options served by commercial, recreational and educational
choices that are easily accessible. Ideally, residents could live, work, learn
and play without ever leaving the safety and comfort of their community.
Walking and bicycling paths were a critical element.
Ideally, a resident could do almost everything---shopping, dining, doctor’s
visits, school, church, workouts at the gym---without ever cranking the family
car.
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| Andres Duany |
“Today I feel we have achieved all those goals,” Kähli said
recently. “What we have now is different in some ways from our original concept
because we have responded to the market.
"Home buyers told us what kinds of
homes they wanted, what kinds of neighborhoods,” Kähli said.
Duany had played a major role imagining the predecessor of
Avalon Park in the 1980s, but when Kähli took over the project in the
mid-1990s, he went Duany one better.
Almost immediately he carved off more than 7,000 acres from
the original site plan and engineered a series of transactions that created a
publicly-owned conservation area along the pristine Econlockhatchee River at
bargain prices.
Today, Avalon Park is considerably smaller than its first
developers imagined a generation ago, but under Kähli’s guidance, the community
now serves as many residents as the City of Longwood with even more
services---schools, shopping and the like---and a fraction of the taxes.
There’s more to come---the opening of a new Senior Living
Facility in the coming weeks, a new round of apartment construction to serve
senior citizens, a new parking garage in Downtown Avalon Park.
Through all the changes Kähli’s initial vision has
persevered. Today, Avalon Park lives up
to its reputation as a community where residents can “live, learn, work, and
play” without ever leaving the community.
For a complete copy
of the company’s news release, please contact:
Larry Vershel or Beth Payan, Larry Vershel Communications
407-644-4142 lvershelco@aol.com
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