By Coral Gables Gazette staff
The future of one of Coral Gables’ most distinctive green spaces—and the mature trees that define it—will come into sharp focus next week, when a Special Master reviews an appeal challenging the city’s approval of a redevelopment at 110 Phoenetia Avenue.
At issue is a project that would replace the Garden of Our Lord, a rare biblical garden created in 1951, along with more than 100 mature trees, including a large live oak preservation advocates say predates the city itself. The hearing, scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 13, at 2 p.m. in the municipal building located at 427 Biltmore Way, will determine whether the Coral Gables Board of Architects properly applied city code when it approved the redevelopment in October 2023.
The appeal was filed by Coral Gables resident Bonnie Bolton, who contends the approval failed to enforce full-time green space requirements and adequately account for the site’s design and environmental impact.
A hearing that narrows years of conflict to a single question
For years, the Phoenetia Avenue site—home to St. James Evangelical Lutheran Church and its garden—has been at the center of a heated debate over growth, preservation, and neighborhood character. Residents and preservation advocates have repeatedly warned that redevelopment would permanently erase a landscape they view as ecologically and culturally irreplaceable.
Next week’s hearing narrows the conflict to a focused procedural question: Whether the Board of Architects correctly applied city regulations when it approved a nine-story mixed-use project for the 1.47-acre site at the corner of Phoenetia Avenue and East Ponce de Leon Boulevard in the North Gables.
The garden and trees at the center of the appeal
Opposition to the project has consistently centered on the loss of green space and the proposed removal or relocation of more than 100 mature trees. Among them is a large live oak estimated by preservationists to be between 100 and 200 years old, a claim supported by letters from regional botanical and preservation experts submitted during earlier reviews.
Critics argue that relocating the tree would jeopardize its survival and undermine city policies designed to protect heritage canopy. The developer has maintained that the tree is transplantable and that mitigation measures meet city standards.
Those competing claims form part of the record the Special Master will review.
What the Special Master will evaluate
The Special Master’s role is appellate. The hearing will examine whether the Board of Architects properly enforced requirements related to green space, setbacks, and site design when it approved the project on Oct. 19, 2023. Any findings or recommendations issued by the Special Master would inform subsequent action by the City Commission, which retains final authority over the matter.
Testimony will be sworn, and the review will focus on the existing record rather than new design proposals. The hearing will take place at the City of Coral Gables Development Services Building, in the Fairchild Tropical Board Room.
What the ruling could mean for the site
A decision affirming the Board of Architects would allow the project to proceed under its current approvals, clearing a major remaining procedural hurdle. A decision finding deficiencies could send the matter back for further review, reopening questions about how green space and tree preservation standards were applied.
City officials have previously said alternatives such as land swaps or garden preservation agreements are not under consideration, citing the project’s advanced stage. As a result, the Special Master hearing represents one of the final formal opportunities for opponents to challenge the approval within the city’s regulatory framework.
A moment of consequence for preservation and process
For residents who have followed the case through years of hearings and revisions, the Jan. 13 session marks a shift from public debate to procedural judgment. The outcome will help determine whether the Garden of Our Lord—and the canopy that surrounds it—survives as a physical place or gives way to redevelopment.
This Post Has 12 Comments
How sad! We really don’t value trees enough.
Te disappearance of the Garden of Our Lord is a travesty. Whatever that project is must consider the preservation of historical sites and the preservation of mature and live trees. The overdevelopment in Coral Gables is changing the nature of the place and is destroying the beauty that attracts people to this neighborhood. I have a special attachment to this site as my daughter, who is now 60 attended St. James school as a little girl. Is there anything that I, as a resident and property owner in Coral Gables can do to prevent this travesty from happening?
I understand the project at 110 Phoenetia Avenue is coming up for the Special Masters Review I wanted to mention my opposition to the project as presented.
I have lived in the City of Coral Gables for 32 years. I have been a member of the Coral Gables Woman’s Club for 25 years. I am opposed to this development which is planned next door to the Woman’s Club property as it is completely out of place in the neighborhood. East Ponce is very low rise and residential and to suddenly allow a 13 story building at 110 Phoenetia Avenue is out of prospective for the area. This is not Ponce de Leon Blvd. It is EAST Ponce de Leon Blvd.
Our club house celebrated 100 years in 2023. Our Centennial. Much of our income is derived from renting our historic building so we can maintain the building to City standards while supporting our Coral Gables Children’s Dental Clinic since 1939. https://coralgableswomansclub.org/dentalclinic/ With this development, our business will be affected by both construction dust and use of all our “free parking” surrounding our building. Not only that, but the Garden of the Lord will be destroyed. There are two two-hunderd year old oak trees in the garden and some plants that are not replaceable. The developer says he can move the trees. There are two (2) two hundred year old oak trees on the property. These cannot be destroyed and must be protected. I spoke to Jody Haynes of Signature Palms, who is an expert at moving large specimen trees. He told me the trees “could be moved” but it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, would take well over a year and there is no guarantee they would survive. This alone should be a good reason not to allow this project to proceed. In Coral Gables, I have to obtain permits to remove trees on my property, and only if they are diseased. Why is it a developer can come in and just destroy everything with no plan to replace it?
This project is too large and too dense for the neighborhood. It is not in harmony with the surrounding North Ponce neighborhood. The developer purchased this parcel zoned as Institutional/Religious and now is seeking a variance to build here. My understanding is this area is under a commission-funded study for historic designation.
This neighborhood is protected under the zoning code, Section 2-404 North Ponce Neighborhood Conservation District Overlay (NPCO). The density of this proposed project will have an adverse impact on the historic landmarks surrounding the area, specifically the nationally and state recognized Coral Gables Woman’s Club and the Douglas Entrance.
This project will be destroying “historic green space, “The Garden of Our Lord,” deemed a cultural landscape by two nationally recognized prominent UM School of Architecture professors which it does not have plans to replace.
This project should not be allowed to proceed under its current plan.
Stoped them
I totally agree with the Coral Gables Women’s Club!
As a city we need these open garden places!
What would Manhattan be without Central Park!
Stop paving over Paradise!
“Woe betide the leaders now perched on their dizzy pinnacles of triumph if they cast away at the conference table what the soldiers had won on a hundred bloodsoaked battlefields.”
― Winston S. Churchill
All this overdevelopment takes away from the city’s character. I hope this garden will be saved.
Stop this over development in the City Beautiful of Coral Gables! George Merrick must be turning in his grave!
I agree, so sorry for the loss of The Garden Of The Lord; my son attended Saint James many years ago and I have felt attached to its beautiful surroundings.
I have been a resident of Coral Gables for 40 years. I am totally opposed to this development project. It is totally out of line with the city’s architectural plan made from its incipiency. In addition, it would be a travesty to remove a tree that is so old, it would not survive the transfer. Coral Gables prides itself for being the City of Trees, lets live up to it.
Why doesn’t our City just take the property under its eminent domain powers and forever preserve it? That was a loaded question; I know they answer. We don’t want to pay for it! This is a recurring theme in the “preservation” racket. Some of my fellow residents, commonly labeled “activists”, always want to get their hands on other people’s realty . . . without having to pay for it.
There is no taking by residents if Coral Gables uniformly requires all landowners to comply with the Coral Gables Zoning Code and its Comprehensive Plan which includes the Future Land Use Element and the Housing Vision Statement to prevent incompatible real estate developments. Developers know these rules when they purchase land in Coral Gables. The proposed development at 110 Phoenetia Avenue is seeking a variance/exception from these rules. Applying these rules uniformly to all developments is the only fair and balanced approach between developers and existing residents (who also purchased land based on these rules and the promise of no incompatible developments). An incompatible real estate development is a taking – it lowers the land value of existing residents living near an incompatible development while increasing the land value of the developer building the incompatible development based on obtaining a zoning code variance/exception. And the developer does not have to pay the residents whose property value has decreased! I am hopeful that the Special Master applies the Zoning Code and Comprehensive Plan to prevent the proposed development at 110 Phoenetia Avenue from being built (9 stories, 177 residential units, 16 live/work units and 340 parking spaces) and require it to be compatible with the garden-apartment residential architecture and urban design represented by the Coral Gables Woman’s Club and/or The Garden of our Lord.