Land Grab

 

Just down the road, about five miles away, are the ever-growing West Villages, not to be confused the well-known Villages in the middle of Florida.

This project has obliterated a former cattle ranch set between Venice and North Port and is an amalgam of developments under one umbrella. When it’s finished, it will have a population greater than the entire city of Sarasota (currently almost 58,000) and is the fifth largest master planned community in America.

My morning walk today - less than a mile one-way - here in Venice provided the steps of real estate creep, even if on a minuscule scale. The new developments by us will have fewer than twenty units.   

First, the untamed Florida. It makes you wonder how those explorers ever made it more than three feet.

 

 

Then, this sidewalk to nowhere. Was there once a house here, or is this as far as the construction got?

Followed by the road to nowhere; this just stops at a bank of trees.  Again, a development that never happened?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Across the street from our complex, this used to be a grassy field where as recently as last year, people would ride their horses. 

 

 

Half a block down Venice Avenue, the latest project in mid-build.

 A finished project.

And in the midst of all this, the wildflowers still bloom by the sidewalk.