By Eric Curl
March 30, 2025 – The completion of the Hyundai Metaplant was celebrated last week, just 2.5 years after the ground-breaking in October 2022. The grand opening of the EV manufacturing plant, and its speedy development, got me thinking about all the local projects, most much smaller in scale, that began earlier than it did but have yet to have their own ribbon cuttings. I also reached out via social media to get residents’ insight on some ongoing projects they might be aware of and their responses ranged from incomplete gas stations to the Islands Expressway bridge project. Of course, it is important to keep in mind that these projects don’t have the controversial safety issues Hyundai’s project has been plagued with, nor do they have the promised economic and job creation touted by supporters who are willing to put our region’s already threatened water sources at risk to see it come to fruition. This column is devoted to those ongoing projects that don’t seem to have such overwhelming sense of urgency behind them – those that help the city earn its “Slowvannah” nickname. This compilation can be updated so feel free to chime in with your own suggested projects by emailing me at eric.curl@savannahagenda.com or by posting comments below.
RELATED: Safety Overshadows Hyundai Metaplant Opening (The Current)
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New Chatham County Courthouse at 400 W. Oglethorpe Avenue
The completion of the new Chatham County courthouse at 400 W. Oglethorpe has experienced multiple delays and contract increases since the groundbreaking in October 2020. It is difficult to find any recent status updates for the project on Chatham County’s website, but in February, county commissioners approved a $108,621 emergency procurement for completion of a millwork package, one of the smaller projects identified for the courthouse to function as needed, according to officials. The $88 million SPLOST supported includes eight courtrooms for the superior courts and four for the state courts. The old courthouse, recently nominated as one of Savannah’s ugliest buildings, will continue to operate next to it.
Islands Expressway Bridge Replacement Project
The Georgia Department of Transportation issued a Notice to Proceed to Prince Contracting, LLC to begin construction on February 2, 2018. The first of the two bridges was completed, and traffic was shifted to the new bridge in July, 2022. Now, the construction of the second bridge is underway. The current schedule is to complete Bridge 2 in 2026, according to Chatham County’s website. The contract between Prince Contracting and GDOT expired on April 1, 2024 and GDOT has been fining the company $5,000 a day, according to this WTOC report. The two new, high level, fixed span, multi-lane bridges over the Wilmington River are replacing the double bascule bridges that were considered to be functionally obsolete.
Tomochichi Federal Building Renovation Project
Adjacent roads and scaffolding have recently been taken down to the relief of area business owners surrounding downtown’s Tomochichi Federal Building at 125 Bull St., which takes up an entire block on the west side of Wright Square. The milestone comes more almost four years since renovations of the building began in the fall of 2021. The collapse of a section of the building’s third floor in 2023 brought work to a halt, with subsequent stabilization and debris removal work taking place until that October. The construction work resumed in November 2023 and the project is now scheduled to be completed in the summer 2026.
Leopold’s Original Ice Cream Shop
First introduced in 2010, Stratton Leopold’s plan to restore his family’s original ice cream shop at 720 Habersham St. has not progressed beyond talk and a few meetings before the Historic District Board of Review. The building continues to sit vacant and unused, even after plans to extend and restore the building were approved by the review board in April 2022.
RELATED: Restoration of Savannah’s original Leopold’s ice cream shop may be on the way
Delesseps Avenue Improvements
Last June, the city council approved an almost $1.7 million increase the for Delesseps Avenue Project with APAC-Atlantic as a result of quantity increases, removal and replacement of unsuitable soils, additional water line work, and changes to stormwater structures due to field conditions. The original $7 million contract was approved by the city council in July 2021, although construction and rerouting didn’t begin until July 2023. The project, which includes the addition of sidewalks and bikes lanes, along with drainage improvements, is now expected to be completed by the end of the year. An additional road closure was implemented at the end of March on DeLesseps from Cuba to Wilemere Drive due to the ongoing construction of that section. DeLesseps from Waters Avenue to Cuba and Wilemere to Skidaway, as well as the side roads, have reopened.
Starland Village
Planned since at least 2017, the Starland Village mixed-use apartment complex at 2201 Bull St. appears to finally be making some visible progress. The planned 5-story building along Bull Street is taking shape following the demolition of an old church school building at the site in 2023. That demolition came after a couple years of construction delays and the resumption of work ended up causing some delays itself when an earth mover knocked the building down and some of the debris hit some adjacent power lines. Located on a two-block stretch of Bull Street in Thomas Scquare in the area branded as the Starland District south of downtown, the planned development implemented by the Forum Group includes the construction of two apartment buildings and renovation of a historic church.
RELATED: Starland Village work resumes, power outage ensues
Abercorn and Largo Drive gas station and Convenience Store
A new gas station/convenience store has been under construction on Largo Drive and Abercorn Extension since at least early 2022, following the demolition of a service station at the site.
Bay Street Dry Cleaner’s Site
Despite the announcement of a new hotel plan last August, there has been no activity at the site of the fenced off closed dry-cleaning business at Bay and Habersham Streets. The latest plan for 401-409 East Bay was submitted about eight years after a previous developer announced a plan to build a boutique hotel at the location but failed to move beyond the installation of orange and white temporary barricades and fencing around the vacant building at Habersham about five years ago. Brian Huskey, who owns a restaurant, B. Matthews immediately across the street, was apparently correct in not getting too excited when I informed of the new plan last year. The “eyesore” doesn’t appear to be going anywhere soon.
Darling Oyster Bar
A site plan was submitted to the city on Feb. 22, 2021 to renovate the downtown building at 27 Montgomery St. for use as an oyster bar and restaurant, later revealed to be another location of the Charleston-based Darling Oyster Bar. The historic two-story masonry building on the southwest corner of Franklin Square was constructed in 1891 and has been vacant since the Universe Trading Company moved out in 2012. Franklin Square Real Estate, LLC sold the building to B&B Savannah, LLC for $2.5 million in January 2020, according to the property record. The building has since been extensively renovated but the restaurant has yet to open. Jesse Blanco’s Eat It & Like It blog seems to have the most updates on the project, and I’m sure will break the news when an opening date is set.
Chatham County Multi-Agency Emergency Response Center
It’s been about nine years since Chatham County and Savannah decided to build a new emergency response center. Still, a “groundbreaking” ceremony last May is about all the activity that has taken place at the proposed building site near the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport. That was held despite the lack of a contractor for the project, as reported by The Current. The county is now in the process of resoliciting proposals for the construction of the facility. The city of Savannah agreed in 2017 to transfer the operation and control of the E911 Center from the city to the county, with the goal of improving public safety communications across all communities and stakeholders throughout Chatham.
RELATED: Chatham County seeking $20M grant as planned 911 center’s cost’s grow (Savannah Agenda)
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