Cypress Creek Town Center Outlet Mall Could Open By Summer 2015

By Matt Wiley

With the go-ahead from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the property owners of the Cypress Creek Town Center Development of Regional Impact (DRI) have indicated to Pasco County that they are finally ready to move forward with their outlet mall project.

Since 2007, when the more-than-500-acre development—which was to include a regional mall, office and retail space, a subdivision and a movie theater, as well as an extension of Wesley Chapel Blvd. — has floated in development limbo since a lawsuit was brought shortly after construction began on the property, located off S.R. 56, just west of I-75. The DRI includes land on both sides of S.R. 56 between the interstate and Wesley Chapel Blvd.

Now, instead of a regional mall, the development is set to be home to an outlet mall, similar to the Prime Outlets in Ellenton, an hour south on I-75. So far, the only announced store is Saks “Off 5th” Avenue, which listed the property as a future location on its website, last spring.

Pasco zoning administrator Carol Clarke says that the Richard E. Jacobs group, which owns the land, Simon Property Group and Sierra Properties are ready to move forward after receiving a building permit from the Army Corps.

“They have indicated that they are ready to move forward,” Clarke says, adding that, although the developers’ plan is to be open by 2015, no site plans have yet been submitted for the project.

Clarke explains that this is because the developers are examining infrastructure that previously was installed before a lawsuit from a coalition of environmental groups, led by the Sierra Club of Tampa Bay, ground development to a halt, citing a violation of the Clean Water Act because of run-off water draining into Cypress Creek.

After a Federal Appeals Court reversed a decision that almost revoked the mall’s building permit in 2011, the Army Corps was instructed to determine if the mall would affect wildlife in the area, specifically the eastern indigo snake. But, now the development is gearing back up.

“(The developers) are looking at the previous infrastructure to see what needs to be updated,” Clarke says. “They want to use what’s there, if they can. But, so far, they haven’t submitted any new materials.”

In the 2004 development order, the plan for the Cypress Creek Town Center originally included a 1.4-million-sq.-ft. regional mall, 600,000-sq.-ft. retail center, 420,000-sq. ft. of office space, 700 rooms of hotel space, a 630-unit multi-family subdivision and a 2,500-seat movie theater.

Hope Allen, executive director for the Greater Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce (WCCC), says that the day the news broke that the outlet mall plan was finally moving forward, the Chamber office was contacted by Bay News 9 and other local TV stations and daily newspapers for comments.

“All I could tell them was that it was nice to see that the outlet mall will finally be built,” Allen says. “It’ll be a great addition to the Wesley Chapel area.”

Our calls to the Simon Property Group were not returned before we went to press with this issue.