Is city hall’s destiny condo towers or a municipal treasure?

Our report last week on city offices coming to the old Melreese Golf Course posed a warning for anyone who cherishes heritage: how long can historic Miami City Hall survive?

It flies under the radar, but the gleaming building by cutting-edge Arquitectonica will replace not just its predecessor on the Miami River but also city hall, which for 50 years has been on the National Register of Historic Places.

The city has already dealt away its riverfront administration building to developer Adler, which is building for the city on Melreese. Once the new offices open, how long will it take to try to sell off the historic city hall on Dinner Key too?

The argument will be that the city has no use for the building and its land that was the Pan American World Airways seaplane gateway to Latin America and the Caribbean. Elected officials will point to current needs and say sale to a developer can fill holes in the budget.

We’ve heard that too often. The city needs cash, so deal away Melreese Golf Course and build an office park, a vast hotel, a soccer stadium and more. The city needs money so rent space in our downtown parks to billboards. Sell the 1950s baseball stadium for housing. Tear down the Knight convention center for private development.

All that and more. Why not sell historic city hall too?

The sell-off game can fill budget gaps – until nothing is left to sell. That’s why Miami Today proposed a public facilities trust, so that the city’s assets didn’t disappear forever to fix today’s budget. Soon there will be no need for a trust, because more and more city assets have been sold.

Why think now about maximizing our city hall gem rather than deal it away?

First, because of its glorious location on Coconut Grove’s waterfront. They aren’t making any more such land and it’s a community treasure. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever.

Second, not only is the land an asset, it’s an historic asset – and not just because it’s been the site of city hall for 70 years. It was ready for the history books before the city ever moved in. Here’s why.

First is the site’s name: Dinner Key. Long before there was a Miami, a Coconut Grove village did its picnicking on – where? – Dinner Key. In fact, Coconut Grove’s government remained separate from Miami into the 1920s.

During World War I, Dinner Key became a naval aviation base. The Coast Guard put a seaplane base there in 1932. And the New York, Rio and Buenos Aires Airline convinced the city to convert Dinner Key to a commercial air base. 

That didn’t last long. A year later the Pan American Airways System bought out its competitor and built a terminal there to serve its clippers that flew between New York City and Latin America, so famed that 100,000 people a month came to see the Pan American clippers land and take off.

Today, far fewer come to that terminal to see Miami government in action. The Art Deco terminal is still a beacon despite the Miami City Hall sign over its front door.

“The terminal’s elegant two-story waiting and ticket hall is decorated with ornamental friezes under a ceiling painted with signs of the zodiac and major moments in aviation history, from Da Vinci’s glider in 1490 to PanAm’s first Martin seaplane in 1933,” Miami Today wrote in our 2021 supplement marking the city’s 125th birthday.

PanAm outgrew the terminal in 1945 as Latin American nations built airports to serve planes from what is now Miami International Airport. In 1946 the city bought the terminal, and in 1954 it became Miami City Hall. Soon, it will be city hall no longer. 

As a city hall, the building is not imposing. A European visitor recently seen photographing its architecture turned to ask how such a big city could get its entire administration into the building – which, of course, has never been the case. The city has used multiple sites. All will be united in the new city hall – once the city makes that public.

But that’s what the building is to be. Asked by city Urban Development Review Board member Anthony Tzamtzis at an approve hearing for the new site what type of offices it will house, Alejandro Gonzalez, a principal of Arquitectonica, said “The intention is that all the city functions that are currently in [Miami Riverside Center] and in City Hall will be moving to this building.”

Since the days of city hall as a city hall are numbered, what should be its next use?

For money alone, the answer is ultra-luxury condo towers, or maybe condos mixed with top-end office buildings.

But money would not replace the location, much less the history. Remember, the city was supposed to replace all parkland at Melreese Golf Course that it yielded to developers. Yet by sleight of hand the replacement is just sites the city already owned but had never labeled parks.

When city hall closes, why doesn’t the city turn it and the surrounding land into parkland, making the former Pan Am terminal a museum to Miami’s rich aviation history? 

Keep for public use what is the public’s history and land asset. Don’t let Miami’s heritage take flight.