New office will fuel north end

A new plan will pump life into the former Longbeach Chevron station — but the building will not be used as a gas station.

After more than seven years of vacancy, the building at 6990 Gulf of Mexico Drive is under contract for an undisclosed price.

Keller Williams Realty plans to close on the building at 6990 Gulf of Mexico Drive and redevelop the existing building into a real estate office that could have 20 or more agents, according to John Thompson, senior vice president of Keller Williams Realty.

Thompson, who said renderings are not yet available, described the future design as “modernistic.”
“It’s a statement building,” Thompson said. “It’s at the entrance to the north end, where there’s a lot of room for growth.”

The company will rehabilitate the existing 2,025-square-foot building and plans to open the office — its first on Longboat Key — in March.

According to Senior Town Planner Steve Schield, a real estate office is an allowable use for the property’s C3 zoning.

Tampa-based J.H. Williams Oil Co. Inc. owns the property and paid $512,100 for it in August 2005.
The property has been vacant since 2007, when Longbeach Chevron owner Robert Self closed the business after 17 years. He now works for Grooms Motors, on Holmes Beach.

For the north end, the station’s 2007 closing came toward the beginning of a decline in business. Around the same time, Dr. Robert Gordon, a longtime Longboat Key dentist, closed his north-end business. The bank building at the north end formerly occupied by the Longboat Key Chamber of Commerce later went into foreclosure.

Most tenants left the north-end Whitney Beach Plaza, and the shopping center sold at the end of 2010 in a commercial short sale.

But the north end has recently seen business return.

Whitney Beach Plaza co-owners Richard Juliani and Ryan Snyder have invested approximately $2 million in the property, and nearly half of storefronts are occupied or under contract.

In 2013, the gas station building got a face-lift with new paint and renovations.

“Ironically, I was with Arvida Disney when we did the south end of the Key and we did the Chart House,” Thompson said. “We hope to spur that development at the north end.”

Richard and Alison Estrin first listed the gas station property through their Longview Realty at least five years ago.

Alison Estrin expressed enthusiasm for the contract last week.

“I think it’s going to be a great property on the Key for the north end,” she said. “It will be a positive feature for the total vision of the Key.”

When the Longbeach Chevron was in operation, the Key had three gas stations. The mid-Key Shell station has since closed, and the only remaining station is the south-end station that was rebranded as a Mobil station and was previously a BP.