Once-contentious Sunset Harbour project scores approvals from Miami Beach

Deco Capital Group secured key approvals from two Miami Beach boards over the past week and is moving forward with its plans for a scaled-back development in the Sunset Harbour neighborhood.

Bradley Colmer, managing principal of Deco Capital, said the developer has all the city approvals it needs now that it got the OK from the planning and design review boards, but it’s still facing opposition from the nearby Beach Towing Services, which is appealing the project’s approval.

RWN Real Estate Partners, a New York-based private equity firm backed by billionaire Marc Rowan, is a majority partner in the project.

As planned, Sunset Park would be a roughly 67,000-square-foot mixed-use retail and residential development at 1733-1769 Purdy Avenue and 1730 Bay Road. Domo Architecture and Design is designing the project, which includes 20,000 square feet of ground-floor commercial space with two larger restaurant spaces, two cafes, and four traditional retail units.

The five-story building would have one level of parking above that, plus three stories of condos. The condos would be between 2,900 square feet and 3,700 square feet.

Construction could begin next year, but Colmer said he expects that it will begin in 2020.

In 2015, the developer withdrew its height increase request after it was unable to reach agreements with residents living at the adjacent Lofts at South Beach Condominium and with Beach Towing, which holds a deed restriction that it said prevented parking on property previously owned by the towing company.

Colmer called Beach Towing a “bad faith actor” and said he expects its appeals will run their course.

Previous versions of the project were taller. In 2017, Miami Beach commissioners voted down an ordinance that would have increased the height for the development, known then as Sunset Harbour Residences, to 90 feet from 50 feet.

The developer picked up another piece of the assemblage earlier this year, paying $3.53 million for the Bay Road site, which allowed the developer to redesign plans for the project.