They are part of a $10 million hardening project.
By Gretchen Cochran
Original Air Date: September 8 2026
Host: A $10 million project is underway to harden The Bay Park just north of Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall. Gretchen Cochran reports.
[Sounds of construction]
Gretchen Cochran: Imagine that noise in your backyard. That’s what the neighbors of Sarasota’s 53-acre park called “The Bay” have endured for a few days. It’s the sound of preparing the shoreline near Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall for rocks as big as your refrigerator. They are to be artfully placed so that Gulf Coast sea water driven by the next hurricane will be slowed before it tears across the park, slamming into historic buildings bordering the property and pouring into the city.
Those awesome rocks, trucked in from Ft. Myers, are presently piled in a mountainous heap along the edge of the Van Wezel parking lot.
Their purpose is important relating to “Resilience.” That’s the word sprinkled throughout nearly every explanation CEO A.G. Lafley gives describing the broad goals of the 10-year park development project. “Resilience” means being able to bounce back quickly after facing a difficult situation, a change or even physical stress.
Here’s Laffley’s partner, Diana Shaheen, Chief Operating Officer. She was there in October 2024 when Hurricane Milton swept through. It was a Category 3 Hurricane with 115-mile-per-hour winds driving salt water and destroying plants and trees as well as buildings and infrastructure.
Diana Shaheen, chief operating officer of The Bay | Photo courtesy of The Bay
Diana Shaheen: What we learned after the storm was that the riprap—the revetment, which are those large stones—the size that was located there was too small and moved.
GC: But this rock project is just the beginning of changing the slope of the land. This first phase, called “The Resilient Shoreline,” will create a rain garden bordered by a walkway. Its slope will go from five feet to eight and a half feet.
Over the next couple of years, more rocks and dirt will be hauled in so that incoming water will be diverted to outgoing.
DS: Remember, that’s not the end-all be-all. We are going to go up to about 20 feet in the center of the park eventually, in a future phase.
GC: This $10 million rock project also includes Centennial Park, the area just north of the 10th Street entrance to The Bay Park. That area focuses on boating. It features a canal and boat launching ramps, and it allows for day parking.
DS: It’s the first of multiple phases to improve the resilience of the site.
GC: Ground has not yet been broken for the restaurant planned for the canal/park corner but the Venice Pier group has been selected to design and manage it. Three other restaurants are included in the long-range plans.
Laffley and Shaheen have predicted the park will be completed by 2030. But the “One Park for All,” as it has been dubbed, has already attracted over a million visitors.
For WSLR this is Gretchen Cochran.
WSLR News aims to keep the local community informed with our 1/2 hour local news show, quarterly newspaper and social media feeds. The local news broadcast airs on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 6pm.