City of Ocala staff told the Downtown Community Redevelopment Advisory Committee on April 16 that multiple downtown construction projects — including a new parking garage tied to a hotel development — are moving forward on schedule but will require extended site preparation, intermittent road closures and heavy truck traffic that will affect adjacent businesses.

Charlita Whitehead, economic development and cultural arts projects coordinator, said the site-preparation phase for the new parking garage and the adjacent AC/Marriott hotel will continue through fall 2025, with foundations placed from fall into winter, precast erection from winter into spring 2026 and remaining work into summer 2026. "They're starting the site prep phase... you'll start seeing a little bit more activity there in the next couple of weeks," Whitehead said.

The city warned of a permanent road closure for the length of construction on Broadway between Second and Third streets and additional rolling closures elsewhere downtown. Whitehead said contractors expect more than 1,200 truckloads of materials, some deliveries on tractor-trailers more than 100 feet long, and that a shared construction-management team is coordinating both the hotel and parking-garage sites to reduce disruption.

Eric Smith, senior transportation project administrator in Ocala Growth Management, described interim measures to keep businesses accessible: new millings and striping on Third Avenue to improve ADA access, temporary signage rerouting customers to alternate lots, and supplemental asphalt patches to stabilize pedestrian paths. Smith said the city may complete final paving itself rather than delay businesses while the hotel contractor finishes a planned water connection under the roadway.

Whitehead and Smith described design features planned for the garage: roughly 800–805 additional public parking spaces; a flat-floor layout to improve sight lines for passive security; electric vehicle charging stations; security camera coverage and regular security patrols; and two elevator shafts, with one elevator bank to be dedicated to hotel valet access on the top levels. Whitehead said the top one or two floors will serve hotel parking/valet operations, reducing cross‑use with general public parking.

The city also said project teams are considering a memorial or commemorative element for Mount Moriah on a portion of the site that previously housed a church; the final concept and placement had not been decided at the meeting. Whitehead said renderings of the parking garage are available and that hotel renderings exist but were not on hand at the meeting; she offered to provide those to advisory committee members.

Staff said the city is coordinating with Ocala Main Street and with a construction-management contractor (identified in the meeting as Tom Fyle's team) to post schedules, presentation decks and videos on the city's website under the downtown construction management section, and to maintain regular outreach to affected businesses through William Spinney, outreach manager for Growth Management.

Committee members asked whether the new garage would charge for parking; Whitehead said rates had not been finalized and that the city had not received a confirmed price point. She noted some downtown lots where pay stations were installed recently have been held in reserve (not activated) during construction to provide additional free capacity to businesses. "Just because of the added stress and pressure on the parking, they've decided to keep those lots free at least during the construction," she said.

The advisory committee was also updated on related downtown projects during the same meeting: the Hilton Garden Inn project is in a final set of improvements and is scheduled for completion in September 2025; the Forge at Rising Commons (a multi-vendor event/food hall) is expected to open in August 2025; and other streetscape and site improvements (Third Avenue paving, sidewalk work and a planned road diet) are being phased to reduce disruption to businesses. Smith said the corridor work is likely to be substantially complete within about two months of the meeting, although some decorative sidewalk and finishing work will continue.

The city repeatedly emphasized communication and signage to reduce business impacts. Whitehead said the city and contractors will try to coordinate large deliveries and crane moves to serve both the hotel and garage sites and "use that one team that's doing the management for both sites... to hopefully maintain some order."