New landscaping planned for the passive park under construction in south Jacksonville Beach will be funded by the Jacksonville Tree Commission.
Construction began in June 2026, with crews initially clearing invasive vegetation and overgrown vines while preserving significant trees, protected buffers and healthy native plantings.
However, crews determined that the bulk of the vegetation was not suitable as a natural barrier for residential properties surrounding the city-owned property west of South Beach Parkway at Jacksonville Drive in the city's Southend Redevelopment District.
CRA Coordinator Taylor Mobbs outlined the findings during the Aug. 24 meeting. Trevor Hughes, Jacksonville Beach's chief of parks development and maintenance, worked with the Jacksonville Tree Commission to secure funding to install a new landscape buffer. The City Council also has until the end of the week to provide input. As of Monday, only two of the seven members had responded to the request, Mobbs said.
"Once they got in there and started clearing out a lot of the underbrush, what we thought was a healthy barrier and buffer is not. There were a lot of invasive plants and a lot of dead plants. It was really ugly and it was not something that was going to provide a really great long-term buffer for the passive park," she said.
"We have a plan to create an appropriate buffer that over the next five, 10, 15 years will actually grow into a buffer that is intentional and serves a purpose. It's not just invasive vines."
The Jacksonville Tree Commission is an advisory panel established in 2017 to help expand the city's urban tree canopy. The commission reviews tree-planting projects and makes recommendations involving the city's tree funds. For the passive park, the commission has agreed to fund installation of more than 100 trees and native plantings. Any existing trees that are alive and healthy will remain on site.
"There's fast-growing, dense shrubberies like native options that fill in really quick while the trees are spending 10 years to grow up," CRA member Thad Moseley said.
Mobbs said door hangers with updated information on the landscaping plans will go out to the 14 nearby residents.
"We are going to give them an opportunity to chat with us first before they see people out there clearing more than they anticipated," she said. "It doesn't change our timeline. It doesn't derail the project per se. But it was just something that we couldn't anticipate until we got in there and cleared out what was existing that we realized how unhealthy it actually is. It really doesn't provide an adequate buffer at this point."
The passive park is designed to integrate with the city's Urban Trail project adjacent to South Beach Park, and will feature native vegetation, seating, informational signage and water stations.
