Once known only as “that little fishing and farming village between Fort Myers and Naples,” Bonita Springs is now the focus of some of the most intense development in Southwest Florida. Over the past few years new banks, restaurants, retailers, offices and a movie multiplex have popped up along several miles of U.S. 41 in Bonita. All of this is surrounded by luxury housing and gated golf-course communities, fueled in good part by the efforts of two Bonita Springs-based developers—The Bonita Bay Group and WCI Communities. Bonita’s original developers arrived about 1890 and settled along Survey Creek, now known as the Imperial River. The settlement was known as Survey. In 1912, one of those original settlers sold 6,000 acres to an investment group from Tennessee. They platted the property and renamed it Bonita Springs, derived from the Spanish word for pretty. Today, Bonita Springs is Southwest Florida’s newest city, incorporated in 1999 to ensure that the community could manage its own destiny in the face of the unprecedented growth. Bonita’s proximity to Southwest Florida International Airport and Florida Gulf Coast University, and its position midway between Fort Myers and Naples, have made it a preferred location for many businesses.

Photo by Ronald Dubick