Q: What is being built just east of Logan Landings and west of the Saturnia Lakes community on Immokalee Road? They have taken down every tree in sight. Thanks for your great information! — Ann Cowen, Naples
A: Land is being cleared on the south side of Immokalee Road east of Logan Boulevard for The Karlyn, a senior housing community with 159 market-rate apartment units. Minnesota-based Roers Companies is developing the three-story residential apartment building on 9 acres at 7576 Immokalee Road, adjacent to Saturnia Lakes gated residential community and Logan Landings retail center.
Clearing of the property began in November and construction probably will begin in early 2025.
“We expect to go vertical first quarter at some point,” said Andy Bollig, a Roers development partner. “We’re expecting completion in April 2026.”
The Karlyn will have a fitness center, yoga room, library and club dining room on the ground level within its 189,317-square-foot main building. Amenities will include a swimming pool, grilling stations and courtyards. The community will have a surface parking lot with 246 spaces, including more than 90 carport spaces, plans show.
The apartment building will have 42 one-bedroom units, 38 one-bedroom units with a den, 61 two-bedroom units and 18 three-bedroom units. The size of the apartments will range from a 699-square-foot one-bedroom unit to a 1,303-square-foot three-bedroom unit, architectural plans show. A resident on each lease has to be 55 or older during the lease term, Bollig said.
Before construction begins, a right-turn lane into the development will be installed on Immokalee Road. A 53,550-square-foot preserve will be retained at the rear of the property.
Roers also has a few other residential projects in planning stages in Collier County.
The Mattson at Vanderbilt residential planned unit development is proposed for a maximum of 150 multifamily rental units on 5.88 acres on Vanderbilt Beach Road east of Livingston Road in Noth Naples. The apartment complex will be located between the Bradford Square and Sandalwood Village senior housing communities on two adjoining properties that used to be home to Bobbin Hollow Equestrian Center and Naples Safari Animal Hospital & Pet Resort at 3375 and 3333 Vanderbilt Beach Road, respectively.
“We’re hoping to submit for a building permit on that one in January and start construction not too long after that,” Bollig said. “Obviously, we had to add some affordability to get the county commissioners comfortable with the project. We’re happy with where it landed.”
Another multifamily project is planned on parcels near Greenway Road and Tamiami Trail East in southeast Naples. “I think we’re looking at about 300 units there,” Bollig said.
The initial site development plan package has been submitted for review, said project manager Jackie Page, a Roers senior development associate.
“We’re kind of in our final stages for review there and we have our hearing scheduled Dec. 19 for that,” Page said.
A fourth site includes a smaller parcel under contract near the HeadPinz bowling alley off Radio Road in East Naples. “We’re looking at doing a smaller 120 or so unit deal,” Bollig said. “We haven’t submitted on that yet.”
Tide coming in
Q: Do you have any idea what is going into the old Wells Fargo bank on Strand Boulevard and Tavilla Circle in front of the Strand golf club. There is construction activity there. — Alice O’Shea, North Naples
A: Tide Cleaners is coming to the former Wells Fargo bank branch at 5610 Strand Blvd. in The Strand shopping center, anchored by Publix supermarket off Immokalee Road just west of Interstate 75 in North Naples.
“We’re just waiting on our final permit to start construction,” said Jon Kassolis, chief financial officer for Consolidated Cleaners Inc., the Naples-based franchisee of Tide Cleaners in Florida. “We’re still on track for 2025, opening a 5,000-square-foot plant/retail store there, so that’s very exciting.”
The Tide franchisee painted the former bank’s exterior white and plans to use one of the bank’s drive-thru lanes as a drop-off/pickup lane for the dry-cleaning business. The freestanding Tide will not have a companion tenant on the 1.23-acre corner outparcel lot.
“SK Holdings, our real estate development company, owns it,” Kassolis said. “We bought it from Wells Fargo when they were selling a lot of the buildings. So, we gutted the interior of it and took out the bank vault, which I never knew how hard it was to do that.”
The Strand location is only about two miles west of the Tide location at Logan Landings, which is on the opposite side of Immokalee Road at Logan Boulevard.
“What we’ve learned along the way is that it really doesn’t matter proximity-wise where it is. It’s all about traffic patterns,” Kassolis said. “A perfect example of that is at Vanderbilt and 41, where we put the first Tide, the first Naples store. Everyone at Procter & Gamble told us we were crazy putting the one on Old Trail with the Starbucks near the Fresh Market. It was less than three miles away. But we said, in Naples, the roads predominantly run solely east and west and north and south. There are no zig-zaggy roads or anything like that. It creates these unique traffic patterns where I might not realize it, but on any given week, I’m probably on the same five roads the entire time. So, people that live north of Pine Ridge on 41 don’t go south for daily shopping needs; if you live south of Pine Ridge on 41, you don’t go north. It’s the same kind of theory for The Strand and Logan Landings. … It’s just different traffic patterns for different population groups.”
Expect Tide Cleaners to continue expanding in Collier County. A seventh location in Collier is planned in 2025 at the site of the former 7-Eleven convenience store on the northeast corner of Pine Ridge Road and Shirley Street. Initial plans for a pet grooming business fell though at that location.
“We are putting in a 1,200-square-foot [Three60] wine store and a 1,200-square-foot Tide,” said Kassolis, who began a partnership with Three60 Wine when it moved in next to Tide in a building owned by the franchise on Trail Boulevard in North Naples.
Tide also plans to follow the growing population rapidly pushing east.
“We know we’re going to put a Tide east of Collier and Immokalee; we just don’t know exactly where, how far east we should go with the next one,” Kassolis said.
The retail brand features Tide’s distinctive orange-and-yellow bull’s-eye trademark that has dominated bottles and boxes of home laundry detergent made by Procter & Gamble for generations. Its machines and proprietary process for dry cleaning use a Green Earth system designed to be gentler on clothes and the environment, the company reports.
The “Tim Aten Knows” weekly column answers local questions from readers. Email Tim at tim.aten@naplespress.com.