WATER & COAST
St. Pete Pier
Pinellas County · Gulf Coast
A 26-acre waterfront park reaching into Tampa Bay, opened in 2020 on the site of the inverted pyramid pier that stood there for forty years.
ABOUT THIS PLACE
St. Petersburg has put piers into Tampa Bay since the 1800s. The Million Dollar Pier opened on November 25, 1926, with 10,000 people on it and a Mediterranean Revival casino at the end. The inverted pyramid that most people remember opened on January 15, 1973, designed by William B. Harvard Sr. at a cost near four million dollars, and came down between 2015 and 2016. The replacement opened on July 6, 2020, after a delay caused by the pandemic. It cost 92 million dollars and covers 26 acres, which makes it a waterfront park with a pier attached rather than a pier alone. ASD Architects, Rogers Partners and Ken Smith designed the winning scheme, called Pier Park, chosen in 2015. On it now are five restaurants, a playground, an environmental education center, a fishing deck, a small beach and public art by Janet Echelman, Xenobia Bailey and Nathan Mabry. Walking out to the end and back is about a mile, and it costs nothing
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