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Health & Fitness

Look Out! Neal Communities' Grand Palm Adds Island Amenity

Rolling up in a tough looking vintage, hard core 2004 Jeep, you wouldn’t exactly expect our tour guide to hop out in ironed black pants, a white buttoned down shirt and tie, with fancy black shiny shoes. But that’s exactly what Chris Reese did, agreeing to give us a sneak peek around Lookout Point Island at Grand Palm in Venice.

“Do you mind walking in the dirt?” he asked. Well, we didn’t - since we’d come prepared in sneakers! It’s just another day at the office for Reese, the vice-president of land development at Neal Communities. These days, he’s spending quite a bit of time at Grand Palm in Venice, the largest community Neal has ever built over a 40 year history of building homes and neighborhoods in Southwest Florida.

Grand Palm, home to 1,999 families when completed, boasts amenities that challenge typical expectations of a Florida community. There’s a main clubhouse, with a state-of-the-art fitness facility and recreation area, a resort-style pool with a slide, a fitness pool for swimming laps and water aerobics, 28 miles of walking and bike trails, complete with bike racks, basketball, tennis, bocce and volleyball courts, a large, open field for baseball and kickball, a pavilion and picnic area, a children’s splash park and an adventure playground complete with an in-ground chalk board, and Adventure Lake.

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Lookout Point Island will be smack dab in the middle of Adventure Lake, accessible to residents by walking bridges on foot or on bicycle. It promises to be the perfect spot for adventure-seeking castaways or anyone looking to momentarily escape to  a natural oasis reminiscent of Old Florida.

The newest and arguably most exciting feature at Grand Palm, Lookout Point Island should be complete this summer.

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The land development team at Neal Communities, led by Chris Reese, has worked hard to ensure that not only will residents feel like they are living in a unique and beautiful environmentally friendly community, but that they are truly offered one-of-a-kind experiences.

Reese plans for Lookout Point Island to be full of fun surprises, sure to delight kids of all ages and their parents. The 8- acre island is filled with gorgeous natural and native Florida landscape surrounded by the stunning man-made Adventure Lake. Lookout Point Island will feature a canoe livery, the “Wilderness Tot Lot”, which he proudly demonstrated for us, a ⅓ mile winding sidewalk that runs around and through the island, benches and picnic spots, two boardwalks and gazebos with fishing stations.

“With every project, a main focus of the team at Neal Communities is to save as much of the natural environment as possible. With Lookout Point Island, that goal was brought to a whole new level. Nothing on the island has been planted, it’s really untouched, and that’s one thing that makes it so unique. We left as much as possible undisturbed, so that we could really keep the feeling of native Florida on the island,” said Reese.

Every so often you’ll find a palm leaf or animal hoofprint imprinted on the winding sidewalk that meanders through the island, and it’s a great place to explore.   

“When this project was started, we had a very specific vision of how we wanted to proceed. Our team worked with engineers, eco consultants as well as local governments to make sure that we were able to complete this project. We are so excited to introduce the island, which is as natural as possible because of the hard work and many steps we took to ensure a native environment,” said Reese.

Families, children  of all ages, nature enthusiasts and guests alike will be able to enjoy the island, which will be opened for official “business” on May 1, 2014.

Lookout Point Island: just another reason that Grand Palm is close to everything, but far from ordinary.

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