Apopka is Popping
Apopka may be best known as the "indoor foliage capital of the world," but the primary crop this city in northwest Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County now cultivates is housing. According to local officials, there are an eye-popping 45 subdivisions encompassing 6,027 homes either in development or awaiting approval.
"Apopka has come of age," says Ruth Caseo, a Coldwell Banker realtor and 22-year Apopka resident. "It has become the address of choice."
Blessed with gently rolling hills, leafy shade trees and a climate conducive to agriculture, Apopka was inhabited by Timucuan Indians in the 17th century and by Seminole Indians in the early 19th century.
The Armed Occupation Act of 1842, which offered 160 acres to anyone who would homestead the land, brought an influx of European settlers. Soon the town became an active farming community and trading center.
In 1857, Orange Lodge No. 36 was organized, and its members built a headquarters that still stands just a few feet from busy U.S. 441.
The white block-and-frame structure, now the state's oldest Masonic lodge still in continuous use, was quite literally the center of town when Apopka was incorporated in 1882. Officials determined the city's borders by measuring a one-mile radius around the modest building.
Following the Civil War, the bubbling natural springs at the head of the Wekiva River began to attract tourists. Snowbirds flocked south via steamboat to soak in the healing waters, staying in a large resort hotel that remained in operation until it burned to the ground in the 1930s.
The sparkling clear springs, which stay at a constant 72 degrees, are now part of 7,800-acre Wekiwa Springs State Park. (In the language of the Seminole Indians, Wekiwa means "spring of water," while Wekiva means "flowing water.") With miles of hiking and biking trails as well as picnic areas and campgrounds, the park remains Apopka's biggest recreational attraction.
Apopka earned its first nickname, "The Fern City," in the early 1900s, when cultivating ferns became a major local industry. Later growers added lush tropical plants and other indoor foliage. Today a handful of large nurseries are still in operation, but land values have made agriculture increasingly impractical.
"We've tried to maintain our agricultural base," says Richard Anderson, the city's chief administrative officer. "It's getting harder and harder with the price of land going up for those nursery owners to stay in business."
Apopka today has a population of about 34,801, covers 19,303 acres and spans two zip codes.
According to the Orlando Regional Realtor Association, between 2004 and the third quarter of 2005, the average sale price of a home in the 32703 area code rose from $158,895 to $197,304. In the 32712 area code, the average sale prices jumped from $204,583 to $258,226.
"The prices have gone up, but Apopka is still an incredible market for families," Caseo says. "There's still land to develop, still room to put schools in."
She points to the area's three golf course communities: Errol Estate and Rock Springs Ridge, located within the city limits, and the well-established Sweetwater Country Club, located nearby and partially spilling over into Seminole County.
Each of these upscale communities have new phases under way, with homes typically priced from the $400s.
Concurrently, dozens of new communities are in development, especially in the rolling, rural countryside north of Ponkan Road. There, most new single-family homes are priced starting in the $300s.
The bulk of the new-home buyers are in their 30s and 40s, says Caseo.
"Young families are moving in," she notes. "They're upwardly mobile, with good jobs, and want new construction. They're just congregating here."
Better roads, as well as home prices somewhat lower than those in areas closer to Orlando, are among the reasons for Apopka's recent explosive growth. A billion-dollar-plus expansion of the region's transportation system is also in the works.
Commute times to downtown Orlando have been greatly reduced thanks to the completion of a portion of the new Western Beltway (S.R. 429), which links Apopka directly to the Florida Turnpike and provides easy access to S.R. 408 and I-4.
The Beltway project is ongoing, and its impact is only just beginning to be felt.
The Maitland Boulevard Extension (S.R. 414) will create a southern bypass of Apopka's business district, linking up with Orange Blossom Trail (U.S. 441) east of the city. And eventually, the planned Wekiva Parkway will connect S.R. 429 with I-4 in Sanford, completing the Beltway's northwestern loop.
In anticipation of the boom the Beltway project would bring, Apopka city officials began conducting development studies eight years ago. The result was a comprehensive plan to manage unprecedented growth.
"We wanted to get ahead of the curve," says Anderson.
The city created balanced residential and commercial zones, planned neighborhood centers, purchased environmentally sensitive land for conservation and recreation purposes and set aside school sites.
In the northern part of Apopka, a new elementary school and a new middle school are scheduled to open in 2006 or early 2007.
Plans also call for a new high school off Vick Road. According to Anderson, the high school will share facilities, such as the swimming pool and gymnasium, with the local YMCA.
"That's kind of a unique approach, and we're proud of it," he says.
Another initiative focuses on the downtown area. Main Street, while nicely maintained and lined with streetlights, seems to be fronted by more bail-bond offices and pawn shops than retail stores and restaurants. A downtown redevelopment project will focus on improving the city center, Anderson says.
One sign of Apopka's growing affluence is the expansion of the private Orlando Apopka Airport on west U.S. 441. The facility, operated by County Aviation Services, will boast expanded runways and new hangars.
"People will be able to fly business jets into here," Caseo says. She predicts that a "fly-in, fly-out" community may be developed in connection with the airport at some point.
"This is an area where you can afford to come now and really see some appreciation," Caseo says. "It's a wonderful place to bring a family and start out, with the new schools and the parks. Apopka is popping."
APOPKA'S CASH CROP
From African Violets to Zamioculcas zamiifolia, just about every type of house plant is grown in the Apopka area.
Ferns got the local foliage business started at the turn of the century, when asparagus fern fronds were cut and shipped on ice by train to northern florists.
But by the 1920s, the Boston fern had become the area's most lucrative export, since it could be grown outdoors and mass-produced inexpensively in Central Florida's temperate climate. Within just a few years, the once-expensive decorative plant, which had previously been produced in limited quantities by northern greenhouses, could be bought cheaply at dime stores across the country.
A fern growers' association was organized in the 1920s, and the City of Apopka adopted the slogan of "The Fern City."
Soon, though, the dime stores started asking for other plants and local growers began to diversify. Today, Florida grows more foliage plants than any other state, and Apopka area growers produce three-fourths of the state's smaller-sized plants.
While the statue of a fern still sits in front of Apopka's City Hall, it has adopted a new name: "The Indoor Foliage Capital of the World."