Mount Pleasant Magazine Sept/Oct 2019

www.MPBusinessMag.com | www.BestOfMP.com | www.MountPleasantMagazine.com MPB mp business moving away from expansive residential development in Mount Pleasant. To have an economy for the 21st century, we have to grow our business base.” Bennett pointed out that Portside was already 75% to 80% preleased in late July. Among the first tenants in the building, managed by Holder Properties of Atlanta, are Merrill Lynch and Serendipity, as well as a mortgage company. Work on the second office building is expected to begin near the end of 2019. The name of the development, a $325-million investment, is a nod to the mode of transportation that almost a century ago provided the only method for people to cross the Cooper River between Charleston and Mount Pleasant. That was prior to the construction of the Grace Memorial Bridge, one of the Ravenel’s two predecessors and now also only a memory, in 1929. “Before there was a bridge, ferries landed in that general area of Mount Pleasant,” Bennett explained. “My mother, who lived in downtown Charleston, remembers those ferries.” Bennett, a lifelong Charleston-area resident, explained that he had a contract to buy just one acre of land on that area of the harbor in 2005. His plans to develop a small part of what eventually would become Ferry Wharf were derailed by the recession a few years later. The deal fell through, but he never gave up on his dream of building something big on the Mount Pleasant side of the river. He ended up purchasing the entire 18-acre site in four separate transactions between 2012 and 2015. In addition to the two office buildings, plans call for the construction of three hotels — a Hilton, a Marriott and one other brand — waterfront parks, high-end condominiums and additional residential options. Ferry Wharf ’s “main