Bay Soundings l Don Whyte

Don Whyte: Greening the Vision of Development

Some developers count their handiwork in buildings. Don Whyte measures success in bicycle racks.

On a recent tour of FishHawk Ranch, Whyte whisked visitors by a school where bike racks were filled to overflowing. “Where in the world can you see that in a community today,” said the 53-year-old director of Newland Communities Southeast, the man behind Hillsborough County’s FishHawk Ranch and MiraBay, and Pasco County’s Bexley Ranch.

Don Whyte

That vision is emblematic of the kind of neighborhood Whyte tries to foster –communities that make it easy and attractive for people to get out of their cars, with plenty of green spaces and places to congregate throughout. So it was a natural evolution for Whyte and Newland to embrace “green building” practices that take those principles a step further.

At Waterset, Newland’s newest community, home builders will be required to meet residential green building standards for energy, water and resource efficiency set by the Florida Green Building Council. The Apollo Beach community along U.S. Hwy 41 will have 4,000 homes at build out, which is expected to take 10 years. The first model home will open next Spring.

“It gets back to the fact that we’re dealing with very educated consumers,” Whyte says. “People are reading articles and finding out that they can have paints that don’t emit chemicals and carpets the same way – and now that people know more and see more, they’re demanding it.”

Waterset will feature Florida-friendly landscaping and hopes to curb water use outdoors with a high efficiency irrigation system that will utilize reclaimed water for sprinkling. The company has hired a sustainability director to evaluate how Newland can enhance the environmental quality of all its developments, from site design through construction and ongoing operation and maintenance.

“We’ll be living with the consequences of the choices we make for many years to come,” says Whyte, who hails from Canada but has called Tampa Bay home for more than 20 years.

“Developers tend to be painted with a brush that we are creating growth – but growth occurs in the bedrooms not the boardrooms of America,” he says. “The industry obviously benefits, but we’re also a device for solving the problems.”

"Growth occurs in the bedrooms not the boardrooms of America."
Don Whyte

Whyte is a driving force behind Reality Check, a regional visioning exercise that kicks off May 18 (see story, page 1). He is co-chairing the event and serves as chairman of the Urban Land Institute’s Tampa Bay District, one of its principal sponsors.

Whyte is eager to develop a broad dialogue on what Tampa Bay should look like in the future. His efforts to advance regionalism recently earned him the Herman W. Goldner Award from the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council, the organization’s highest honor. In 2005, he was named to the Century Commission, which is studying regionalism and strategies for sustainability throughout Florida.

“We can get bogged down in the debate about whether growth is good or bad – the fact is it can be good or bad,” he says. “Instead of debating whether there will be growth, Reality Check says if growth occurs this is how we should manage it.”

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