Grandview Heights Palm Beach FL
Grandview Heights Palm Beach FL is one of 13 historic districts located in the City of West Palm Beach. It is an approximately 23 acre. The district consists primarily of one-story and two-story single family dwellings constructed between 1914 and 1948. Most of the primary residences have outbuildings, such as garages, garage apartments, and separate apartment structures. There are also a few small commercial buildings in the area, and churches.
Grandview Heights neighborhood is adjacent to many downtown landmarks, including Howard Park, the Norton Museum of Art, CityPlace and the Palm Beach County Convention Center. Being one of West Palm Beach’s oldest neighborhoods, Grandview Heights was mainly built in the 1910’s and 1920’s, with many different architecture styles used, such as Spanish Mission / Mediterranean Revival, Craftsman / Bungalow, American FourSquare, Art Deco, Mission Revival, and Dutch Colonial Revival. The Grandview Heights Historic District is bounded by Park Place, Alabama Avenue, M Street and Lake Avenue. The name Grandview Heights is derived from the neighborhoods location atop the Atlantic Ridge just south of Okeechobee Boulevard. Residents with certain two story homes can see the beautiful Atlantic Ocean over the island of Palm Beach from their second floor windows
The Grandview Heights Historic District developed as an early speculative middle to working class neighborhood southwest of the central downtown area. As one of the earliest areas to be developed outside of downtown, the property which now makes up Grandview Heights was chosen because of the relatively steep topography for South Florida. The neighborhood was considered a very desirable place to live since it was less than a mile from downtown and within close proximity to the City Terminals and Turning Basin, which were located where Howard Park is found today. The Turning Basin remains on the northern section of Howard Park, but the City Terminal docks were destroyed in the 1920s. Historically, the neighborhood stretched from Okeechobee Road to Park Place. According to the 1926 Sanborn Map, various businesses were located along Okeechobee Boulevard, but the most of the neighborhood consisted of houses, their rear garages, and garage apartments as well as one and two-story apartment buildings. Since the area was platted in the 1910s, the eastern boundary of the district has always been the Florida East Coast Railway tracks (laid 1895) located just beyond Alabama Avenue. Throughout the neighborhood’s history, warehouses and commercial buildings were located along the railroad tracks.
Grandview Heights Palm Beach FL
The three subdivisions now known as Grandview Heights were plated in a grid pattern. The lots were either narrow, so potential buyers would have to buy more than one lot to accommodate their homes, or approximately 50 x 100 feet, to allow homeowners to construct a garage at the rear of the house. The neighborhood design reflects the early influences of automobiles through the rear alleyways and original garages and garage apartments, which architecturally complement the main houses. The streets are laid out in a traditional suburban format, either with driveways leading from the main street past the side of the house to either porte-cocheres or garages or with rear alley access to the garages or garage apartments. Sidewalks are located along the street and walkways lead up to the front doors. A landscaped median along Florida Avenue was included in the design of Moss and Heisler Addition when it was platted in 1912. The other subdivisions, Palm Beach Heights and Grandview Heights, chose to extend the median along Florida Avenue through their areas as well. Historically, the median featured palms and other native plantings.
The Grandview Heights Historic District is made up primarily of single family residences on double lot parcels. In addition to the residences, there are numerous outbuildings, including garages, garage apartments, and detached rear apartment buildings. There are also a number of primary apartment buildings, including one-story duplexes and two-story structures. The district also has two churches and five small commercial buildings. Nearly all of the single family dwellings in the district are owner occupied. Over ninety percent of the contributing buildings in the district were constructed between 1914 and 1926. The remainder were built between 1927 and 1948.
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