Ferg’s Sports Bar has weathered nearly every version of downtown St. Petersburg. It opened before Major League Baseball arrived. It survived the construction of Tropicana Field, multiple redevelopment proposals surrounding the stadium and the uncertainty that followed the Tampa Bay Rays’ decision to walk away from a new ballpark deal.
Now, owner Mark Ferguson is placing another bet on downtown’s future.
St. Petersburg City Council unanimously approved two 99-year ground lease agreements Thursday that will see Ferguson contribute $6 million toward the city’s $7 million purchase of nearly a mile of abandoned railroad corridor for the Booker Creek Trail project.
The city will acquire the former CSX rail corridor and lease portions of it back to Ferguson, whose sports bar and adjacent property have occupied the land for more than three decades.
“I’ve been leasing this same piece of property for the last 33 years,” Ferguson said. “The railroad will be sold to the city and leased back to us. We can use it for whatever we want for our business.”
For Ferguson, the investment positions his bar for the future, similar to his initial investment, which was made in anticipation of the arrival of baseball.
“We’re going to have a lot more business from it,” he said. “There will be apartments and retail built there. Business will be brought to the Trop, EDGE District and Ferg’s Sports Bar.”
The Booker Creek Trail will transform approximately .86 miles of unused railroad into a multi-use trail.
City officials have described the project as both a recreational amenity and an economic development tool, creating a pedestrian and bicycle corridor through one of downtown’s fastest-growing areas.
“I think it will give people another option to walk, ride bikes, use scooters,” he said. “We don’t want more cars on the streets. The more people we can get walking and riding bikes in the downtown area the better it is for everybody because we have limited parking.”
Even with one of downtown’s largest parking garages across the street, Ferguson said demand already outpaces supply. “It fills up pretty quickly.”
Ferguson knows better than most how much downtown has changed. He opened Ferg’s in 1992 after purchasing what had been a neighborhood gas station, years before the Tampa Bay Devil Rays played their first game across the street. What began as a modest sports bar gradually expanded into one of St. Petersburg’s best-known gathering places, growing alongside the city’s emergence as a regional destination.
That long view helps explain why he’s willing to make another substantial investment despite uncertainty surrounding the future of the Historic Gas Plant District.
Mayor Ken Welch recently selected Blake Investment Partners as his preferred developer for the 86-acre site, but negotiations remain ahead and a future City Council could still reject or alter the project.
Ferguson isn’t deterred. “I think it’s a great deal for everybody,” he said. “We are in one of the fastest-growing downtown areas in the country.”
“With the Trop site being redone, that will bring us a lot of new business,” Ferguson continued. “I can’t wait to see five years from now what it will pan out to be.”
“My hope is we get a convention center,” he said. “And my feeling is the Rays will stub their toe in Tampa and will stay in St. Pete.”
The city expects to close on the railroad property later this month. Construction of the Booker Creek Trail will likely take several years, but for Ferguson, the investment reflects the same confidence that led him to open a sports bar on the edge of downtown.
This time, he believes the next chapter won’t just benefit Ferg’s – it will connect entire neighborhoods that have long been separated by unused rail lines and surface parking, bringing more people through the heart of downtown without adding more cars to its already crowded streets.
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