Railroad tracks through Ferg’s Sports Bar could become St. Pete trail

ST. PETERSBURG — Ever wonder why the back half of Ferg’s Sports Bar & Grill is a hodgepodge of lean-tos, picnic tables and pop-up tents?

That’s because old railroad tracks slice through the iconic sports bar and Ferg’s owner Mark Ferguson is not allowed to build something more permanent on much of the property. Though Ferguson owns the land, there is a 100-foot wide easement that bisects it for the rail spur that once passed through.

Ferguson cut a deal years ago with CSX Transportation Inc. to rent that space with a condition: no permanent fixtures over the tracks in case the rail line was needed again.

Those tracks could have new life as a public recreational trail that would weave through Ferg’s to the planned Historic Gas Plant District.

Five years ago, CSX filed to convert nearly a mile of abandoned tracks in St. Petersburg into a trail. But when the federal government allowed it, officials technically took the land under those tracks, through eminent domain. Ferguson said he wasn’t notified by the government about it and wasn’t paid.

Ferguson sued, as did two other St. Petersburg landowners who have parts of the spur running through their property. The four-year-long case in federal court ended last month. The U.S. Court of Federal Claims issued its largest trial decision in a rail-to-trail conversion case, attorneys say, that could pay a total of almost $20 million. That money hasn’t been paid out yet because the federal government has about a month left to appeal the case.

Ferguson’s $12.9 million award is said to be the largest ever for a landowner in a rails-to-trails case, but it means that the landscape of Ferg’s will likely change. The city of St. Petersburg is negotiating to gain control of the strip and potentially redevelop it into a recreational trail that would cut through Ferg’s to the Historic Gas Plant District that would surround a new Tampa Bay Rays baseball stadium.

Ferguson said the sports bar could be redeveloped in a smaller footprint on the Central Avenue corner near the restored World Liquors Globe he moved there five years ago.

“We’re a staple in the community,” he sa id. “We’re a local gathering place. There’s so many memories here after 33 years.”

The tracks begin at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street S and First Avenue. They run west, parallel to the Tropicana U-Haul Moving and Storage center that is staying put and Tropicana Field. Evidence of the rails disappear as the line jumps north across the street behind Furnish Me Vintage, where the Moxy St. Petersburg Downtown Hotel is going up, resurfacing at the southeast corner of Ferg’s.

The tracks at Ferg’s lie beneath a shipping container with bathrooms and through a storage space with kegs, canned soda and gallons of Sweet Baby Ray’s barbeque sauce and butter flavored oil. They resurface between Ferg’s party deck and a mobile kitchen but are concealed under pavers and tables, reappearing across Central Avenue between parking curbs in a gravel lot also owned by Ferguson. That parcel includes a picturesque portion of hidden Booker Creek.

The abandoned segment continues northwest diagonally through a warehouse at 269 16th St. N. owned by Carlos Lopez, Jr. and Colleen A. Lopez. Aside from Ferg’s, the Lopezes were plaintiffs in the lawsuit along with the owners of the Moxy St. Petersburg hotel, Miami-based Collective Edge LLC.

The Lopezes won more than $2 million in the case and Collective Edge were awarded $2.9 million. Reached by phone, Carlos Lopez Jr. declined to comment because the funds weren’t disbursed yet. Matthew Tillman of Collective Edge did not respond to an email seeking comment.

The judgments were based on lost value. In the case of the Moxy Hotel at 1246 Central Ave., Collective Edge lost almost 10,000 square feet of developable area, according to exhibits from the trial. The Lopezes’ case was more difficult to determine because a parcel on the other side of the trail has an unknown owner, complicating the value of the land.

Ferguson said he had a strong case because he owns land on both sides of the easement. He remembers when railroad cars carrying Ringling Brothers/Barnum & Bailey Circus’ lions, tigers and elephants to the circus downtown would come through the bar in the 1990s.

“The whole building would shake,” he said.

The tracks, Ferguson said, were abandoned about a decade ago. There was talk about installing light rail to get folks to Tropicana Field for games, which he had hoped for to increase foot traffic to the bar but nothing ever transpired.

Ferguson owns 52,000 square feet of land, but he won’t be able to develop the whole parcel with the trail in the middle, leaving 14,511 square feet that can be built on in the northeast corner plus surface parking on the southeast corner on the other side of the trail.

“I’d much rather have the land in our ownership than the $13 million,” he said.

Ferguson said he received a letter from LewisRice, a law firm based in St. Louis, Missouri that specializes in rails to trails cases. He contacted his attorney, D. Tobyn DeYoung of Helinger DeYoung Lawyers in St. Petersburg, who specialize in eminent domain. The two law firms spent four years in court held in Washington, D.C., and Tampa.

Alizza Punzalan-Randle, a spokesperson for the city of St. Petersburg, said the city is in negotiations with CSX to take over control of the trail. She said the track near Ferg’s was included in both the 2003 CityTrails program and the 2019 Complete Streets Implementation Plan as a potential area for future recreation trail development.

In an email, CSX Transportation spokesperson Sheriee Bowman declined to comment citing what she called “pending litigation.”