Opening Doors for Development in Tampa

What Developers Need to Know About the City’s New Site Plan Approval Process 

Big changes are underway in Tampa. For the first time since 1987, the City is overhauling its development code—an ambitious effort aimed at removing confusing language, clarifying regulations, and streamlining the overall approval process.

The initiative, called Tampa Forward: Building Tomorrow Together, is a two-year project designed to modernize the Land Development Code (LDC) and tackle the hurdles developers often face when navigating the system. 

For developers, this marks a major opportunity to shape the future of growth in Tampa. 

Aligning Permitting Practices

Tampa’s code revision brings long-awaited changes to the permitting process — changes that promise to speed up development and reduce costly delays. Previously, the City required developers to submit site and building permits as a single package, forcing projects to wait until every detail — civil and architectural — was finalized. That one-size-fits-all approach often stalled momentum, especially for phased developments. 

Now, that’s changing. Developers can submit site plans independently from building permits, a move that aligns Tampa with common practices throughout the region, including in unincorporated Hillsborough County. 

What does this mean in practice? Civil work can begin while building designs are still being fine-tuned. This is a game-changer for retail and commercial projects, where developers typically handle site improvements and tenants lead building design.

The result: greater flexibility, fewer delays, and faster progress. 

Creating Development Opportunities

This shift allows developers to: 

• Accelerate project timelines by initiating site work sooner 

• Improve coordination between developers and tenants 

• Avoid unnecessary redesigns triggered by premature building submissions 

• De-risk early investments, especially when site civil feasibility could make or break a project 

These changes also open the door for more flexibility on multi-pad commercial sites, large-scale infrastructure projects, and industrial developments, where previously, permitting could be held up waiting for a building to anchor the site. 

Moving Forward in Tampa

At Bohler, we’ve long served as advocates for our clients — navigating Tampa’s complex permitting landscape to keep projects moving forward. As the City embraces Tampa Forward, Bohler is ready to partner with developers to take full advantage of the streamlined approval process and unlock new opportunities across the market. 

Whether you previously ruled out Tampa due to permitting challenges or are just now exploring its potential, now is the time to reconsider.

For example, we recently supported a single-tenant retailer in Tampa’s urban core. Traditionally, our client would’ve faced significant delays, as the end user’s building plans would’ve needed to be finalized and submitted concurrently with our civil site plans. This often pushes schedules back by months. 

Instead, we helped them secure approval for the site civil plans first, enabling the client to kick off site work much earlier. Subsequently, the tenant could submit their specific building plans for approval later, once the site was underway. This resulted in major time savings and a more flexible development path forward for the end user. 

We’re here to guide you through the updated process, help you assess feasibility with confidence, and get your project moving — faster. 

Have questions about how the changes impact your next project? Let’s talk. Our experts are ready to help you capitalize on what’s next in Tampa.