- May 5, 2026
A new private event center may be coming to Daytona Beach to fill in one of the few vacant lots along the Halifax River.
The proposed Halifax Community Center would be located at 801 N. Halifax Ave. on the barrier island side of the Halifax River, near the Seabreeze Boulevard bridge. The three acre lot is currently vacant, but had previously been the site for a stalled high-rise condo project called the Bellaria.
“Halifax Community Center is the name intended to be a private event center,” said land use attorney Jessica Gow. “So family events, weddings, graduation parties.”
Gow, an attorney with Cobb Cole Law Firm, represents the developer, Gajanan Halifax LLC.
The event center project will be built in two phases, she said. Phase one is a two-story, 25,000-square-foot building that has a 7,000-square-foot ballroom space inside, an on-site manager and security suite, equipment rooms, a kitchen for catering and a back patio area.
Phase two is a separate, three-story condo building with 12 units that will be available for sale, not rent. Gow said per city regulations, the condos will not be allowed to be used as a short-term rental.
The property is surrounded on three sides by single-family homes. A public meeting with local residents within 500 feet of the project site was held on May 4 at the Daytona Grande Oceanfront Resort.
The project is still in the early stages of review with Daytona Beach, Gow told the crowd, with no firm dates for being reviewed by the city’s planning board or the Daytona Beach City Commission. The project first needs to be reviewed by city staff and the city’s Technical Review Team.
Because the property had a planning development zoning already in place, the developer is only applying to replace the previously-approved Bellaria project with the Halifax Community Center plans. The Bellaria project was approved by the Daytona Beach City Commission in 2015, but the development approval expired without any active construction.
Residents in attendance at the neighborhood meeting had several concerns about the property and the proposed projects: parking, road maintenance, the types of events the facility would host, hours of operation, and flood mitigation plans.
Gow said from Sunday to Thursday, the facility events would need to end by 11 p.m. and by 1 a.m. on Friday and Saturday. Gow said any music performed outside would have to end at 8 p.m. every day of the week.
A lack of parking was a large concern for residents. The ballroom space, Gow said, would be able to accommodate a maximum of 500 people, per fire codes, but that is without any tables or chairs taking up space. The actual occupancy number will likely be lower.
But, per city parking requirements, the developer has only tentatively outlined around 150 parking spaces for the property, some 24 of which would need to be dedicated to the future 12 condo units.
Several residents were also concerned about security if the property did not have a gated parking entrance to prevent overnight visitors.Others were concerned about the need of one
“Of all of the hotels, of all of the condos, all of the yacht clubs, all of the everything — I can’t imagine this is needed,” one resident said.
Gow said that while a market study has not been conducted at this stage, except to see what needs to be done for the process.
“Before a shovel is in the ground, I can promise that this development team will not invest millions and millions of dollars in construction of this facility without knowing that there's market demand once,” she said.
