With steel girders reaching more than 55 feet in the air, the new $24.3 million headquarters of the region's toll-road agency is taking shape next to the busiest stretch of State Road 408.
But while the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority sees the new 81,000-square-foot building with its three-story atrium as a symbol of progress and the future, motorists such as Kevin Mueller see it as evidence of the embattled agency's extravagance.
"It sticks out like a sore thumb -- like a castle on the hill," said Mueller, an Orlando software engineer who has watched construction progress as he slows to pay the 75-cent toll on his commute. "I don't know if they need it or not. I just thought it sends the wrong signal."
The new building is four times the size of the agency's current headquarters. And while it will be open to the public, it will be mostly office and meeting space for use by expressway employees and their contractors.
The building's size and cost, and the authority's decision to provide office space for its contractors, make the headquarters seem like a mistake to the authority's newest board member.
"If I were looking at this from a pure business decision, I wouldn't have done it," said Harvey Massey, who was appointed to the authority by Gov. Charlie Crist in February.
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""If I were looking at this from a pure business decision, I wouldn't have done it," said Harvey Massey, who was appointed to the authority by Gov. Charlie Crist in February."
But since its only tax money I say lets go for it!!!