ORANGE BEACH, AL — Developers hoping to build two new condo towers near the only north-south beach connection in Orange Beach, the intersection of north-south Alabama 161 and east-west beach highway Alabama 182 are finally ready to present their plans to Orange Beach Planning Commission on Tuesday, according to an agenda released by the city.

Nathan Cox of Bellator Real Estate and Development says the project will rival if not surpass other opulent condo towers already in place in the city. Originally scheduled for the November Planning Commission meeting and then again for Dec. 8, Cox and other developers asked for more time before both of those dates.

“We decided to table our submittal until the January meeting in order to allow for additional time to finalize some things with several groups we are currently working with in order to make sure everything is 100 percent buttoned up prior to moving forward,” Cox said via an email to The Islander.

To complete the project developers must ask for and receive a planned unit development from the Planning Commission and eventually the full City Council. The 35- and 36-story planned towers to be called Ascension and Grace far exceed the height requirements for the beach resort zoning regulations.

The plot of land is between Summer Chase Condominiums on the west and the Hampton Inn on the east. There is another empty lot between Summer Chase and the proposed development site where the Against the Wind development once stood. It was destroyed in Hurricane Ivan.

On the east between land proposed for the project and the Hampton Inn is another parcel owned by the same group, Gulf Opportunity Fund. Cox says his group hopes to develop that parcel into another hotel or like property in the future.

“No plans are in the works for anything,” Cox said of the strip. “It could be either a hotel or a condo but personally I'd like to see a higher end hotel flag go there at some point.”

Adding 278 units with the traffic focal point the main beach intersection in town has drawn some concerns and the area has been studied by the Alabama State Department of Transportation, according to project architect Forest Daniell.

Daniell said the solution, blessed by the Alabama Department of Transportation, would see the developers providing a feeder road or service road on the south shoulder of Perdido Beach Boulevard that would funnel traffic to the Hampton Inn light on the west and the Alabama 161 light on the east. It would also provide access to the former Against the Wind property as well.

A PUD is necessary to circumvent the zoning regulations which currently allow only 25-story buildings in the beach resort zone with the bottom five used for a parking deck.

There are three towers already in Orange Beach that received PUD permission to exceed those limitations, Phoenix West I and II at the west end of beach road and Turquoise Place with two towers less than a mile east of the Alabama 161-Alabama 182 intersection.

Turquoise Place is one of the tallest buildings on the northern Gulf Coast at 377 feet. The towers in the proposed project would be Ascension at more than 450 feet and Grace at approximately 435 feet.

That height would rival Birmingham's Wells Fargo Tower, at 454 feet, as the second tallest building in Alabama. Mobile's RSA Battle House Tower is the state's tallest building at 745 feet.

Grace would house 77 units while Ascension is planned for 201.