ORANGE BEACH – Look for the signs. They’ll be larger than what you are used to and in places normally not allowed. But not too much larger.

The Wharf Landing PUD for Margaritaville Resort is up for approval of its final step toward beginning work on the Amenity District, and the main remaining issues – the only remaining issue – deal with some slight deviations from the city’s sign ordinance.

“The purpose is to implement signage requirements for the base signage in this particular community and the Margaritaville brand,” City Planner Griffin Powell said. “Deviations for this is dealing with the sign ordinance and both requests of the result are based on the signage. This particular Margaritaville brand really doesn't fit into our current sign requirements.”

The formal request is to rezone 7.8 acres from general business to planned unit development for the Amenity District at Margaritaville. The planning commission gave an 8-0 favorable recommendation at its August meeting.

Among those sought are a sign affixed to the roof, currently prohibited by the city’s sign ordinance, and a sign topping the waterslide and greeting visitors to the resort is slightly bigger than the regulations allow.

Also, a video screen will be attached to the roof of the on-site Fins Restaurant and Bar.

Council suspended the rules to consider the ordinance change immediately. The sign deviations passed on a unanimous 5-0 vote. Councilman Pat Simpson was absent for the meeting.

Four buildings and the waterslide tower are the components of this phase with Fins Restaurant and Bar being the biggest at 10,400 square feet, the Salty Rim Pool Bar at about 2,000 square feet and two buildings of about 3,000 square feet each for bathrooms, locker rooms and storage for equipment. All are one-story buildings. The final component is the waterslide tower at the northwest corner of the parcel, which is 55 feet in height.

Also in the amenity area will be a kids’ dry playground, kids’ pool, lazy river and stage and event area. According to Powell’s presentation at the Aug. 18 council meeting, the developer will own and maintain the Amenity District separately from other resort districts.

When completed, the entire site will include 354 rental units with 160 in a key condo-hotel, 49 traditional condos, 97 resort cottages and 48 resort bungalows.

Planned for the resort are more than “50,000 square feet of entertainment, retail and dining outlets, a 7-acre amenity deck featuring multiple pools, waterslides and food and entertainment venues, all designed and operated under the Margaritaville brand.”

There will be spaces planned for an arcade, pickleball courts along with banquet and meeting spaces, the agreement states, as well as “infrastructure, including utility connections, waterworks, sewers, bridges, grading, curbing, guttering and paving of roads and streets, surface parking and other public improvements,” according to city documents. There will also be 42 transient boat slips built in phase one.

To help spur the project, the city will give the resort a tax incentive of 50% off sales and lodging taxes for 30 years or until a warrant issued by the city of $95 million is repaid. It was voted on by council in January 2025.

“The city would issue the warrant to Wharf Landing in the maximum principal amount of $95 million upon completion of the phase one improvements and the new phase one infrastructure,” the agreement with the city states. “The warrant would not bear interest and would be payable in quarterly installments over a 30-year period. The warrant would be payable based on 50% of the city’s sales and lodging tax revenues received by the city generated from the development.”