In its 1950s and 1960s heyday, Grand Bahama was a fashionable island escape, a rival to Cuba for wealthy Americans and just a 25-minute hop by light aircraft from Miami. Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr were regular fixtures in the casinos on this most northerly of the Bahamas islands, jazz star Count Basie and tycoon Howard Hughes had homes there and many more celebrities lapped up the island’s tax-free temptations.
But since Bahamian independence from Britain in 1973 Grand Bahama, dubbed “the Venice of the Caribbean” because of its canal network, has lost its lustre.
Smaller neighbouring islands have found ways to keep the tourists coming: the capital, Nassau, on the island of New Providence, has its James Bond associations, thanks to a co-starring role in 2006’s Casino Royale, and glitzy towers and casinos; Bimini was Ernest Hemingway’s hangout; and Abaco is the sailing capital.
But Grand Bahama, a 96-mile-long outcrop of pine forests and undeveloped waterfront, lacks that sense of instant recognition and remains – for an exotic island on the US’s doorstep – curiously undervalued and unexploited.
“We want to develop a personality,” says Terence Roberts, a director at the Grand Bahama tourist board. “We are the US’s nearest neighbour. Ninety-five per cent of our visitors come from the US and Canada because they like the fact that we’re foreign – but not that foreign.
“We benefited from the growth of Florida’s real estate market in the 1940s and 1950s, but now there’s a slowdown in second home buying and we need to build tourism based on our heritage and our communities. We need to sharpen up the skills of our service personnel so people get a better sense of value when they visit.”
To help rebuild Grand Bahama and its new identity, international developers have moved in to transform swathes of land such as the area around Freeport, the island’s main hub, which were ravaged by hurricanes in 2004 and 2005.
Their timing, of course, is far from ideal. Just as the bulldozers arrived, bringing hope that Grand Bahama’s turnround was happening at last, the global crisis hit, leaving the island to feel the shockwaves of the US recession.
The biggest project, the Ginn Corporation’s $5bn Ginn Sur Mer – a mega-resort of 6,000 homes, an Atlantis-style hotel, new canals and the Caribbean’s biggest superyacht marina, covering the island’s entire western tip around Old Bahama Bay – is currently more a case of Ginn on ice as the original ambitious plans have been pared down due to the tough economic conditions.
Forging ahead regardless and regenerating a large area of Freeport known as Bahamia is Harcourt Developments, the Dublin-based developer behind Belfast’s Titanic Quarter, Europe’s largest city-centre regeneration scheme.
Harcourt plans to renovate Xanadu Beach and the Xanadu Princess hotel, where Howard Hughes secluded himself in the top two floors during his final years. The company has also built two out of five blocks at Suffolk Court, in the heart of Bahamia, the first completely hurricane-proof properties on the island.
The 85 large, high-quality apartments near Xanadu Beach start at $299,000 for a 1,000 sq ft one-bedroom property – prices have been discounted by 25 per cent in recent months – and leases on moorings on the canal are available for $25,000 a year. The most expensive properties at Suffolk Court are three-bedroom 3,300 sq ft penthouses for $1.35m.
Hurricane Proof properties at Suffolk Court
Harcourt’s Mike Murphy – previously a well-known TV and radio presenter in Ireland – admits that the economic conditions are a huge obstacle but he sees great potential in the island.
“Grand Bahama has always been that place that’s about to happen. Freeport, the free trade zone, is ripe for development and the new government, which came in last year, is totally pro-Grand Bahama and has vowed to bring in change,” Murphy says.
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