Ken Griffin is running into opposition to his plans to build a personal heliport in Miami Beach, in a rare instance of pushback to the financier’s South Florida development spree.
The leaders of eight luxury condominiums lining Biscayne Bay are urging local officials to reject Griffin’s plan to land his helicopter at a marina he is building for his yachts near the city’s port. The Miami Beach land-use committee recommended the project to the city planning board at a public hearing Thursday, but it still will need to be approved by the city’s governing commission later this year.
In an email to Miami Beach’s mayor and city commissioners that was reviewed by Bloomberg, the condo group said that Griffin’s chopper flying near their homes would be loud and disruptive.
The condo buildings, located roughly a third of a mile from the proposed heliport site, are home to about 2,000 apartments, from one-bedrooms priced at less than $1 million to a triplex penthouse on the market for $78 million.
“He’s saying that his helicopter is the quietest model, that noise won’t be an issue for us,” John Stimmel, president of the Icon, a 42-floor condo, said in an interview. Stimmel, who rallied his neighbors to oppose Griffin’s plan, rejects that argument.
“I asked ChatGPT if landing helicopters that close will be noisy, and guess what?,” he said. “It will be noisy.”
The heliport is one of the first proposals from Griffin that’s run into significant public resistance since he moved his family and his financial firm, Citadel, to Miami in 2022. Griffin, who has a net worth of $57.5 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, has assembled a real estate portfolio valued at well over $1 billion in South Florida.
The backlash is a sign that some Miamians have started to chafe at the super-wealthy transplants who’ve been remaking the city since the Covid-19 pandemic. Other similar fights, including a battle over plans to transform a municipal marina in Miami into a refuge for superrich yachters, have been playing out elsewhere in South Florida.
Not all of Griffin’s neighbors oppose the heliport. Residents of three nearby enclaves for the wealthy — Palm Island, Hibiscus Island and Star Island — told city officials they support it. Griffin also owns property on Star Island.
“A helipad is an appropriate accessory use for the marina,” the residents’ representative, Chris Torto, wrote to city officials on Sept. 4. The marina, which is still under construction after being approved last year, “will enhance the character of the Islands,” he added.
