Former Valencia site ready for expansion

The University of Tampa caused quite an uproar in June 2009 when it purchased the nearby Valencia Garden restaurant with the aim of expanding the campus along West Kennedy Boulevard.

The once-elite eatery for business and political types stood empty until the recent holidays, when bulldozers took it down and began scraping the site.

That activity is the first indicator that UT is finally looking to do something with the coveted property, part of an entire city block purchased over the last year and a half. Local power brokers lamented that the restaurant, with an 82-year history of serving some of Tampa s best chicken and yellow rice, would be turned into a campus parking deck — but that appears not to be the case.