Fort Myers emerging

Government officials, real estate developers and agents and business owners alike all knew that Fort Myers' downtown had the potential to be a stellar urban area.

But while progress was made in the 1990s to install infrastructure and important public areas, any momentum the city might have had was derailed by the economic recession of the past decade.

Today, though, more than a half dozen significant real estate projects are poised to add thousands of new residences, hundreds of hotel rooms, civic, retail and office space to the city's historic downtown.