Kendall isn’t only quiet suburbia. You just have to know where to go
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The new Miami: a series of villages
Not so long ago, Miami-Dade was a story of east — the sprawling Beach — and a mainland of undifferentiated suburbs, centered by a central business district that shut down at 5 p.m. Today the county increasingly is coalescing around a series of urban villages or centers — compact, pedestrian-friendly places where people can live, shop or dine out, even work or go to school, with few or mercifully short trips by car. Here’s a look at some of the county’s burgeoning neighborhoods.
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In South Florida, Kendall is synonymous with split-personality suburbia — peaceful bedroom community by night, “Mad Max Fury Road” car wars by day.
Yes, traffic is notoriously bad in Kendall, a census-designated, 16-square-mile place that stretches west from U.S. 1 to the Florida Turnpike. But to those who live there, the neighborhood is a much broader swath informally known as West Kendall, encompassing Kendale Lakes, The Crossings and The Hammocks and Kendall West.
Most people who live in Kendall don’t work there, since the primary industries are medical, restaurants and retail. But despite the soul-crushing rush hour traffic jams that can add more than an hour to workers’ commutes (Kendall Drive is currently in the midst of a year-long face-lift that has made driving even worse), many residents who love it there really, really love it.
“I moved here for the price, the neighborhood and the best place to raise my daughters,” said Drema Vargas, 46, who has lived in Kendall since 2004 and currently pays $1,900 a month for a three-bedroom unit at the Four Quarters Apartments and Townhomes — a relative bargain compared with rents in more easterly locations like Brickell and Coral Gables. “This area is ideal and it has everything you want — good schools, great restaurants, parks and lots of bars for happy hour celebrations.
“It’s true that when I worked in Brickell, I had a 90-minute commute each way,” Vargas said. “But you get used to it. I’m the queen of the rush hour. Give me all the traffic you want! I relax with my music in my car. I put on the jam in my little Honda Civic and dance in my seat. You have to suffer a little to enjoy everything else. I like Brickell, but it’s too expensive. You even have to pay for your parking spot there and then you have no money left over for a life.”
Kendall is named after Henry John Broughton Kendall, a director at the Florida Land and Mortgage Company, which bought the land in 1883. Residential development didn’t really start until the construction of the 826 Palmetto Highway in 1945, paving the way for the exodus to the suburbs. Seminole tribes had a large presence in the area, including one settlement at the current home of Kendall Baptist Hospital, until the bulldozers pushed them out.
Today, the Kendall area isn’t much to look at by car. Its grid-like streets mean there are only a few thoroughfares throughout the area. Drivers primarily see entrances to gated communities — townhomes, apartments and single-family sprawls — along with generic-looking strip malls in between busy intersections. But a ride through Kendall and its neighboring areas doesn’t give a proper sense of the life and activity away from those clogged road arteries. It’s not Wynwood, but it doesn’t want to be, either.
Official Kendall’s population is 74,631, with a median age of 42, a median household income of $72,817 and median property (single-family homes, apartments and townhouses) value of $356,500 — far below the county median of $490,000. The median gross rent is $1,514, according to Data USA, which crunches government statistic and numbers. The suburbs add another 108,690 residents to Kendall’s overall population.
According to Zillow, property values have climbed over the last five years, much like everywhere else in Miami-Dade. In the denser, more populous West Kendall area, median property values jumped from $197,000 in 2016 to a current $272,000 — an increase of 72%.
INTERACTIVE TOOL: WHERE CAN YOU AFFORD TO BUY OR RENT IN SOUTH FLORIDA
West Kendall’s unofficial westernmost boundary is Krome Avenue, which is about as close as you can get to the Everglades without an airboat. More than 80% of its residents are Hispanic. Kendall is big enough to house not one but two full-sized Baptist Hospitals, two jumbo-sized Target stores, a Walmart Supercenter, a Miami Dade College campus, the Miami Executive Airport, the 27-hole Miccosukee Golf and Country Club and the 18-hole Killian Greens Golf Course, and enough Taco Bell and McDonald’s restaurants to feed a small country.
Despite its lack of Wynwood-style hipness, the Kendall area boasts its own level of foodie cool, with restaurants such as Chef Adrienne Calvo’s Vineyard Restaurant and Bar to the Italian eatery Osteria Vecchio Piemonte. Although it is not known as a place for spotting celebrities, O.J. Simpson moved to a gated community in Kendall in 2000. He lived there until 2008, when he was convicted of armed robbery in Las Vegas. Janet Reno also lived most of her life in a Kendall home, which was built by her mother.
“This place is good enough to be in Brickell,” said Johnny Garcia, 25, on a recent Wednesday lunch hour as he chowed down on grilled chicken tacos at the funky health-food conscious PS Green, which is tucked away inside a strip mall in The Crossings. “I like that I don’t have to drive far to have a great meal and can walk in without waiting for a table.”
Go west
Kendall continues to attract residents, with new communities being built at its western and southernmost edges — villas and townhomes priced in the low to mid-$200,000 range. Prices are higher in Dadeland South, a new neighborhood that has risen across the street from Dadeland Mall near the Dadeland North Metrorail station, but that village is its own separate thing — an urban oasis in an otherwise residential area.
Despite two recent crimes that have received media attention, the average personal crime rate index in all of Kendall was 59 as of 2019 (100 represents the national average), according to the geographical firm Esri. The property crime index was 75. Public nuisances mostly consist of occasional drag racers barreling up and down Kendall Drive, blasting reggaeton at late hours. Schools in the area are top-notch with an overall grade of A, according to the Florida Department of Education.
Dan Castillo, a broker who specializes in Kendall and the surrounding areas, said that suburban living, far away from the noisy Ultra and III Points music festivals, is the area’s biggest selling point — along with its still reasonable home prices.
“The family environment and the diverse culture attract a lot of buyers and renters,” Castillo said. “The prices are still affordable — not as expensive as South Miami or the Gables, but not as cheap as Homestead or Cutler Bay — and the traffic isn’t a deal breaker because once you’re home, you have everything you need close to you. It’s a self-sustaining community.”
And although a casual visitor may see nothing but endless strip malls surrounding residential communities, those same malls often harbor hidden jewels — everything from the Kendall Ice Arena, one of only two ice-skating rinks in Miami-Dade (the other one is at the Scott Rakow Youth Center in Miami Beach), to Arcade Odyssey, an old-school pinball and Galaga video-game palace, to Tea ‘n Sanity, an apothecary with a used bookstore in the rear.
Eunice Rodriguez, who owns Tea ‘n Sanity, said that although customers come from as far away as the Keys for her medicinal teas, organic herbs and tinctures, the bookstore in particular thrives on word-of-mouth.
“Kendall is a big community and everybody cares about everyone else, and that isn’t always the case in other parts of Miami,” she said. “I’ve always had my business in Kendall. If someone comes in and discovers this bookstore, they will tell everybody they know. I get customers that way. Yes there’s a lot of traffic, but there’s a lot of traffic everywhere.”
That’s further proof that in Kendall, you have to ask a local where the good stuff is. Otherwise you’re liable to drive right past them.
“People who think Kendall is boring are dumb,” Vargas said. “They don’t know what they’re missing. We have great restaurants and bars and there’s less crime here. I don’t like living in the cool areas. Everything you could possibly want is here. I’m pro-Kendall, 100 percent.”
KENDALL/WEST KENDALL AT A GLANCE
Population: 183,321
Demographics: 85% Hispanic.
Median household salary: $58,000-$72,000
Primary work/industry: Health care, retail, services
Median property value: $259,000-$356,600
School grades: A
Personal crime: 59 (on a scale of 100)
Property crime: 75 (on a scale of 100)
Sources: Data USA, Florida Department of Education and Esri, which ranks crime using a national base line of 100.
ABOUT THIS SERIES
Traffic, the pandemic and the wave of new Miamians from around the U.S. is accelerating Miami’s transformation into a series of villages. In ‘The Map of the New Miami,’ we explore these growing enclaves and the forces shaping them. Community profiles can be found online at miamiherald.com; more will be added throughout the year.
This story was originally published May 23, 2021 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Kendall isn’t only quiet suburbia. You just have to know where to go."
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