Under the Port Lucaya Marina sit 10.6 acres of seabed in the Bell Channel, leased for 99 years at one dollar a year. The lease requires the marina company to keep the property in good condition. The landlord, the Grand Bahama Development Company, known as DevCO, served notice in February 2013 that the company had failed to do so. In 2013 a Grand Bahama Port Authority official put the total repair bill at $214,558. In September 2020 part of the docking collapsed.
Thirteen years after that first notice, the marina has new owners, a $21.8 million plan, and a judge's order setting out the order of steps. The Grand Lucayan resort across the road has its own new owner and plan. A cruise port down the coast brings thousands of passengers to Grand Bahama on busy days. Any one of these could be the headline that says Lucaya is coming back. They don't move together, though, and each answers to a different gatekeeper. For a buyer comparing Lucaya with other parts of the island, the useful questions are which timeline a property depends on and who has to act next.
The Clock A Judge Set
On September 17, 2026, Justice Constance Delancy refused DevCO's request to forfeit the marina lease. She granted its fallback request for specific performance instead, which means the tenant has to do the repairs. As The Tribune reported, the ruling removed the risk that the landlord would take the marina back from Bahama Land Waterways. That company is owned by Port Lucaya Marketplace proprietor Peter Hunt and his business partner Shmuel Herschkowitz.
The published judgment also sets the order of what happens next:
- Within 30 days of the ruling, the marina company hires a structural engineer licensed or approved by the GBPA to assess the whole marina.
- Within 60 days of being hired, the engineer finishes a report recommending the repair or replacement work and shares it with DevCO.
- After that, the company applies to the GBPA for a building permit, with the report attached.
Counting from September 17, the hiring deadline falls around October 17, 2026. That is our calculation, not a date printed in the order. Both windows are deadlines, so each step can finish sooner. If both run their full length, the engineer's report is due around mid-December 2026, and the permit application goes in only after the report exists. The order gives the GBPA no deadline to decide on it. So the marina's clock is the most predictable of the three, and repair work under it still waits on a finished report and a permit review.
Why The Paperwork Mattered More Than The Barges
The Tribune reported that demolition started on Thursday, July 23. Executive Marine Management ran the job with a ten-member crew working from floating barges with a crane and an excavator. Its president, David Mellor, said the work would take about six weeks and would start with three dock fingers. Phase one of the wider plan calls for 60 concrete slips, dredging of the basin, renovated onshore facilities, a new fuel dock and upgraded marina offices.
Work stopped the next day after the GBPA issued a stop-work order. The two authorities involved are connected, and that connection explains the stop. The GBPA owns 50 percent of DevCO, and it is also Freeport's building regulator. DevCO is the landlord whose written authorization the GBPA needs before it can issue a permit. In comments to The Tribune, DevCO president Charisse Brown said the company welcomed the investment and had "no objection to the proposed works." She added that it had not yet received legal documents confirming the new ownership. Troy McIntosh, GBPA deputy director and city manager, described the Authority's position in the same report:
"We operate based on documentation, and the required documents were never submitted to this office."
He also said the Authority wants projects to move forward in a code-compliant way. For anyone reading Freeport development news, the lesson is that a crew on site and an approved project are separate facts, and only the second one restarts work. The September ruling clears the lease question. The Tribune also reported that liens and charges for unpaid legal fees and bills, allegedly left by former owners, may still have to be resolved.
The Hotel Across The Road Runs On Its Own Schedule
The marina's neighbor depends on a different kind of agreement. The Grand Lucayan is a government-to-developer deal, and its milestones have been reported in phases.
In May 2025, Concord Wilshire Capital announced that it had bought the 56-acre beachfront resort and the 160-acre Reef Golf Course from the Bahamian government for $120 million. In October 2025, The Tribune reported that title had passed to Concord Wilshire's Bahamian entity but the $120 million had not yet been paid. The paper understood the purchase to be a phased "take-down," with payments tied to demolition. A February 2026 report carried by Bahamas Chronicle still described the price as unpaid and discussions as active. That same month, the Office of the Prime Minister called one news report "incorrect" and said it continued to work with Concord Wilshire on the redevelopment. We found no later source confirming whether the full payment has been made.
The plan itself has grown. In April 2026, The Tribune reported a definitive agreement between Concord Wilshire and CTL Maritime. It covered an MSC Beach Club, a mega-yacht marina and casino resort, an Ancient Waters beach hotel and casino resort, and a redevelopment of the Reef Golf Course. At that point demolition still depended on environmental approvals. By May, Eyewitness News described a $700 million project anchored by a 550-room Hilton-branded property. The report said demolition had begun, with initial work focused on securing and fencing the site after permits were approved. It also described a 20-acre beach club expected to be open to Bahamians, residents and stopover visitors, plus at least 20 new restaurants, all to be built over the next two years.
"The next two years" describes how long development is expected to take. It is not a hotel opening date, and none of the sources we reviewed gives one. For Port Lucaya, this matters because merchants' visitor traffic has fallen since the resort closed. The marina could finish its slips well before the hotel reopens, and the marketplace would still be missing the guests who used to stay across the road.
The Ships Mostly Keep Their Passengers
The third clock looks the most encouraging and does the least for Port Lucaya so far. Grand Bahama's cruise passenger numbers have risen significantly. Speaking to The Tribune, however, Grand Bahama Chamber of Commerce president Ralph Hepburn estimated that "out of the 7,000 passengers that flow through there, less than 1,000 basically leave there," meaning Carnival's Celebration Key. He added that Freeport Harbour has not been getting ships regularly since Carnival moved, and now depends on MSC and Royal Caribbean, "which is not consistent."
That October 6 report also covered the temporary closure of Agave Restaurant at the marketplace, which affected about 40 workers. Hepburn said one of the owners described it as a renovation during a slow period, not a permanent closure. He said Port Lucaya businesses increasingly rely on local customers, and that the island has limited airlift and too few hotel rooms, especially in September and October. Two days later, The Tribune reported that PLP chairman Fred Mitchell had pressed cruise lines to make sure the marketplace gets its share of traffic. The same report noted that in September 2023, when two Carnival ships brought more than 7,000 passengers to Freeport in one day, one busload of at most 60 people reached the marketplace.
Cruise lines decide where passengers spend their shore time, and neither the marina owner nor the hotel developer controls that. The Grand Lucayan plan's MSC beach club is the one point where cruise traffic and Lucaya's own development overlap.
Reading A Lucaya Listing Against The Three Clocks
A property sold on its walk to the marketplace, its view over Bell Channel, or its nearness to the old resort depends on one or more of these timelines. The table shows where each one stands as of October 12, 2026, based on the reporting above.
| Clock | Who acts next | Next public marker | Still unconfirmed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Port Lucaya Marina | Port Lucaya Marina Company, then the GBPA | Engineer hired, about Oct 17; report about 60 days later | Lien resolution; permit decision date |
| Grand Lucayan | Concord Wilshire and the government | Visible demolition beyond fencing | Full payment of $120M; hotel opening date; signed operator |
| Cruise spillover | Carnival, MSC, Royal Caribbean | Changes to shore excursion routing | Any commitment to Port Lucaya visits |
On a Lucaya property, a buyer can ask for the specific milestone the listing assumes, how much of the property's appeal it rests on, and whether that milestone has a deadline or only a projection. Only the marina has dates set by a court. The hotel has a stated two-year development window. The cruise traffic has a promotional campaign and political pressure.
There is a smaller, nearer marker for anyone who wants to see the food scene up close. The Grand Bahama Island Promotion Board moved the full Restaurant Fest to 2027 and announced a one-night culinary event in November 2026 with the Xquisite Catamaran Center and The Galley Bar & Restaurant. Its date and other details have not been announced. The Galley is at 208 Kelly Court and lists its hours as Tuesday through Sunday.
If you're weighing a property near Port Lucaya and want to know which of these timelines it depends on, Colibri Bahamas can go through the court sequence, the resort milestones and the listing details with you, discreetly and at your pace. Schedule a consultation, and we'll match each claim in a Lucaya listing to the step that has to happen first.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
