After the new proposed design for Germain Arena was revealed, residents expressed mixed feelings about the Hertz Arena bright yellow design.
“I just think that’s a horrible color, it’s fine now. They need to pick a nicer color for our beautiful area,” said Estero resident Diane.
The Director of Community Development said in an email they made suggestions about “toning down colors” before moving forward with the project.
“Possibly if they went with a pale yellow instead of a bright yellow,” said Estero resident Dan Appel. “I understand that’s Hertz colors, but if you look at Hertz headquarters its a white building.”
But Hertz isn’t backing down on the color yellow.
Estero Villagers packed into the design review board meeting Wednesday night to get one message across.
“Reconsider that garish yellow color, I don’t know how else to describe it,” said Estero resident Joe Miceli.
Some attendees said if Hertz is so committed to yellow, might as well go all in by coloring the roadway to the building yellow as well, and installing a sign that says, ‘follow the yellow brick road.’
Villagers pointed to the mild and toned down style of Estero. They claimed it is part of the reason why they moved there. Now, residents are saying plopping a big yellow building in the middle of it would take away the charm.
Hertz says they’ll take the feedback and come up with a solution, but yellow isn’t completely out of the picture.
“We’ve been here for 100 years, and we’re proud of our yellow,” said Senior Vice President of Hertz Jayesh Patel.
The mayor said the next step for the Hertz Arena design is it will likely got to a mediation process to come up with some kind of compromise.