A standing-room-only crowd of unhappy condo owners couldn’t dissuade the Sunny Isles Beach City Commission from pushing ahead Dec. 22 with its plan for developing Heritage Park.

Neither could the presence of a noted land use attorney, a court stenographer and the clear hint of potential legal challenges ahead.

So in a special meeting, the commission voted 4-0, with George “Bud” Scholl absent, to approve the rezoning of the property at 19200 Collins Ave. from B-1 (neighborhood business) to CF (community facility).

Speaker after speaker hammered the city on points that ranged from the technical to the philosophic. At one point, City Attorney Hans Ottinot acknowledged that the city had erred in formally informing residents near the park of the city’s intentions. At another point, the city said that it had ordered up a traffic study after residents complained about proposed changes in the route between Collins Avenue and the condo complex’s parking structure. The results of that study are expected in mid-January.

But in the final analysis, none of that matters, Mayor Norman Edelcup said. The issue before the commission was strictly a rezoning matter and those issues only matter when the city considers a site plan for the project.

And there’s the ticking time bomb in this situation.

The city maintains it doesn’t need to go through the normal site plan process for a city park, citing practices it inherited from the county. But to be sure, it has given first approval to a measure that specifically exempts the city from needing any site plan review for a park.

Without a site plan to challenge, opponents were left wondering how their voices would be heard.

Cue the lawyers.

Attorney Jeffrey Bercow, a principal with the highly regarded Miami land use practice of Bercow Radell & Fernandez, welcomed the mayor’s invitation to meet with city staff and discuss the results of the traffic study with an eye toward finding a win-win resolution for his condo association clients. After all, he explained, the residents support the park, just not the traffic flow or the process they consider fatally flawed. But Bercow also wondered what would happen if a compromise isn’t reached and the commission finalizes its position that no site plan review is needed.

City officials say they are confident the traffic study will support their view that altering the traffic flow from the condo parking garage is a good plan. The condo owners seem equally sure any deviation from the existing traffic pattern is a bad idea.

The next round is scheduled for the city commission’s Jan. 28 meeting.