Welcome to Downtown's Tempo District
How to find the historic St. James Church.
Public Parking
St. James at ENCORE!® is located at 1202 N. Governor St. in Tampa, Fla. The historic red brick structure sits between Central Ave. to the west and Governor St. to the east in Downtown’s Tempo District. Ray Charles Blvd. runs parallel to the building once home to St. James Episcopal Church.
Two-hour, on-street parking is available for free throughout the ENCORE!® community. For special events, attendees may find additional parking in the Ella parking garage (1st floor) at 1210 Ray Charles Blvd. Just so you know, the parking garage entrance is located off N. Governor St.
On-street parking next to Perry Harvey, Sr. Park is reserved for park patrons only. We ask guests of this special event to park along Ray Charles Blvd. or in the Ella parking garage.
Public Transportation
St. James at ENCORE!® is accessible by HART at the Marion Transit Center (1211 N. Marion St.) and bus routes 2/9/12 at 1112 E. Cass St.; 2/12 (Southbound) 918 N Nebraska Ave.; 2/12 (Northbound) 1001-1099 N. Nebraska Ave.
Meeting in a historic location.
St. James Episcopal Church was founded in 1895. In its early years, Bahamian and Afro-Cuban immigrants comprised most of the church's congregation. The church grew in the early Twentieth Century, and in 1921 it began holding services in the brick church you see today.
In the 1960s, this location was the site of one of the few integrated churches in the area.
In 1997, St. James' congregation merged with the Episcopal House of Prayer, built in 1922 at 2708 N. Central Avenue, Tampa, Fla.
Dobyville: One of Tampa’s forgotten Black neighborhoods
Many of these early Black communities – including Bealsville (near Plant City), the Dorcas Pond area near today’s Tampa Union Station, Red Quarters, and Four Quarters near downtown Tampa, sections of Port Tampa City and the Town of Fort Brooke, plus a large community in northwest Hillsborough County near today’s Citrus Park – are largely gone from the landscape. Another neighborhood that still exists today – at least in part – is the Dobyville section of west Hyde Park.