Ok, so here's the deal: Ayer's Medical Plaza is a fairly large four (or is it five?) floor medical arts building on University Avenue near Alachua General Hospital. Mainly composed of doctors' offices and a day-surgical center, Ayer's also hosts a deli and a pharmacy (I think the latter is still there, at least). Also, there's some truly odd things housed in Ayers: the public utilities legal office or such is near a doctor's office I once went to and a variety of other non-medical offices seem to be hidden here and there. I guess the office space was on the cheap?
Ayers, with a few possible exceptions, appears to not have been updated much since the early 1980s . . . it still has the typical hospital tile floors, dark wood-grain doors, potted palms, bad reproductions of Impressionist art, and name-plates (for the offices) in that very generic white on black sans-serif lettering used for such twenty years ago. In this age of fancy medical centers and offices the likes of those of Shands/ UF Physicians, it's a rare treat to see something along the lines of Ayers out there. When UF closes up Shands at AGH I have to wonder what the fate of Ayers will then be? I think it will certainly survive, but it will no longer serve its original purpose of being close by to what was once the city's leading hospital.
Ayers gets five stars for just being its oddball self. read more