[1] The place name "South Jacksonville" or Southside has similarly evolved, and now signifies a much larger area of southeastern Duval County.

The boundaries used by the San Marco Preservation Society are Interstate 95 to the north, Philips Highway to the east, Greenridge Road to the south, and the St. Johns River to the west.

[9] Permanent habitation on this part of the St. Johns River came only during Florida's British period, when officials established a ferry crossing at the Cow Ford in 1760.

[10] When the Spanish resumed control of Florida in 1783 they built Fort San Nicolas beside the ferry landing in present-day St.

In 1873, Elizabeth Hendricks sold the eastern part of the Hendricks-Hudnall tract to retiring Florida governor Harrison Reed, who moved there and established the original South Jacksonville development.

[14] By 1907, South Jacksonville was a regional transit hub with a population of around 600, though it still lacked paved streets, sidewalks, and electric lights.

[6] In 1857, the Red Bank Plantation House became a residence in the Colonial Manor neighborhood that grew around it; it is Jacksonville's second oldest residential building still in use.

[17] The bridge triggered economic development in South Jacksonville as well, though it greatly reduced the ferry business, which disappeared entirely within twenty years.

[6] San Marco, which eventually gave its name to the former area of South Jacksonville, broke ground in 1925 as the city's most ambitious development.

[19] San Marco, designed as a fashionable, upscale development in keeping with Villa Alexandria's reputation, comprised 250 lots and a commercial district.

It was remarkably successful from the beginning; apparently driven by land speculation, San Marco shattered local records by selling every lot within three hours of putting them up for sale, even though very little work had begun.

San Marco was originally planned in the Italian Renaissance revival style, which influenced the name of the development and several of its streets.

[21] Unlike most of Jacksonville's neighborhoods, San Marco's momentum and profusion of desirable properties carried it through the collapse of the 1920s Florida land boom and the onset of the Great Depression.

While other neighborhoods faltered in the downturn, in 1929, Telfair Stockton formed a company to purchase and develop the remainder of the former Villa Alexandria property as the "First Addition to San Marco".

In the 1990s, the City of Jacksonville undertook a major renovation and streetscaping project, which included restoring the fountain with three lion statues inspired by the Piazza San Marco.