The Ritz-Carlton is scheduled to open a 375-room resort on Dec. And greeting them are signs that South Beach's glory days are indeed far from over, that the ''new South Beach'' may, in fact, be South Beach itself. So, like swallows to Capistrano, the hipsters are returning to South Beach. The much-touted Fort Lauderdale? You've got to be kidding. Puerto Rico? Fine for one visit to the Water Club, but that's it. Jamaica? You're chained to your resort because of local crime and the lack of good restaurants. Bart's? No direct flights and prohibitively expensive once you get there. But what were the alternatives? Rio? It's where the beautiful people are flocking, to be sure, but not for a weekend getaway. Ocean Drive now a fraternity-house nightmare of sports bars, fuzzy navels and hot body contests - a ''South Street Seaport for tourists,'' in the words of Brett Sokol, a columnist for New Times, a Miami weekly.Īnd thus the hip crowd moved on in search of the new South Beach. The litany of complaints piled up as this high-profile strip of Miami Beach seemingly fell victim to its own success. FOR the past few years, the word has gone out among the fashionable set: South Beach is so over.