Thanks for posting this, Randy. This is very helpful in getting the word out. This project is critical to, and emblematic of, our approach to the core of the city. Basically we are talking about a paradigm shift in land use and development philosophy that makes to one that is less auto-centric to one that is much more pedestrian friendly. This is not an easy transition to make, but it is basically an extension of what is working downtown into commercial corridors in the neighborhoods around downtown. We will use the same sort of form based zoning approach that was used for the South Knoxville waterfront and will soon be underway for Cumberland Avenue where Anne Wallace (working with Bob) is the point person.

You will see the results soonest in Downtown North, where much is already happening. We have coordinated the work of Community Development with the facade improvement program with that of MPC (and KCDC)in these efforts, which basically lessen parking suburban on-site parking and set-back requirements that presently get in the way of revitalization in the core. With more on-street parking, fewer lanes, wider sidewalks, buildings and businesses that front on the street can work, and can become mixed-use work-live structures that people in nearby neighrborhoods can reach by walking.

This effort in the Downtown North area is led in our dept. by Bob Whetsel, who, along with his wife Melinda, was one of the early pioneers / leaders in the revitalization of 4th and Gill. Folks in 4th and Gill, Old North, Mechanicsville, and Park Ridge and other areas have already done a lot of the investing and heavy lifting to provide a set of strong neighborhoods that support a revitalized set of commercial corridors.

A lot is already happening in the area, but there area lot of real challenges in front of us. A lot of this was citizen-driven, beginning with the Broadway-5th Task Force. I hope folks in the area and beyond will take the time to participate and support this effort, which is the among the best and most efficient (and doable within constrained budgets!) policy responses I can imagine to the energy and environmental challenges we face.

Just curious, do you object to the phrasing or the "paradigm shift" itself?

Efforts to form an inclusive association of residents, merchants, and property owners in the Downtown North area are underway. Draft provisions of bylaws for organization of the association are to be considered at the next meeting on June 30.

Location of the meeting will be finalized soon. Please contact me for more info. All who have an interest are welcome and invited.

rsc@w3st.com

I like that the city is looking at ways to change the codes and building forms but I have a couple of questions.

You have the Central plan, the Magnolia plan, Waterfront plan and Cumberland Ave plan. Bearden plan?? That's an awful lot of new development for a little city. Are we suffering from irrational exuberence?

What's with the elimination of ANY required parking (see waterfront plan)? Seems a bit naive in our car centric society. I figured it was just an excuse for a publicly funded parking garage at the time. Does Bill Haslam have insider info from Pilot Oil about $10/gallon gas?

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

Bill Lyons,
I, for one, greatly appreciate the city's focus on this area as I believe it is key to sustainable city center. While it is just outside the scope of the various initiatives geographically, the scuttlebutt about St. Mary's is very concerning. Even more concentration of services for the homeless, mentally-ill and addicted between Woodland and Broadway is unbelievable to me and I hope that they City will take an active role to ensure that this does not occur.

I would further suggest that the city become actively involved in the future TDOT project involving the connection of Hall of Fame Drive to Broadway. Leaving its interstate-esque design as opposed to a simple, urban T-intersection would be yet another lost opportunity. Unlike the ill-conceived rebuilding of 40 through downtown, it is not too late to redo this intersection which could possibly reconnect Luttrell St. (at least with a pedestrian bridge) and reconnect 1 or 2 other streets to Broadway making the community more pedestrian and bicyclist friendly.
Thanks,
Bill

I don't want to quibble about semantics, but as landscape architect I think of a plan first as a drawing. I was thinking of the drawing MPC presented at a LWV meeting that I would define as a "conceptual master plan". It showed road changes and blocks of potential new developments. Similar to what I've seen for the north central corridor, and the large scale waterfront plans for that matter.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

I think the Haslem gang is really
doing a bang up job on center city
projects or plans or whatever one
wants to call it.

The center city developed more or less
like this:

1.downtown..incorporated in 1794..

2.Magnolia annexed in 1868(ok I know the
eastern part of Magnolia was caught up
in the 10th ward flap of 1893)

3.North Central & Cumberland in 1897

4.Park City,Lonsdale & Oakwood in 1917.

When I read Bill's post it seamed to me
the Haslem folks are working on plans/
projects in the oldest sections of the city.

I know Bill Lyons talks about the vibrancy of
a central city adds to the culture.

However,I would make the arguement that
these areas of our city have a vine ripened
infra stucture.

When we develope the central city

We dont have to cut down any trees..
flood downstream..build new roads or
widen 2 lane country roads.

The traffic lights are in place..same with
sewer/water/power & cable.

There are schools & parks & sidewalks.

Oh yea..the bus serves the central city well.

Just keep plugging along,folks.

Finally,I want to say this.

Am I a supporter of Mayor Haslem

Hell yes.

Do I think everything he's trying to do
will work out.

Hell no.

But by god this guy tries every day
to see if he can make Knoxville better.

I am one voter that wants to say

Right On..Brother Haslem..Right On

Very poetic, Bill Y, as usual.

I like your imagery: vine ripened vs. hothouse grown.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

This is funny and no wonder government people stay off of the blogs. Lyons tries to explain what they are doing. He takes time to go into a lot of detail. So he gets criticized for his word choice. Then someone brings up the question of how the city can do all of the stuff in the center city at once. Lyons explains that they are not doing it all at once and that some are further along than others. He explains the difference in the plans, and that only the waterfront has a lot of new stuff that you would plan for. Another quarrel with a word choice. Then it gets funny. He is criticised for not doing anything on Magnolia and then explains that it is early for Magnolia and the city is putting its money into housing. He doesnt say it but everyone knows what happened with Five points when the stores came in too early without the neighborhoods being ready. Then somemone links to a powerpoint and says there is a plan there but when you go to the powerpoint it was to get ideas from a meeting. Then the city is criticized for not having a Magnolia plan but somehow they are supposed to place businesses or get busiesses to build there. The best is that Pizza Palace is 45 years old. So the City obviously is supposed to got rehab Pizza Palace.

The great thing is that the City of Knoxville is doing what looks like great things on Central and nobody except Bill Youg could say a thing about it but they are doing too much and not enough and have a plan and don't have a plan and the director of development uses words they dont like. Kudos to Bill Young for figuring it out and being able to be say something nice. Like I said that is pretty funny.

Plans or no plans I think what will help Magnolia the most are 2 things. One will take a lot of money and effort and city county cooperation. The other will take a staff meeting and may already be done.

First Austin East needs to be turned around. Whatever it takes. Make it a first rate high school. They've made the teachers all reapply, why not make the students reapply as well. Get some funding from the city. Ask MPC to do a study on how much property tax the city would collect if all those vacant lots in Burlington had homes on them.

Second: I hope I NEVER again call police dispatch about a suspicious character on Fifth avenue and get this snarky response: "well what do you want me to do about it?". Yes Ma'am, I know the guy has rights and I'm glad we live in a country where he has rights. I don't expect you to snatch him up and ship him to Guantanamo but can't you at least send a cruiser by to give him the evil eye? Maybe a plainclothes cop if you have one available. I know he's selling drugs, you know he's selling drugs, and I wish you would be grateful I'm giving you a tip rather than treat me as an annoyance.

Yes Phil, I know this has nothing to do with Central. It's called thread drift and it happens. Unlil last night I did not realize that the Magnolia drawings had nothing to do with the city.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

There is also a road diet plan that would reduce North Central Street to two through lanes with turn lanes at signalized intersections from Broadway to Woodland.

Is the city planning to cameraize the intersections when they signalize them?

Better watch it, Dr. Lyons, Phil will zing you for making a joke.

I hope he starts a blog for city cheerleaders only. It's so annoying when people disagree in public!

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

From an article on pedestrian friendly road designs in Wired magazine.....

(link...)

However no red light camera revenue.

Oh yeah, I encountered a few of those stopsign free intersections in Seattle and coulda had a wreck at one. They'll need to figure out a way to ban tourists from these areas. If I hadn't read about this (sorry bizz) paradigm shift somewhere I would have assumed a downed sign and barreled through the other intersections as well.

To me a stop sign at least means slow down and see if someone's coming because they have the right of way.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

Believe it or not, I do stop for pedestrians as a general rule. I am trying to do this more consistently. Partly from traveling in europe and partly out of respect that they are polluting the environment less than I.

The rolling stop comes from not wanting to waste energy accelerating from a dead stop.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

I'll bet it's been difficult to adjust to rising energy prices by learning to roll through stop signs. If only more people were as conscientious maybe we wouldn't be in this mess.
~m.

Yeah, it's a tough life, Michael.

Do I get extra points for rolling through a stop sign on my electric bicycle?

To get back on subject, I would like to see a good bike route from South Knox to Happy Hollow. I thought I read/heard about an "alternate route" under consideration to north central via Mechanicsville. Now that I think of it, I may be able to scout one myself via 2nd creek and Blackstock and crossing over the RR tracks.

____________________________________
Less is the new More - Karrie Jacobs

I don't live in this neighborhood, but do business there. I'm going to attend this meeting.

In looking at downtown revitalization in other cities, the primary object for downtown revitalization seems pretty simple- entice people to want to be downtown and to bring their wallets with them. One jumpstarter to that is to entice the employers, so that if people work downtown, they will eat there, buy there, and maybe want to be entertained there. And, a downtown actually has something of an advantage as convenient central location for museums, stadiums, theatres, and other cultural attractions to the surrounding area.

So, you focus on commercial recruitment, and the relevant governmental and cultural entities locate the primary public and cultural draws downtown. What follows is a greater demand that provides an opportunity for further supply, i.e., more businesses can succeed downtown or nearby because more people have been drawn there, and more people will live there.

Most U.S. cities followed that pattern for 150 years, then with the advent of faster transportation and an accomodating highway system, came the burbs. Businesses realized that going to where the people are meant locating near the subdivision. Downtowns were emptied. Some cities have reversed this trend, some haven't. Knoxville hasn't, and based upon where we are currently, it won't in the near term.

While we all talk about downtown revitalization, the larger corporations located here have built new headquarters in the burbs (Goody's, Pilot Oil)- or moved to contiguous counties (Clayton, Hackney). One of our critical cultural components, our professional baseball team, was moved to another county. Our governmental entities attempted to find a main attraction, Universe Knoxville, etc., but failed to reach a concensus. No similar effort has even been intitiated or promoted in the private sector.

Ironically, during this period, 2 of our mayors had considerable influence in this regard. The Testerman family was instrumental in residential development in West Knoxville. The Haslam family of course controls Pilot Oil and the once-named Knoxville Smokies. This isn't a political commentary, both Mayors have remarkable achievements to speak of, but only a commentary on the movement away from downtown.

Imagine the boost to downtown if Clayton Homes, Pilot Oil, Goody's, and other local companies had located there. Imagine the boost if a landmark cultural venue were built, and other cultural venues remained. Municipal plans for downtown would not just be well-intentioned wishes for increasing use and demand, but instead would be infrastructural necessities to accomodate increasing use and demand.

Knoxville's business and political leadership, which understandably overlap, have not "voted with their feet" by locating and/or recruiting downtown. For the private sector, that's their prerogative. Although it would have been nice to see a concentrated effort to revitalize downtown, obviously the will to do it in the local private sector is not there. Instead, I think that what we are seeing is an effort to appease those who want a revitalization by creating plans that will make things look a little nicer, but don't really address true revitalization, and won't bring many more people to the area.

If past behavior is an indication of the future, successful and substantive downtown revitalization in Knoxville will not occur until a new generation of business and political leadership, with a commitment to investing their own interests downtown, takes the reins.

This isn't a political message or even a criticism, but only one person's view as to where we're going based on where we've been.

Don't believe me? Take a look at the downtown landscape, and remove just 3 buildings- the Whittle Building, Riverview Tower, and First Tennessee Plaza, and imagine what our downtown would like like without them. Those buildings are there because just 3 business leaders, Whittle, Jake Butcher, and C.H. Butcher, like them or not, committed to downtown. Similar commitment is not now seen, nor is recruitment, and any plans without that commitment and recruitment are really somewhat insignificant.

1.My Dad grew up on Highland..
around '50/'51 his parents bought a
house in Holston Hills.

When my Grandfather passed in '56
my Aunt Dot & Uncle Joe's family
moved into the Holston Hills home
with my Grandmother.

2.My mother's family bought a house
in West Hills around '58/'59.

3.Jim Coffin(who also grew up on Highland
& is a dear friend of my Dad's)in the
late '50's moved Coffin Shoe Store
from Downtown to Bearden Center &
bought a house in West Hills.

So when I was a kid I spent time
in Holston Hills & West Hills.

The first thing that changed in the migration
from the central city to Holston Hills & West Hills
was grocery shopping.

Other than a delivery from the corner
market every day.

Moms,on Saturday,drove to the
White Stores in the nearest strip mall
& bought groceries for the week.

Then,as with Coffin Shoes,the
smaller local retail shops began to
migrate from down town to these
strip malls.

Before you knew it..movie theaters &
all kinds of stuff began popping up
on Magnolia & Kingston Pk.

Never forget when the first McDonalds
opened on Magnolia.

We were evolving into a car society.

No longer did you walk or take streetcar
downtown..to see a movie or shop.

Nor did the high school kid bring todays
groceries to the back door.

We got in our car & drove to the strip mall.
Bought food,shoes,clothes ect.

We also stopped going to the Tn Theater
& started going to the new theaters
on Kingston Pk & Magnolia.

The department stores had not made the move
out of Downtown & they began to feel the
economic pinch of less traffic.

Department stores do not buy space they
rent space.

They do this because when
traffic patterns change they pull
up stakes & follow the traffic.

Downtown started devoloping in 1794.

In 1970 it was still the only place that
provided the infrastructure for a department
store.

Then BANG..in two short years..WEST TOWNE MALL
was built & the department stores left downtown.

Today a vast majority of Knox Countians
must get in a car & drive to do anything.

My goodness,West Towne is right next
to West Hills but I double dog dare
you to walk from West Hills to West Towne.

It just aint safe.

Plus,you cant walk from Holston
Hills to the Krogers.

It's just too far away.

My question is?

Are the aging boomers,their kids &
grandkids thinking about spending
more time in the neighborhood & less
in a car?

I'm not talking about yearning for
a past that is gone.

But a 21st century neighborhood with
light rail..combined with the internet
& right now covenience..in the central city.

Then again

In with the new paradigm

Same as old paradigm

My goodness,West Towne is right next
to West Hills but I double dog dare
you to walk from West Hills to West Towne.

It just aint safe.

Noticed when I had to make one of my infrequent trips to Westown the other day that after 30 years the intersection of Kingston Pike and Morrell Road now has marked crosswalks and walk signals. Still no sidewalks, but other than tourists staying at the motel there isn't much reason for pedestrians to cross at that intersection.

The meeting on the Downtown North Redevelopment plan is this evening at 5:30 at the Knox County Health Department auditorium, 140 Dameron Ave. Thanks to Hayes and the NS for a good summary of many of the key issues. (link...)

From NS article..[Gotta love that first comment!]

The success of Knoxville officials' new focus on revitalizing the Broadway and North Central Avenue corridors could hinge simply on a comfortable pair of shoes.

Whether it's the new redevelopment plan that calls for a pedestrian-friendly streetscape or efforts to draft a form-based zoning code that would allow for a wide mix of commercial and residential uses without traditional, suburban parking requirements, walkability is being designed as a key component to the area's renewal.

I hope as many people as possible can attend. This whole effort began with concerns expressed by many over the situation at Fifth and Broadway and in the core of the city between Downtown and neighborhoods to the west, north, and east. For those who want some background and context, all of the history of this, including meeting notes, and recommendations of the task force assembled, can be found at (link...)

To reiterate, this is about a "whole new approach" to development and the rules governing such, with the goal being walkability and mixed uses. Thanks for the opportunity to discuss, and I hope to see some of you there this evening.