Fri
Jan 4 2008
01:05 pm
Homogenizing Knoxville
By: jbr

NY Times article discusses how development, like we have in Knoxville area takes the unique character from a city and makes everywhere look and feel the same.

(link...)
(link...)
Lisa Starbuck's picture

Good article

Submitted by Lisa Starbuck on Fri, 2008/01/04 - 3:17pm.

jbr, Thanks for the article on the importance of place and visual pollution. I believe as we tear down historic buildings that are one of a kind and replace them with souless boxes and chain restaurants, we are losing an important part of our identity. To me, it emphasizes the importance of saving our downtown area, because it is the only place that seems to be uniquely Knoxville.

Driving down Kingston Pike, Broadway, Clinton Hwy, Chapman Hwy or any of our other main thoroughfares, it feels like for the most part you might as well be in any other city in the US as be in Knoxville. And that's a shame, both for us and for all the other increasingly homogenized cities out there.

Hayduke's picture

We can expect to continue to

Submitted by Hayduke on Sat, 2008/01/05 - 9:39pm.

We can expect to continue to lead the way in having the same crap as everyplace else. Count Ragsdale wants more freeway exits because they're "economic development" and they City Mayor's office was paid for with truck stop money (no wonder we get nothing from him on protecting historic buildings).

James Howard Kunstler's Eyesore of the Month series is good for documenting the beauty of modern development. His blog is pretty good too (if you don't mind losing all hope).

edens's picture

Uh, Hayduke:

Submitted by edens on Sun, 2008/01/06 - 12:06am.

Uh, Hayduke:

(link...)

Btw, I'm pretty sure a substantial sum of that truckstop money was sunk into a certain movie theater so as to accommodate the S&W instead of shoving it over (not to mention putting the brakes on said high profile project so that a solution could be worked out...)

But, you know, whatever...

More on topic, however, the city administration does deserve criticism for subsidizing sprawl, considering the sizeable check they cut Tim Graham in that SoKno annexation deal.

Hayduke's picture

Well, the topic was

Submitted by Hayduke on Sun, 2008/01/06 - 8:38pm.

Well, the topic was aesthetics and, while I'm really glad the theater is there, there's nothing about the looks of the place that says anything but sprawl mall cineplex (unless it says future home of the museum of cheap facade materials). I assume Hizzoner could have had some influence on that if he'd noticed/cared.

In the mean time, if you look at the Sprankle building. . . oh yeah, you can't anymore. I don't think preservation is high on the list over there. Maybe you know more about the thinking process. There wasn't really anyone wanting to tear down the S&W, was there?

Yep, I'd like to see a hit list of destructive, sprawly things we're funding.

edens's picture

>>>There wasn't really

Submitted by edens on Sun, 2008/01/06 - 11:31pm.

>>>There wasn't really anyone wanting to tear down the S&W, was there?

Uh, Regal. In fact, the initial design their architects produced was of the "scrape the site and start over" variety. The theater layout that allowed the S&W to remain was developed independently by a committee of folks from Knox Heritage, primarily Faris Eid.

Not sure if that was the final layout adopted (the facade certainly wasn't), but Faris demonstrated it was doable. And seriously, outside of a small core of preservationists and downtowners, how many people would have missed the S&W much? Haslam backed up the KH proposal plan (kicking in a considerable personal investment to bridge the cost gap) when it would have been easier take Regal's big box design, say "they're the experts" and fire up the bulldozer.

Meanwhile, form zoning to urbanize (or in some cases re-urbanize)and increase the density of the largely low-rise auto-centric commercial strips of Central, Broadway, Cumberland is moving forward.

Feel free to keep riffing on the truckstop money, however. Nobody likes a guy who mostly gets by on his dad's dime.

Rachel's picture

You're both right.I

Submitted by Rachel on Tue, 2008/01/08 - 1:35am.

You're both right.

I certainly give the Mayor kudos on the entire 500 block effort, and his support for new ideas like form-based zoning is impressive as well.

I even think he cares about historic preservation, to a degree. But his record on the issue is mixed. He certainly caved on the Sprankle. Admittedly, negotiating with HF was no picnic, but I see no evidence that he tried very hard. And IIRC he knew the demolition permit was granted and didn't even let preservationists know about it.

The predictable result is that we have a big gap in the urban fabric that accomodates a few dozen cars a day.

But hey, we did get the nice fence Keasling (or was it Sharp?) promised. Of course, he also promised that HF wasn't going to leave a "big ugly hole in the ground." And that HF would put up a new building starting in 2007, I believe it was. Oh well, 1 out of 3 ain't bad.

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