Eric Myers
photo by John Shearer
As the Chattanooga Design Studio’s coordinated study on ways to improve the heart of downtown reaches its halfway point, officials came together Monday to list findings or ideas the non-profit studio and its partners had developed thus far.
They included everything from possibly reusing at least part of the TVA Complex to having more tree canopies and other green infrastructure, improving non-auto traffic movability, tying UTC better into the heart of downtown, increasing residences and other mixed-use development for a city with some remote workers, and increasing entertainment and cultural opportunities.
Other ideas presented among a number of others included the need to improve the parking imbalances that feature a lot of surface parking and add to the impervious surfaces, and improving the reliability of public transportation through town.
The roughly 100 who attended the event at the fourth-floor gathering room at the Chattanooga Public Library also had chances to say which ideas they liked while working at tables with participating planners during the second part of the two-hour event. Officials hope to more formally tabulate and unveil those suggestions next month.
Then, officials said, the Chattanooga Design Studio will work with local residents and industry experts to produce what is being called the Civic Center District Plan by the end of the year. It is expected to serve as the unified vision for the district, which is bordered by Fifth and 13th streets in one direction, and U.S. 27 and Houston Street in the other.
The plan – which is also being done in connection with firms Sasaki, Tinker Ma, and James Lima Planning + Development -- will also include urban design recommendations for both long-term and short-term improvements.
Eric Myers, executive director of the Design Studio, said before the meeting that the gathering was important for those who care about downtown Chattanooga.
“We’re here to gather their input about what matters to them,” he said, “how they move around, how they entertain themselves, and how they see the future of this district responding to their needs.”
He also said the TVA Complex – at least part of which is being possibly eyed as the site for a new federal courthouse by the General Services Administration – might be worthy of preservation in some form.
“There are a lot of ideas about how to repurpose the existing buildings,” he said. “There are a lot of great bones in those buildings. They were built very well. They are solid concrete. They have a heritage in and of themselves. And TVA’s connection to our region is strong.”
Susannah Drake of the Sasaki global integrated design firm said she got to tour the TVA Complex and was also impressed with it, even though some have called for it to be torn down.
“One of the most interesting experiences I had was touring the inside of TVA and seeing the incredible resources they have, all these amazing devices that were fascinating, and seeing the interior of that space.”
While she knows Chattanooga does not operate in a “pure world” and that completely preserving all of the complex with so many other demands on downtown might be hard, she did add, “There are really wonderful things about that facility.”
County Mayor Weston Wamp and city of Chattanooga Chief of Staff Jermaine Freeman did not mention the TVA Complex but endorsed the overall planning process and work for the Civic Center District. County Mayor Wamp said the meeting was like the old Chattanooga Venture public planning meetings of the 1980s that he remembered his grandmother participating in and was a great opportunity for Chattanooga to do some worthwhile public visioning.
“These moments forge community for the city, so thank you for being here,” he said, admitting he was “blown away” by how many had attended. “Your voice really matters."
He also said that sometimes when visioning sessions like these are held, participants don’t think big enough. As someone who is interested in Chattanooga’s history, he said he learned that Charles James dreamed of taking a trolley from his home near the bluff of Signal Mountain down to his office in a skyscraper he envisioned building, and he did that after constructing the James Building well over a century ago.
Local creative strategist and healer Erika Roberts asked the crowd what they would most like to see happening in Chattanooga three years from now, and one man quipped that he would like to see a trolley running again from Signal Mountain to downtown.
In his remarks, Mr. Freeman praised the work of recently deceased City Councilman Moses Freeman Jr., to whom he said he was not related, and added of the visioning plan, “We have a unique opportunity to take this city in a new trajectory and to stand on the shoulders of those before us.”
Ron Littlefield, who went from leading Chattanooga Venture in the 1980s to Chattanooga mayor, was in attendance and received hearty applause on at least two occasions as a pioneer in such a planning process.
Other speakers who shared some of the proposals or findings before the attendees broke into small-table discussion groups included Siqi Zhu of Sasaki and Carey Danfey of James Lima.
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Jcshearer2@comcast.net
Discussion around the tables
photo by John Shearer