Current Courthouse

[dougskiles]

Thinking out of the box, how about a mixed use convention center is a green roof?  Retail/dining facing the river & Bay Street, exhibition hall in center of site with integrated parking and green roof for additional public space.

I like it.  I would imagine that a completely 'green' building would help in the attraction of those types of conventions.  The opportunity is certainly there for Jacksonville to become the hub of 'green' technology (alternative energy & water quality being the primary focus).  We have the natural resources to demonstrate these technologies all around us.

I know, I know, crazy non-sensical dreaming...

[ChriswUfGator]

I drew the ifs, and, buts, and 'at the same times' from your post, future jax.

And I'm just trying to make a point about this kind of thinking.  Anything that has three or more unknowns or uncontrollable factors is unworkable, ive found.

I don't disagree with the vision at all, but I am interested in how you think waterfront green space contributes to a vibrant downtown.

Partial, i.e. a little?  Some kind of 'public square' along the river along with dining, nightlife, perhaps some residential mixed in and next to.....Basically, I think it can contribute as one piece of the puzzle.  Not the puzzle itself.  Do you not?

I don't know, really.  Why do you think it would?  What would it contribute that friendship park, the two riverwalks, the landing and metropolitan do not?

I wouldn't think of the Landing as green space.  To me Metro park is at least for the time being a little out of bounds; there's no foot traffic down there.  Friendship is across the river.  I just think if there was say a little greenspace (i'm thinking a decent swatch, not anywhere near the entire area). Located where say the gigantic courthouse parking lot was right now with various commerce around it and along the river it could give an easy focal point of public space on the northbank for people to meet up, hang out, (watch an outdoor concert, have a picnic, am I dreaming?) and then visit these hypothetical new establishments nearby and then along Bay Street.  

Why doesnt this happen spontaneously at friendship, metropolitan park and along the riverwalk?

I don't have all the answers  

but probably mot likely due to the reasons stated in posts above this

Or is it more likely that expecting grass to stimulate economic development might not be so effective?

You can have all the parks downtown you want, they'll sit empty if there are no people there to use them.

[thelakelander]

^To sum up your last two post, in short.....apply the concepts of connectivity and clustering complementing uses within a compact setting and you'll achieve the vibrancy we've been dreaming about for the last 50 years.

[dougskiles]

Of course, in Jacksonville, watch the City make regulations to make all of the above businesses impossible.  Watch the simple bike line extension become a public boondoggle that takes 10 years to complete and doesnt work for bikes.  Watch the cops find a way to charge bikers for DUI and Dart to close down the fish market because one of the canoers falsely reported drug dealing, watch the parking department install meters for bicycles.

How much of these problems are attributable to the consolidation of Duval County?  The needs of the county are so diverse that it becomes impossible to effectively do anything to improve any one particular area.

[futurejax]

I drew the ifs, and, buts, and 'at the same times' from your post, future jax.

And I'm just trying to make a point about this kind of thinking.  Anything that has three or more unknowns or uncontrollable factors is unworkable, ive found.

I don't disagree with the vision at all, but I am interested in how you think waterfront green space contributes to a vibrant downtown.

Partial, i.e. a little?  Some kind of 'public square' along the river along with dining, nightlife, perhaps some residential mixed in and next to.....Basically, I think it can contribute as one piece of the puzzle.  Not the puzzle itself.  Do you not?

I don't know, really.  Why do you think it would?  What would it contribute that friendship park, the two riverwalks, the landing and metropolitan do not?

I wouldn't think of the Landing as green space.  To me Metro park is at least for the time being a little out of bounds; there's no foot traffic down there.  Friendship is across the river.  I just think if there was say a little greenspace (i'm thinking a decent swatch, not anywhere near the entire area). Located where say the gigantic courthouse parking lot was right now with various commerce around it and along the river it could give an easy focal point of public space on the northbank for people to meet up, hang out, (watch an outdoor concert, have a picnic, am I dreaming?) and then visit these hypothetical new establishments nearby and then along Bay Street.  

Why doesnt this happen spontaneously at friendship, metropolitan park and along the riverwalk?

I don't have all the answers  

but probably mot likely due to the reasons stated in posts above this

Or is it more likely that expecting grass to stimulate economic development might not be so effective?

You can have all the parks downtown you want, they'll sit empty if there are no people there to use them.

K, and I'm thinking of how to get people to go/stay down there.  What are your suggestions for that?

[thelakelander]

How much of these problems are attributable to the consolidation of Duval County?  The needs of the county are so diverse that it becomes impossible to effectively do anything to improve any one particular area.

I don't buy the consolidation argument either.  Consolidated cities like Nashville, Indianapolis, Lexington and Louisville along with spread out cities like Charlotte, Oklahoma City, Memphis and Columbus prove you can still have a vibrant DT, despite being a community with a variety of interests and neighborhood needs.  Over the years, we've spent just as much money in our DT as they have.  However, we've found a way to ignore the power of connectivity and clustering within a compact setting while enforcing policies at the same time that limit creativity from taking place within that environment.

[futurejax]

Thinking out of the box, how about a mixed use convention center is a green roof?  Retail/dining facing the river & Bay Street, exhibition hall in center of site with integrated parking and green roof for additional public space.

with various commerce around it and along the river it could give an easy focal point of public space on the northbank for people to meet up, hang out, (watch an outdoor concert, have a picnic, am I dreaming?) and then visit these hypothetical new establishments nearby and then along Bay Street.

Further thinking about this, you could also just fix up the Landing's courtyard and the green space in front of the TUPAC and achieve the same thing for millions less.

The River itself is one of the biggest greenspaces that we have, and we simply don't include it in our plans for downtown.  Don't get me wrong, Im all for greenspace.  I love parks, arboreteums, and all kinds of natural settings.  But I think the one design element that we need to plan for above all others is active use and collateral interactivity.  For example:  Piers marinas, and a huge waterborne fish market.  Perhaps an aquatic farm of some sort.  Add in a boat rental for the river.

Add an additional dedicated bike lane along the riverwalk that connects Riverside with Downtown.  A couple of travel/tour agencies in the same location.

Watch the restaurants open up around the joint because of the access to fresh seafood, boaters at the marina, workers at the aquafarming outfit. customers of the boat rental joint. Watch those restaurants become the destination for the bikeriders.  Watch the bikeriders schedule meetups and critical masses using the area as a starting point rather than a destination.

Watch the bike repair shops open up to service the bikeriders.

Watch a couple more bars open, and so on...

This is the kind of thinking that produces working districts and creates vibrancy

Of course, in Jacksonville, watch the City make regulations to make all of the above businesses impossible.  Watch the simple bike line extension become a public boondoggle that takes 10 years to complete and doesnt work for bikes.  Watch the cops find a way to charge bikers for DUI and Dart to close down the fish market because one of the canoers falsely reported drug dealing, watch the parking department install meters for bicycles.

Love everything you just said here.  I guess the $64,000 question is WHY does the city make all of these things so impossible to do?  Is there some element that has a monetary stake in seeing that d'town stays asleep for eternity?  

[thelakelander]

^Being nice, it seems we have a tendency to believe downtown can only come back via hundred million dollar one-trick gimmicks.  In reality, we'll do better getting out of the way and letting things naturally evolve.

[tufsu1]

Or is it more likely that expecting grass to stimulate economic development might not be so effective?

You can have all the parks downtown you want, they'll sit empty if there are no people there to use them.

don't tell that to St. Louis....their new park has sparked a renaissance downtown.

If you follow the PPS guidelines, almost any public space will attract people.

[thelakelander]

Or is it more likely that expecting grass to stimulate economic development might not be so effective?

You can have all the parks downtown you want, they'll sit empty if there are no people there to use them.

don't tell that to St. Louis....their new park has sparked a renaissance downtown.

If you follow the PPS guidelines, almost any public space will attract people.

Agreed.  However, it can probably be argued that the park isn't the prime attraction.  It's just one of the several elements that make the entire urban environment the attraction.  The concepts of connectivity and clustering complementing uses within a compact setting clearly applies with this park and the surrounding land uses.  Here are a few images I took a couple of months ago.




Active spaces within actual park




Retail/Dining within actual park


Plaza space for special events to take place within actual park


Parks open up to downtown and retail/dining across street.


Parks also integrated with cultural uses.

Our public spaces won't work until we start to apply some of these same historically successful connectivity and clustering complementing uses within a compact pedestrian oriented setting techniques.

[ChriswUfGator]

I drew the ifs, and, buts, and 'at the same times' from your post, future jax.

And I'm just trying to make a point about this kind of thinking.  Anything that has three or more unknowns or uncontrollable factors is unworkable, ive found.

I don't disagree with the vision at all, but I am interested in how you think waterfront green space contributes to a vibrant downtown.

Partial, i.e. a little?  Some kind of 'public square' along the river along with dining, nightlife, perhaps some residential mixed in and next to.....Basically, I think it can contribute as one piece of the puzzle.  Not the puzzle itself.  Do you not?

I don't know, really.  Why do you think it would?  What would it contribute that friendship park, the two riverwalks, the landing and metropolitan do not?

I wouldn't think of the Landing as green space.  To me Metro park is at least for the time being a little out of bounds; there's no foot traffic down there.  Friendship is across the river.  I just think if there was say a little greenspace (i'm thinking a decent swatch, not anywhere near the entire area). Located where say the gigantic courthouse parking lot was right now with various commerce around it and along the river it could give an easy focal point of public space on the northbank for people to meet up, hang out, (watch an outdoor concert, have a picnic, am I dreaming?) and then visit these hypothetical new establishments nearby and then along Bay Street.  

Why doesnt this happen spontaneously at friendship, metropolitan park and along the riverwalk?

I don't have all the answers  

but probably mot likely due to the reasons stated in posts above this

Or is it more likely that expecting grass to stimulate economic development might not be so effective?

You can have all the parks downtown you want, they'll sit empty if there are no people there to use them.

K, and I'm thinking of how to get people to go/stay down there.  What are your suggestions for that?

Well, like I said before, having lived in and visited other large cities with vibrant urban centers, it is immediately obvious (to everyone except COJ) that successful urban areas are like a 3-legged stool, resting on the combination of Residential, Commercial, and Transportation. The rest is fluff, I mean it's nice to have parks or a convention center, but none of that matters without those 3 things because those are the basic legs that support the structure of urban density and without them you'll just have empty parks.

Jacksonville went off the rails in the 1950s and still hasn't come back to sanity yet. If you want to watch it regenerate, then we need to replace what we lost. Which is functional mass transit (Amtrak station in the Prime Osborn, and use streetcars, or extend the skyway, to serve places that are actually occupied, e.g. Riverside, San Marco, Springfield, etc. instead of serving vacant parking lots as it presently does), and affordable housing in the residential areas that Jack Diamond and the other thundertards dumbassedly blew up to build golf courses, offices, hotels, and all the other pies in the sky that never happened. Ironically, actually, when they never happened because of the decline of downtown, which these same idiots caused in the first place.

Wouldn't hurt to get rid of the parking cartel and our meters and asinine enforcement policies, either. Also, encourage maritime industry growth downtown. Get some 50-story glass tower that will be pretty but empty like all the others out of everyone's heads and acknowledge the possibility that the waterfront industrial areas at the former JEA generating station and the shipyards and the current transfer plant by Metro park may well be industrial maritime uses. Zone and encourage the former Lavilla areas as residential, and encourage residential development there immediately.

If COJ just concentrated on this short list, downtown would come back.

[ChriswUfGator]

^Being nice, it seems we have a tendency to believe downtown can only come back via hundred million dollar one-trick gimmicks.  In reality, we'll do better getting out of the way and letting things naturally evolve.

+1,000,000

That, friends, is exactly what has plagued downtown for 5 decades. This realization is also the key to the future.