http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/020500/met_2034127.html
The Brooklyn Contemporary Arts Center.
(http://www.jacksonville.com/images/020500/met_forestWidens2.jpg)
Mark Rinaman and Brian Mickler, the developers.
(http://www.jacksonville.com/images/020500/met_forestWidens1.jpg)
This was pre metjax, and pre metrojacksonville.
It was when Brooklyn was beginning to get developed. The Contemporary Arts Center was there, and businesses had begun to open. The Dance Warehouse had recently opened their doors to arts events, and the Trophy Center relocated to the area.
All of that was demolished to make way for a series of projects that never materialized.
What most irritating is that it also opened a window for the redevelopment of Springfield into an arts district, which I worked with the Mayor's office, and Rita Reagan to make happen.
All of those dispossessed artists. And they really made a difference to Springfield.
The real estate speculators put an end to that for a while.
This one story encapsulates two missed opportunities.
Are there any other photos of the district before the Godzilla Stomp?
QuoteArts hub or major thoroughfare?
By David Bauerlein
Times-Union staff writer
In mid-November, hundreds of Jacksonville arts boosters gathered to celebrate the start of the Brooklyn Contemporary Arts Center. They walked through what used to be a dank and abandoned building, brightened now with paintings hanging on the walls.
A week later, the Florida Department of Transportation mailed letters to property owners whose buildings are in the path of plans to widen Riverside Avenue and Forest Street.
The list includes the Brooklyn Contemporary Arts Center, which supporters have touted as a catalyst for transforming the Brooklyn neighborhood into a haven for artists.
Demolition also will claim 21 other buildings along Forest and Riverside, part of the estimated $23 million the state will spend to get right of way, demolish buildings, and relocate tenants. By contrast, the state will spend $4.3 million to widen the road.
The transportation department, which views the project as a way to better link downtown and Interstates 10 and 95, has conducted several public meetings since introducing the idea in 1990.
But Bryan Mickler, one of the investors behind the Brooklyn Contemporary Arts Center, said that while he and his partners knew there had been talk of widening Forest Street, they thought it was a long-range plan still "many, many years from now."
"And I'm glad we did what we did, because we created something special," said Mickler, a real estate broker who is a co-owner of the building.
The partnership, called Pedestrian Properties-BCAC, bought the two-story building and a next-door warehouse for $300,000 in June 1999. The venture includes Steve Williams and Jim Draper, who also own the Pedestrian Gallery, and Mark Rinaman, an engineer and planner.
They began negotiations for the building in late 1998, seeing it as a way to bring many artists together under the same roof, and possibly spark similar projects in Brooklyn's aging buildings. The one housing the arts center dates back to the 1920s, when Brooklyn was a new suburb for Jacksonville.
"When we first started doing it, we didn't know what the response would be," Rinaman said. "When we started leasing it out, it was a scary move. But now we have a community of users and it's beginning to jell."
Typically, the state pays more in construction costs than for right of way, particularly when roads are being built to keep up with suburban growth. In the case of Riverside Avenue and Forest Street, the right of way expense reflects the cost of widening roads in established parts of the city, where one building after another borders the streets.
The Jacksonville Transportation Authority will chip in $8 million to help the state buy the property, clearing the way for four-lane Riverside Avenue to become six lanes from the Acosta Bridge to Forest Street. Two-lane Forest Street will be widened to six lanes from Riverside to Park Street.
The state wants to acquire the property, relocate the tenants, and demolish the buildings by February 2001.
At the arts center, that will affect about 40 tenants.
Lee Harvey, a painter who rents studio space at the Contemporary Arts Center, said a six-lane Forest Street is "ridiculous."
"They just don't get it," said Harvey, who envisions Brooklyn becoming a place where people stroll to various galleries, not a neighborhood that drivers "race through."
"We don't want gas stations," said Angel Passailaigue, board chairman for Art Stop, a group that wants to make Brooklyn part of an arts district extending into the Five Points area.
State engineers say Forest Street must be six lanes because a $200 million project to rebuild the I-10 and I-95 interchange will build highway ramps to and from Forest. That will make Forest Street a major connector between the highway interchange and Riverside Avenue, which in turn heads into downtown.
"It will definitely be a big traffic pattern in Jacksonville, particularly if Riverside continues to develop with high density," said Dave Byrd, a top administrator for the transportation department's Northeast Florida district.
Indeed, Downtown Development Authority officials see the state's project as a possible spark for bringing new investment into Brooklyn. The development authority is looking for a "master developer" who will map out a plan for rejuvenating the neighborhood.
It is typical that some will complain day and night about looking at the terrible "beriut style building" and then turn around a year or two later and complain that nothing was done with the site. You are right, Stephen, we all need to watch what we wish for and what gets torn down and why.
And we were supposed to have 10,000 people living downtown, what is the point? Misguided development, it is sprinkled all over Duval County....move on.
the few times i hung out there i really liked it, that was a great space.
The key to urban revitalization is to build up around the vibrant things already in place. In the past, Jacksonville has had the tendency of tearing down the few positive things the urban core has to add improvements. For example, the courthouse project demolished a perfectly fine historic Southern Bell office building. The library project took out the 10-story Rhodes Building and the loft district, despite a ton of parking lots already (and still existing) on Main. The Riverside Ave project took out Brooklyn's commercial district and the contemporary arts center mentioned above. Now we're talking about replacing Friendship Fountain to add a couple of interactive kiddie fountains. For every step forward you take, when you destroy existing fabric you're taking two steps back. Just imagine if just these couple of projects were designed around existing building stock instead of replacing it? The entire core would feel different today.
Quote from: thelakelander on June 19, 2009, 10:13:51 AM
The key to urban revitalization is to build up around the vibrant things already in place. In the past, Jacksonville has had the tendency of tearing down the few positive things the urban core has to add improvements. For example, the courthouse project demolished a perfectly fine historic Southern Bell office building. The library project took out the 10-story Rhodes Building and the loft district, despite a ton of parking lots already (and still existing) on Main. The Riverside Ave project took out Brooklyn's commercial district and the contemporary arts center mentioned above. Now we're talking about replacing Friendship Fountain to add a couple of interactive kiddie fountains. For every step forward you take, when you destroy existing fabric you're taking two steps back. Just imagine if just these couple of projects were designed around existing building stock instead of replacing it? The entire core would feel different today.
It's almost rhetoric, but how do you reverse the trend. Had La villa been revitalized instead of being razed, downtown would've been much better off.
Quote from: Seraphs on June 19, 2009, 07:41:54 PM
Quote from: thelakelander on June 19, 2009, 10:13:51 AM
The key to urban revitalization is to build up around the vibrant things already in place. In the past, Jacksonville has had the tendency of tearing down the few positive things the urban core has to add improvements. For example, the courthouse project demolished a perfectly fine historic Southern Bell office building. The library project took out the 10-story Rhodes Building and the loft district, despite a ton of parking lots already (and still existing) on Main. The Riverside Ave project took out Brooklyn's commercial district and the contemporary arts center mentioned above. Now we're talking about replacing Friendship Fountain to add a couple of interactive kiddie fountains. For every step forward you take, when you destroy existing fabric you're taking two steps back. Just imagine if just these couple of projects were designed around existing building stock instead of replacing it? The entire core would feel different today.
It's almost rhetoric, but how do you reverse the trend. Had La villa been revitalized instead of being razed, downtown would've been much better off.
Is the city really still thinking about replacing Friendship Fountain?
Yes. This was in the paper last week.
QuoteMayor John Peyton and Ron Barton, the executive director of the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission, want the community to have a conversation about that, as part of Peyton's push to improve the public space on the downtown riverfront.
Friendship Fountain with its lighted columns of water can certainly be spectacular - when it works.
But the fountain and pool are so big they dominate the park and they are surrounded by acres of concrete.
Last week, Barton showed me conceptual plans - with a heavy emphasis on conceptual - that could be a way to reshape the park.
Instead of one giant fountain, there would be several interactive water features that would still shoot streams of water into the air but also invite people - mostly children - to cool off on a hot summer day.
Think the fountain in the Landing's courtyard but on a bigger scale.
The concrete would be replaced with grass and trees, divided into sections that would be great places to throw a Frisbee or have a picnic.
A small amphitheater would face the St. Johns River.
And an addition to the Museum of History and Science would reorient MOSH toward the river and park instead of facing away from them as the museum does now.
These are just ideas and a lot would have to happen to bring them to fruition.
One hurdle is Friendship Fountain itself. Many people are attached to it, and that's understandable. But what if something better replaced it?
full article: http://m.jax2go.com/topic/1071-Opinion/articles/191986207