Colorado Springs to "revitalize" downtown

[spuwho]

Colorado Springs is attempting to revitalize its downtown. Working with the Urban Land Institute it came up with the following:

(look for some tidbits that could be helpful to Jacksonville)

Per the Colorado Springs Gazette:

The Urban Land Institute panel, headed by former Indianapolis Mayor Bill Hudnut, also recommended that developers build between 100 and 150 housing units, including some for college students, and a 200-room full-service hotel and convention center in the downtown area. The eight-member group also urged the city to connect an “emerald necklace” of existing parks, trails and open space with bicycle trails, allow downtown visitors to park longer at metered spaces but charge higher rates and clean up and renovate Acacia Park.

“Colorado Springs needs to try to trade off the Olympic presence here to generate tourism, which is a very fundamental driver of the economy of downtown. The need to identify Colorado Springs as the town where the Olympic headquarters is located is of critical importance,” Hudnut said Wednesday while discussing the panel’s recommendations with reporters. “The next step is to look for immediate victories, such as getting some downtown housing going. I think there is tremendous energy and commitment to downtown here.”

Other recommendations include convincing local colleges, including the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, to move some offices, classes and research downtown, create a “bus rapid transit” system to link downtown with the UCCS campus, improve the lighting and safety of downtown parking garages and create gateway monuments or arches on major roads entering downtown. The panel did not address whether the Martin Drake power plant should be shut down or offer recommendations on how to pay for the projects it suggests.

The panel visited Colorado Springs during the final week of June and interviewed more than 100 area residents and community leaders; it was the same week that the Waldo Canyon fire roared into the city, killing two and destroying 345 homes in the Mountain Shadows neighborhood.

“It was a testament to the spirit and tenacity of the city stakeholders and civic leaders that they were able to participate in the panel and deal with the effects of the fire at the same time,” the panel's final report states.

Read more: http://www.gazette.com/articles/revitalize-145786-steps-time.html#ixzz2ApsqZDOz

[I-10east]

The main downtown square in Colorado Springs (I forgot the name of it) looks remarkably similar to Hemming Plaza.

[Josh]

The main downtown square in Colorado Springs (I forgot the name of it) looks remarkably similar to Hemming Plaza.

Acacia Park? That park is surrounded by nightlife and retail, but aside from that I still don't think they have much in common.

[I-10east]

^^^The actual park itself is surrounded by mostly mom and pop restaurants, and small retail stores. I wasn't necessarily talking about the surrounding buildings, but the square itself. Maybe I judged too much into the 'similarities' from certain vistas of the park. I still wouldn't call Acacia a world class thriving park by no means. Locals complain of their DT being stale for years now. Alot of locals are likely the go to someplace like Citadel Mall, Garden of the Gods, or Denver itself moreso than their DT area. 

[Josh]

Oh. I was there for a major event last year, so around the park was buzzing quite a bit during the weekend. There were a lot of restaurants and bars on Tejon Street that were quite busy. The park itself is large and has so much greenspace I would consider it pretty different from Hemming Plaza on that alone.

The young people I talked to definitely had an inferiority complex when it comes to having Denver nearby. While their downtown may be dull compared to Denver, they're still leaps and bounds ahead of us IMO.

[Ocklawaha]

Where's the transit mall? Everyone knows that adding a parade of diesel buses through the heart of downtown is going to cause billions of dollars of new development. NOT! If any of the planners decides to leave Colorado Springs, I've got some land for sale in the Okefenokee.

[tufsu1]

^ don't tell that to Denver...their transit mall does quite well....and nearby Boulder has a great pedestrian mall