Khan: Downtown has "gone downhill" over last decade

[jaxlongtimer]

Not 100% on the same page as Khan on how to develop Downtown but I do give him credit for calling out Downtown for what it is:  A failure over the last 10 years (I would add at least 50 more years to that!).

And for what it needs among other factors:  Self-confidence of leadership "because "it's going to work." (I read as we don't have to give the place away, including to Khan, but rather develop a good plan and stick with it as we are confident in the assets we have and what we have planned for them!).

From a media interview this week in the Jax Business Journal:

..."Downtown has, in the 10 years I have been here, absolutely hasn't progressed," Khan said Monday while speaking with the media on his yacht, the Kismet. "It's gone downhill."

Reversing that slide remains a goal, he said, a decade after buying the team for $770 million dollars.

"What I like about Jacksonville is there is a vacuum here," Khan said. "There is a football team here and, as an owner, I can move the needle. How many times do you get a chance to move the needle in a good way in a great American city?"

Moving the needle is part of the point of having a Four Seasons hotel in his latest proposal for the Shipyards.

"The thing is Jacksonville needs some self-confidence," Khan said. "They told me 'We don't know how this is going to work, but since you want it we're going to do it.' To me it was 'It's going to work, and I can give you the reasons it's going to work.'"...

https://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2021/12/14/jaguars-shad-khan.html?utm_source=st&utm_medium=en&utm_campaign=ae&utm_content=ja&ana=e_ja_ae&j=26042400&senddate=2021-12-14

[heights unknown]

There are a few things he's done or tried to do that I don't like; but...I like his analogy here and to me it's the truth. He wants to help, and he wants to help in many different ways, and to me he believes in Jacksonville and is confident that things can be turned around downtown and in the Urban Core. I'm glad he's decided not to move the team, and to continue trying to help and assist in a big change for the greater good of our city.

[Ken_FSU]

Others might disagree, but I think the guy continues to have terrible optics. Less malicious, more tone deaf/failure to read the room.

"Downtown, in the 10 years I have been here, absolutely hasn't progressed," Khan said. "It's gone downhill."

And what has Shad Khan done about it in the last ten years? Almost single-handedly sabotage the convention center RFP? Conspire with Curry and Brian Hughes to get rid of the Landing to make way for development at Lot J? Ask the City to kick in $300 million for private development on Lot J? Abandon the flex field we built for the Jags?

The Four Seasons should be a step in the right direction, but let's not act like Khan has somehow been this long white knight for Downtown Jacksonville in the last 10 years when Vestcor and Southeast have brought more vibrancy to the area than the Jags have since Khan bought the team.

I think it's probably accurate to say that downtown hasn't progressed as much as it should have in the last ten years, but it's just so smug and dismissive of all of the restauranteurs, hoteliers, developers, investors, DIA and DVI members, etc. to say that it's "gone downhill." It's the same elitist garbage as when Khan said his rich friends don't want to stay in our hotels here, despite the fact that all the infrastructure that supports his billion-dollar team was built on the back of bed taxes from those same hotels.

"The thing is Jacksonville needs some self-confidence," Khan said.

This stupid line should have been retired a long time ago. Jacksonville has developed more self-confidence in the last decade than it's had in a century. Businesses are choosing to open up shop here. Our restaurant and brewery scene has exploded. We've gotten way younger, and way more progressive. UNF has made some great strides. An organic groundswell in pride and identity has developed post-recession. And all of this has happened IN SPITE OF a historically shitty football team dragging Jacksonville's good name through the mud each and every Sunday and a front office that never misses an opportunity to remind the city that they're not really that viable as an NFL market.

Takes a good bit of nerve to make Jacksonville a laughing stock each and every Sunday for nearly a decade, but then say we "need more self-confidence."

Wanna know what self confidence looks like? Self confidence is feeling secure enough in our awesome city and its future to emphatically vote down a Lot J deal that's bad for the city despite veiled threats by the team about what it could mean for the franchise's future in Jacksonville.

Shad Khan has many good qualities, but the pinched-nose act gets really old.

[heights unknown]

Others might disagree, but I think the guy continues to have terrible optics.

"Downtown, in the 10 years I have been here, absolutely hasn't progressed," Khan said. "It's gone downhill."

And what has Shad Khan done about it in the last ten years? Almost single-handedly sabotage the convention center RFP? Conspire with Curry and Brian Hughes to get rid of the Landing to make way for development at Lot J? Ask the City to kick in $300 million for private development on Lot J? Abandon the flex field we built for the Jags?

The Four Seasons should be a step in the right direction, but let's not act like Khan has somehow been this long white knight for Downtown Jacksonville in the last 10 years when Vestcor and Southeast have brought more vibrancy to the area than the Jags have since Khan bought the team.

I think it's probably accurate to say that downtown hasn't progressed as much as it should have in the last ten years, but it's just so smug and dismissive of all of the restauranteurs, hoteliers, developers, investors, DIA and DVI members, etc. to say that it's "gone downhill." It's the same elitist garbage as when Khan said his rich friends don't want to stay in our hotels here, despite the fact that all the infrastructure that supports his billion-dollar team was built on the back of bed taxes from those same hotels.

"The thing is Jacksonville needs some self-confidence," Khan said.

This stupid line should have been retired a long time ago. Jacksonville has developed more self-confidence in the last decade than it's had in a century. Businesses are choosing to open up shop here. Our restaurant and brewery scene has exploded. We've gotten way younger, and way more progressive. UNF has made some great strides. An organic groundswell in pride and identity has developed post-recession. And all of this has happened IN SPITE OF a historically shitty football team dragging Jacksonville's good name through the mud each and every Sunday and a front office that never misses an opportunity to remind the city that they're not really that viable as an NFL market.

Takes a good bit of nerve to make Jacksonville a laughing stock each and every Sunday for nearly a decade, but then say we "need more self-confidence."

Wanna know what self confidence looks like? Self confidence is feeling secure enough in our awesome city and its future to emphatically vote down a Lot J deal that's bad for the city despite veiled threats by the team about what it could mean for the franchise's future in Jacksonville.

Shad Khan has many good qualities, but the pinched-nose act gets really old.

Nice post Ken; he could be blowing smoke is what I think you are saying. As I said, I disagree with a lot of what he's done and not done since coming here. But I will give him another chance and see whether he's for real, or is he blowing even more smoke into our city's eyes so that we can't and won't see the forest for the trees.

[vicupstate]

We've gotten way younger, and way more progressive.

Among the general population?  Yeah I can see that. Among the leadership of the city [Mayor, council, C of C, etc.]?  I don't see it myself.   

[Ken_FSU]

I will say though, this is a pretty great quote, courtesy News4Jax:

But perhaps the most surprising comment made by Khan was his answer to a question about his most proud accomplishment in his 10 years of Jaguars ownership. It was nothing on the field or something involving his real estate investments. Instead, he chose a victory that came in the political sphere: being a part of the move to get the Human Rights Ordinance passed in Jacksonville in 2018.

"That's No. 1. If we had even won the Super Bowl," Khan said. "I told the players that would still be (the) number two thing for me. Why? Because what the team and what the players did put us in a position to get enough votes to get HRO passed. We had tried before that and failed, OK. And those players, who they affected are people you're not gonna know."

"Now the players who are in the room, I mean, they're rich, maybe they're not going to get impacted, but the people we don't know, people of color, whether it's brown, black, whatever, the gender preference, religious and so on. They don't have protection, by the law. So they moved the needle by that season--gave us the credibility with the City Council to get it."

[landfall]

Build your two Vista Brooklyns and your Residence Inn on Lot J and save us Shad.

[acme54321]

I wouldn't say it's gone downhill, but it hasn't progressed much.  Seems like a lot of projects kicking off over there though so we'll see...

[jaxoNOLE]

The cynic in me thinks Shad is actively trying to erode our confidence in the core, via many of the actions and sentiments KenFSU cited, so that we are more willing to direct city resources into establishing the Sports District as our new city center. If he can shake the faith of the public in our city's ability to revitalize the core (not a difficult task, given our tendency to self-sabotage), then maybe he can emerge as the savior figure to do what our city leadership can't -- on his terms, of course.

The thing is, the slow, small bit of momentum we have -- in spite of our leadership -- is building around the core, not the Sports District. I'd place my bets for "most improved" on Laura Street and the JWJ area over the next 5 years any day versus what's in the Sports District pipeline. I do not think his analysis will age well.

[jaxjags]

My response " The Jaguars, in the last 10 years I have been here, absolutely have not progressed. They have gone downhill".

Time to look in the mirror on both the team and downtown.

[Ken_FSU]

The narrative in the media since at least 2013 has been that "Downtown Jacksonville has momentum."

As a guy who's usually downtown five days a week, I have a hard time seeing the evidence.

Maybe that will be different in three years, but I also feel like we've been saying "maybe it will be different in three years" for a decade.

Forward progress has been made, but there's also been a lot of steps backwards as well.

Residential population has increased, which is great. But the regular downtown workforce has fallen dramatically since the onset of the pandemic.

We've gained some cool restaurants like Bread & Board Provisions, but we've lost spots like Zodiak and Vagabond.

We lost the Landing to a grass lot that probably won't be fully built out until 2025.

Convention center plans have gone nowhere.

Ford on Bay has gone nowhere.

River City Brewery had seen better days, but it's gonna be out of commission for a while with no short-term plan for a replacement.

Friendship Fountain work seems to be progressing at a snail's pace.

MOSH is relocating from right across the Main Street Bridge to the Shipyards in the late 2020s and will be a lame duck until it happens.

Times-Union Center work hasn't started.

We've been patting ourselves on the back for years for plans to two-way the streets and lure new restaurants to strategic corridors with no concrete progress.

Laura Street Trio hasn't started yet.

Independent Life building hasn't started yet.

Perfect storm of pandemic, DIA meddling, and a well-intentioned but counterproductive (in my opinion) push to conserve the First Baptist building prevented what could have been a transformational use of the property.

Clown cars are moving full speed ahead.

Berkman II is still standing and the demolition has been a comedy of errors, up to and including a cartoonish scissor machine tipped onto two wheels trying to take apart the building like a child's crane game and a fourth delay this week for the traditional implosion.

The JEA remains INCREDIBLY determined to implode the old headquarters as soon as the new one is done.

RiversEdge is currently just a parking lot built for a DCPS that is about to abandon their headquarters.

Four Seasons is an idea on paper; though it's been approved, it's like the 10th set of renderings we've seen in the last six years from the Jags without a shovel in the ground.

To me, momentum is when vibrancy actually starts to pick up and storefronts start to open.

People hate to hear it, but a scooter share did more to add to the vibrancy of downtown from my perspective than 10 years of city planning.

I think a better way to put it would be:

1) The Southbank lacks momentum.
2) The Stadium District lacks momentum.
3) The Riverfront lacks momentum.
4) Because of private investment, a small group of civic-minded developers and activists, and positive changes to funding mechanisms for historical rehab, the Laura Street Corridor and several surrounding streets may potentially build some momentum if and when new projects come online.

Just kind of silly to me that the media touts momentum based on the same list of projects that have been in the DVI's State of Downtown reports for like five years running.

[thelakelander]

Independent Life started construction about a month or so ago. Here's a pic for a construction update that I'll have coming soon:



I'd agree with Kahn that downtown has declined since 2000. I believe the loss of the Landing has been the biggest hit, along with the results of the pandemic. Another hit has been a tendency not to focus on doing what it takes to keep existing restaurants and retailers surviving. This has been the case with both the Landing tenants and other closed businesses like Zodiac. The Landing was such a simple fix and we not only blew it, but loss 30 businesses, everyday programming and the associated foot traffic generated in the process. That flop set us back at least a decade alone.

As such, we're going to have to wait another few years to see the Noco stuff be completed. I do disagree with the FBC building. Demolishing a historic 6-story building for a glorified front church entrance would have not been anymore transformational as any of FBC's other investments in the downtown core. Now, them selling off Noco buildings and garages has paid dividends. We're just going to have to wait to see those investments pan out. When they are completed, that saved 6-story FBC building is rip to become apartments or something along those lines. It also worked out for FBC by renovating the other sanctuary as well as a part of their consolidation plan. That project is underway as well. Overall, we're still not able to do the simple little things that have been needed for decades. Two-way streets, programming, RFPing dead properties, incrementally enhancing public spaces, etc. That's a COJ/DIA problem. This stuff isn't rocket science.

As for the U2C?.......Still waiting. Lots of talk but still far away from actually implementing something that works.

[acme54321]

FWIW Rivers Edge was mowed and extensively flagged (for roads I assume) over the last week.  They are also actively doing sitework on the back side of the property.  Until now the only work has been along the seawall.

[thelakelander]

RiversEdge is on tomorrow's DDRB agenda. They are reducing maximum building heights for a future project on two of the parcels. Giving the building configuration shown on the documents, I assume they have something planned there. Who knows how long it will take before ground is broken on it though.

[landfall]

RiversEdge is on tomorrow's DDRB agenda. They are reducing maximum building heights for a future project on two of the parcels. Giving the building configuration shown on the documents, I assume they have something planned there. Who knows how long it will take before ground is broken on it though.

I could be wrong but aren't they also meeting tomorrow r.e. awarding the ford on bay mk 2?