Redevelopment Strategies: "Cycling"

[Metro Jacksonville]

Redevelopment Strategies:  "Cycling"



The redevelopment of a neighborhood works best when the upgrades and improvements are part of an organic and predictable process called cycling.

This process is most easily understood by comparison to the process of "Cycling" a saltwater aquarium, and draws its name from that comparison.

Any saltwater tank enthusiast knows that no matter how much money has been spent on the interior of the aquarium, and no matter how exotic the fish that are intended to inhabit the tank, everything starts with the one of the lowliest and least expensive fishes on the market:

The Lowly Damsel Fish.

Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2009-aug-redevelopment-strategies-cycling

[jason_contentdg]

^Hopefully after the construction on Main Street finishes, we'll see some growth.  At the least we'll be able to take that out of the equation all together when dealing with the corridor issues.

[Deuce]

Very interesting article. I love the comparison to establishing a salt water tank. I've always wanted one and have read about how hard it is before.

I can see this in Springfield as the first round of businesses went under (i.e. 9th & Main) and the second round has had better success (3 Layers).

[civil42806]

I do not doubt but that we will see growth, Jason.  This recession and the continuing pigheadedness of downtown regarding its public policies guarantees that a huge spurt of growth will return to the core for the next five years.  It will be interesting to see how it is dispersed however.

There are four neighborhoods competing for this phenomenon, and both Riverside and San Marco have positioned themselves well to be the main beneficiaries.

There will be new niche clusters developing.  The back channels and the general cafe discussion is increasingly full of new groups and ideas discussing various plans.

And niche clusters have to cycle.  There are a number of places where this might happen naturally.

Hendricks Avenue, near the library and tennis courts, for example.

Or perhaps surrounding the new House of Insetta project over on Kings in San Marco.

The best inventory for a project is along park street in Brooklyn, except that the city still has its unvisionary little fingers gumming up independent development over there.

There are three zones of Main Street that are able to support a Cycle.

And hopefully the self destructive boycotting and war making on the businesses in the area is a thing of the past.

Does anyone other than me get a  kick out of how the impending redevelopment of Downtown seems to be centered on everywhere but downtown?

" both Riverside and San Marco have positioned themselves well to be the main beneficiaries."


"Hendricks Avenue"

"San Marco."  god knows that area is a slum.

"Brooklyn"  You can hear the wind blow though the vacant lots about as well as La villa after the city finished leveling everything.

[Dog Walker]

There is a wonderful book that, among other things, outlines this phenomenon.  It is "The Life and Death of Great American Cities" by Judy Jacobs.  It was written in the 1970's and the last thirty years have only proved Ms. Jacobs insights correct.  She talks a lot about the organic nature of growth vs. central planned efforts.

Judy Jacobs died this past year, but not before her insights, controversial when she wrote them down, had been proved correct again and again earning her universal respect.

[civil42806]

Exactly Civil.  As covered in the article, you know that depressed real estate is the breeding ground of a cycling redevelopment.

But downtown will not change the policies that destroyed its retail base in the first place.

  then whats the actual downtowns excuse LOL

[stjr]

Stephen, along these lines, note the destruction of smaller, historic, approachable, scalable buildings and spaces that can grow an area incrementally while maintaining its character.  What we do is develop "all or nothing" sanitized and master planned whole city blocks or areas creating the often unrealistically achievable need for instant and simultaneous development all at once to attain any kind of threshhold for sustainable success.

In other words, to get anything sustainable going, it takes a huge "explosion" to light the fire, rather than a mere match.  And such "instant" efforts lack any momentum or proven success to encourage and add the additional efforts of others, especially the unique and necessary smaller niche players who need to be more cautious with their investments.

Large scale redevelopment makes for a complex, difficult, expensive, and much more risky process and demands intervention and oversight by unreliable, unstable, sometimes unskilled, offten distracted, always unpredictable, politcally, not economically driven, and ever changing government administrations, committees and personnel.  Whew! Who could live with a business partner like that? 

Free enterprise demands that developers go where people want to be.  What government should focus on is infrastructure - creating accessible, inviting, attractive, convenient, and secure public "spaces".   And then just sit back, and the people will come.   

[Sigma]

Large scale redevelopment makes for a complex, difficult, expensive, and much more risky process and demands intervention and oversight by unreliable, unstable, sometimes unskilled, offten distracted, always unpredictable, politcally, not economically driven, and ever changing government administrations, committees and personnel.  Whew! Who could live with a business partner like that? 

Wow!  for a minute there I thought you were talking about healthcare reform. 

Excellent points, and a good read.

[Dog Walker]

Stephen,  Thanks for the correction on Jane Jacobs name.  Had a senior moment there.

Avondale, San Marco, Five Points, Murry Hill, Miramar are all areas without a central planning agency like the Downtown Development Authority and they have all done much better about redeveloping than downtown.  Small businesses move in and out.  Some succeed and stay others get too big and move out, still others fail for one reason or another and create a vacant spot for someone else to try and succeed.

Central planning of the economy didn't work for the Soviets and it won't work for downtown either.