It feels like we’ve been here before, but this time, downtown Memphis has to make the most of it.
Despite decades of concerted attention and hundreds of millions of dollars in investments and waived taxes for downtown, vibrancy too often remains event-driven or isolated to Beale Street while much of Main Street is moribund and the riverfront continues to lack vitality.
We’ve all heard the hyperboles that get thrown around about downtown but the truth is that it lags when compared to the downtowns of comparable cities. The Clinton boom years that turned around so many downtowns passed us by, and so today, we often seem to be chasing ideas that other cities executed years ago.
We know that we’ve been here before. Peabody Place was to be the major brick in the rebuilding of downtown. AutoZone Park was going to be the thing that set downtown into high gear. FedExForum was the investment that was to transform downtown. Beale Street Landing was to be the domino that pushed other projects ahead. South Main’s revival was to become a virus that ran upstream and improved Main Street even to the largely desolate blocks at night between Poplar and Monroe.
And yet, we’re still hearing that downtown is making exciting progress, but just as often as not, we’re fighting to keep a building open, whether it’s One Commerce Square or Autozone Park, or fighting to ignore others like the Sterick Building, 100 North Main Building, and the old Police headquarters at 128 Adams that are cenotaphs to a downtown that no longer exists.
It’s About Places, Not Projects
While there are indeed important projects and signs of progress, we have failed to create momentum because we continue to be focused on project-building instead of placemaking. As a result, projects are siloed and the two drivers for successful downtowns – programming and connectivity – are routinely left unaddressed, leaving vast areas between projects that are devoid of energy and contribute to the feeling that downtown is disjointed and fragmented.
More than anything, downtown lacks the connective tissue that leads residents – and visitors – to explore and enjoy downtown. For example, imagine you’re a visitor standing at Beale Street Landing. There are no visual markers – much less wayfinding – that suggest where you should go next. There’s not something visibly obvious that is compelling enough that it pulls you toward the next interesting place and to the next and the next.
More than anything, this is why we can’t fail to capitalize on the Bass Pro effect. Already, the building is attracting glowing national media coverage, but more to the point, it is on track to attract more than two times the original projections. In the first two months since the building opened, there have been one million customers, which means that even if the crowds drop dramatically, it is within the realm of possibilities that it might attract five million people to downtown, or the same number that go to Beale Street (although Bass Pro Shops counts visitors while the Beale Street estimates come from tourism officials).
But just think of it, what does it mean to downtown to have two anchors – one in south downtown at Beale Street and another in north downtown at Bass Pro Shops – that are attracting 10 million people? How do we make the most of this and in ways that benefit downtown?
Creating Big City Parks
As for the Bass Pro effect, the opportunity for us is to find ways to entice millions of out-of-town visitors (the parking lot is a great place to play license plate bingo) to walk along the riverfront and up to Main Street.
In this regard, the shutdown of the trolleys could not have come at a worse time for downtown. At the exact moment when we could have coaxed, tempted, or cajoled hundreds of thousands of people at The Pyramid to hop on trolleys at the stop there and circulate through downtown and the riverfront, we lost that opportunity.
Imagine a customer to Bass Pro Shops. Standing outside the main entrance, there is little to pull in along the riverfront: Mississippi River Park (formerly Jefferson Davis Park) has nothing to attract residents, much less visitors, and looking from the Tennessee Visitors Center at the foot of Bass Pro Drive, there’s nothing to pull anyone up to Memphis Park (formerly Confederate Park) which continues to be home to a hodge podge of Confederate curios.
Then again, the general condition of the parks and the lackadaisical attention to having a value-added feature in each of them don’t inspire even the students at University of Memphis Law School to walk across the charming bridge that connects the school with the park to its north. One deterrent might be that there’s no Wi-Fi in the park although that should be a basic feature in all of downtown but starting with the parks would be a good beginning point.
Maximizing Every Opportunity
Next door to the law school, City of Memphis failed to pursue the potential of Memphis Art Park at the Cossitt Library, which would have been a major inducement to activate a key location and pull people along the riverfront to enjoy distinctive experiences in Memphis.
The riverfront parks are the responsibility of the Riverfront Development Corporation, and it’s not shown an inclination to imagine how these parks could be turned into something we would all be proud of. In addition, there are signs in the declining care of medians and landscaping that the RDC may be coping with budgetary pressures of its own. As a result, it seems a good time for City of Memphis to assume responsibility for considering what it would take for the parks should be to become attractors for downtown.
Come to think of it, in a recent meeting in City Hall to discuss the future of the Pinch District and the riverfront, it was said that a number of national developers are interested in investing in Memphis as a result of Bass Pro Shops, and that’s another opportunity that has to be optimized.
It’s Not Either-Or, It’s And
We understand the frustration of the Bus Riders Union in advocating for much-needed improvements in the customer experience on MATA’s buses. After all, for more decades than we can remember, MATA treated its customers as people who had no other choices but public transit – and it’s hard to imagine that the same level of service would have been delivered if the customers had been middle class.
We have often lamented over the years that the trolleys were postcard material but had little resemblance to a real transportation system, but now, because of Bass Pro Shops, MATA should resist an “either-or” approach when it comes to trolleys and buses. The answer is “and,” because the trolleys now have the potential to be a stimulus for economic development if it can successfully get Bass Pro Shops customers on board and entice them to visit downtown and the riverfront.
That said, most of the complaints of the Bus Riders Union deserve attention, particularly overcrowding, lack of air conditioning, and replacement of aging buses. We can appreciate, if not share, their lack of enthusiasm for the purchase of eight rubber-wheeled, trolley-like buses for $1.8 million. Until we move from trolley-like to trolleys again, it’s all stop gap and a band-aid which means there is no way to get usage back up to 125,000 people a month (it’s down to 35,000 a month now with the green buses).
Taking a 20-20 Look At Downtown
Speaking of luring people along the riverfront, the RDC has announced that it’s moving along with the $6 million restoration of the 150-year-old cobblestone (it cost $83,333 when it was built, equivalent to $2.4 million today) which was originally built with limestone quarried in Hardin County, Illinois, near the tiny port town of Cave-In-Rock.
Hopefully, the project will now move with all deliberate speed, and the RDC said it may be complete by next year. It’s been way too long in getting under way and the Great Memphis Landing today is visually disruptive to the riverfront and largely an eyesore. The project, according to the RDC, will have an overlook, historical markers, an easier-to-navigate sidewalk, and possibly a small boat ramp.
Unfortunately, at this point, it sounds like the project is seen largely as a historic project, and that perspective needs to be broadened. For example, the Landing should be activated, in keeping with the recommendations of author and urban planner Jeff Speck as a site for temporary sculpture exhibits, street fairs, markets, and anything else that brings street life to the edge. Along the way, it can find some innovative, interactive ways to use the restoration to shine a light into the early history of Memphis.
In other words, back to our main point, everything that is done in downtown these days should be seen through the lens of creating lures that encourage people to walk along the riverfront, to experience Memphis more fully, and to stay just a little longer.
Speaking of “lures” it seems that a small “Bass Pro” pond/lake in close proximity to Bass Pro would be a great place for new tackle demonstrations or teaching proper fishing technique (casting, catchNrelease technique, fish handling etc..). Customers could try out their newly acquired lures.
With a megastore like Basspro it’s ironic that fishing is currently not allowed in any of the City of Memphis lakes (Sec 23-74). I like John Branston’s idea of holding casting competitions in the “gulf of Mexico” on Mud Island. Shelby Farms is the nearest public facility for fishing. How about a Bass Pro sponsored lake at the Fairgrounds?
The above post clearly indicates that the citizens of Memphis have many brilliant ideas for place making downtown. I’m still recovering from my shock at the reprehensibly low quality of the Memphis mayoral candidates. It’s hard to foresee a vibrant downtown when we seem to attract leaders that are particularly devoid of vibrancy or forward thinking; however, there is always hope.
You make excellent points about downtown, the trolleys, the parks, the riverfront, visual markers, connectivity, and the cenotaphs. (I admit I had to look this up.)
I don’t exactly understand the appeal of the “Poplar Corridor” office buildings that have absolutely no connection. When I’m downtown and walk down the main street mall I sense a connectivity among professionals who work there, like they bump into each other during lunch hour or to and from a meeting and advance their thinking about business and thus, economic development.
We ought to be able to get those cenotaphs filled up again.
What about a full-service, always clean and safe, multi-use parking garage with valet service on the trolley line with strict 6 minute headways to get a ride? This would be better than going to the Poplar Corridor offices.
Tom, I mostly agree with your observations. I think our shortcomings are rather obvious even if their solutions are not. As you know, solving problems is much harder than identifying them. Unfortunately our downtown has some challenges that most downtowns don’t suffer including being in the poorest large metro area in the nation, being on the edge of the city instead of the population center, and being spread out along the river making our downtown much larger than most American downtowns and diluting its vibrancy.
But to say we’ve failed to create momentum seems too dour. There’s about half a billion dollars in new investment underway in the South Main District alone and it’s spreading to the South End all the way to Crump; we can’t seem to build residential units fast enough to meet the demand to live Downtown; the number of people visiting Downtown continues to increase dramatically with increasing numbers of restaurants, museums, shops, events, etc.; historic buildings like the James Lee House, Chisca, Tennessee Brewery, and Toof on Madison have been saved and redeveloped; One Beale promises two new skyline altering towers with a 4-start hotel; Central Station promises a new hotel and movie theatre to complement the growing Memphis Farmer’s Market; Beale Street is fully leased and making money for the City of Memphis for the first time; the Main to Main project is fixing up our public infrastructure along Main Street and connecting us to West Memphis and a growing network of bike trails.
And to distinguish between projects and placemaking overlooks the large overlap between them. For instance, the Chisca redevelopment project will remove an entire city block of blight and better connect the South Main District to the Core of Downtown. In other words, projects are a big component of placemaking. And to say we don’t focus on placemaking also overlooks the South Main public art installations, the bocce ball court, the Barking Lot and food truck pad, the game tables in Court Square, the annual Downtown Alive series of concerts and programming, Holiday events and lighting programs, and so many other new activities and venues people are enjoying everyday and night in Downtown Memphis.
So, cheer up. And let’s continue the momentum to make Downtown Memphis better.
Paul:
We’ve written often lately about the new energy and momentum in Memphis, so we think we’re more than cheery. That doesn’t mean we should be less than realistic though. I think that we too often hypnotize ourselves with our own hyperbole, and we need to challenge ourselves to do much, much better. We continue to lag behind other cities and we still seem to lack an overall leap frog strategy that gets us from where we are to where we need to be. As for the “connective tissue” of the parks and connectivity, it seems that much of it requires more vision by the RDC and a realization that incrementalism is not getting us where we need to get.
That said, hold on to your comments. There’s a post about you coming on Monday.
Everything is so damn disconnected. So what is THE idea to make the most of Bass Pro? Is Kevin Kane and his tourism folks doing anything? The state of the riverfront doesn’t do anything to keep them here either, but we can’t depend on RDC to figure this out.
Some people act like none of us travel and have seen a downtown that works. I’m tired of excuses like we’re too poor or we’re too black or this or that. For every excuse, there’s a downtown doing great in spite of problems just like ours. Downtown is just like Memphis. No one has a vision of what we should be so we just take whatever we can get and act like it’s worth celebreating.
This is a good summary about how our downtown has been just one failure after another. It’s a long simmering mess. Kevin Kane, along with Wharton, Lipscomb and countless others are true poster boys of failure. We desperately need new leadership across Memphis. This city continues to fall massively behind its peers. I am not optimistic the tide can be turned.
Go to the Memphis Biz Journal and all we have is speculation about a Trader Joes and a Cheesecake Factory chain restaurant in Germantown. Then flip over to the Nashville Biz Journal and you see a report titled “Crane Watch” with an interactive map of hundreds of new developments under construction all across a booming Nashville. This puts it in perspective and makes me very depressed seeing how much Memphis is declining.
Nashville Business Journal’s Crane Watch is inspiring; I do enjoy seeing that their developments are clustering in midtown/downtown, allowing that oft-discussed vitality to develop. Seattle has a similar Development and Construction Projects Map. Does the trickle down theory work geographically, as in trickling westward from Nashville; I hope.
And I agree with Finegold; the Poplar Corridor is immensely uninspiring, pocked by a multitude of curbs cuts, uncoordinated buildings, surface parking lots, poor connectivity, and overhead utilities. If we could somehow redo the past and fit all of the businesses from the 5 linear miles of the Poplar Corridor in East Memphis into a 0.5 square mile high-density area, we’d probably have something compelling.
What happened to Frank Ricks proposal for a “zipper zone” down the Poplar Corridor using a form-based code overlay zoning district? It’s these brilliant ideas which should be put into ACTION.
Interesting piece Tom. We can’t even get our great riverfront area developed in any meaningful way and then I read where Nashville has opened a large outdoor ampitheatre and new downtown riverfront park where a great roster of big name music acts run by Live Nation performing through much of the year. Mud Island is empty and the Beale St landing is only still a pipe dream. Memphis has always failed to take advantage of Old Man River. Even the Bass Pro Shops is virtually isolated from the rest of downtown.
I’m sorry to keep saying this but RDC has to go. Absolutely no imagination for our riverfront. No innovation, No action. Start by getting the Mayor, his/her staff, and the City Council member off the RDC Board of Directors. We need to have arms length dealings with any contractor with the City, unless RDC is a City agency and then the Board should be appointed by the Mayor and approved by the City Council.
Look folks, the staff and Board of RDC may be first rate?, but we haven’t seen anything positive yet. They were supposed to be self-sufficient a few years ago, but we still subsidize them, more than some City Divisions. A number of years ago Bill Morris told Agricenter that the County was going to stop subsidizing its operation and the staff/board got their act together. That’s leadership.
One way to help unify downtown, especially at night, would be Historic lighting throughout the downtown core, with the poles closer together for better security. This would help pedestrian flow in some areas and give a more overall pleasing look to downtown. Front street from MLK to GE Patterson would be a good place to start.